Teaching
"A little while and I will be gone from among you, whither I cannot tell. From
nowhere we come, into nowhere we go. What is life? It is a flash of firefly in
the night. It is a breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow that
runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset." –Chief Crowfoot
I teach Introduction to Investments (FINAN3050) in the undergraduate program and Corporate Finance in the MBA (FINAN6020) and EMBA (FINAN6121) programs at the David Eccles School of Business. Previously, I taught Investment Theory in the undergraduate (FIN441), MBA (FIN532-1), and PMBA (FIN532-4) programs at Washington University in St. Louis and Corporate Finance (FIN408) in the undergraduate program at the University of North Carolina.
Office: SFEBB 7229
Office Hours: By appointment (please email me to arrange a time)
Other Course Documents and Information
Overview of my teaching
My job is to create and distribute knowledge for the betterment of society. Both teaching and research are important components of this. In the words of Will and Ariel Durant:
"Civilization is not inherited; it has to be learned and earned by each generation anew; if the transmission should be interrupted for one century, civilization would die, and we should be savages again…
Consider education not as the painful accumulation of facts and dates and reigns, nor merely the necessary preparation of the individual to earn his keep in the world, but as the transmission of our mental, moral, technical and aesthetic heritage as fully as possible to as many as possible, for the enlargement of man’s understanding, control, embellishment, and enjoyment of life..."
Past Course Evaluations
Selected Student comments:
An absolutely fabulous class. I was extremely skeptical and have little to no financial background. I am amazed at how much I learned even with the depth and challenge of the lectured material. The material was presented in way that even I could be successful in this course. Outstanding.
I learned things I can use in my real work and in my life. I felt like this was a real value-added course, loved Matt's lectures. Matt's passion about finance is contagious. He looks forward to finance like I look forward to Thanksgiving dinner.
MATT IS THE THUNDER GOD OF FINANCE. He quickly became my favorite professor in the program so far. He shared real-world expertise in a way that was both interesting and entertaining. This course was one of the key reasons I sought an EMBA, and it did not disappoint. THANK YOU, MATT!
Dr. Ringgenberg is my corporate finance spirit animal. His enthusiasm made something historically frustrating and opaque make sense and something I could get excited about. I also appreciated the attention to teaching us how to do things manually so that we aren't as reliant on Excel. One of the best professors I have ever had.