Credit Essentials Course Now Available at TAMUCC
Bank’s Chief Credit Officer instrumental in helping to bring Credit Essentials course to Texas A&M University Corpus Christi.
Bringing a Risk Management Association (RMA) Credit Essentials course to Texas A&M University Corpus Christi (TAMUCC) was born a little over a year ago and was the brainchild of Kleberg Bank’s Chief Credit Officer, David Stewart. In his role as the organization’s Texas treasurer, David invited representatives from Texas A&M University Kingsville (TAMUK) and Texas A&M University Corpus Christi (TAMUCC) to participate in an RMA event hosted in Corpus Christi in the winter of 2022. That event attracted a wide audience, including bankers from the Corpus Christi area and across the state, including Dallas, Houston, Austin, El Paso, and San Antonio. That meeting was a rare opportunity for bank professionals, the risk management organization, and local universities to discuss how they could come together to help college graduates enter work in the credit risk management field better prepared.
Over the next months, David promoted awareness of RMA’s value with TAMUCC’s business school dean, chair of the finance department, and other faculty and arranged a meeting with leadership of the educational institution lead for RMA. This resulted in TAMUCC, including their finance faculty, securing RMA educational institution membership, which includes access to the curriculum for the Credit Essentials course. The university added the course to their catalog, with a university professor providing instruction, and the class commenced this spring semester.
Banking industry professionals from Kleberg and other local banks are directly involved throughout the semester, providing real world examples to supplement the Credit Essentials course curriculum. The involvement of local banks of varying size provides students with a well-rounded perspective of real-world credit topics and maximizes the potential of their placement in commercial banking careers, primarily as credit analysts.
Students who have taken the Credit Essentials course are attractive candidates for credit analysts roles, as it puts them an estimated three to six months ahead of other new hires that have not had the benefit of taking the course.
For more information about the Risk Management association visit: Home - Texas Chapter (rmahq.org)