In September 2004, the School of Business at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs and D.A. Davidson put together a program called the Student Investment Program which allows students to invest $50,000 in a working stock portfolio. The purpose of this program is to bolster student learning outside the classroom in a real-world setting. The original $50,000 remains intact year to year, supported by D.A. Davidson. Any returns above five percent are split in half and shared by the firm and the UCCS Student Investment Fund. D.A. Davidson guarantees students against any losses below the original $50,000 mark, which will be replenished year to year if necessary. Since September 2004, D.A. Davidson has given over $1900.00 directly to the University in shared profit.

The first class, 2004-2005 consisted of 12 students and successfully selected strategies that allowed the fund to outperform both the DJIA as well as the S&P 500. The return for the first year was 12.9%. This class is on a restricted enrollment, and students wishing to take it must apply for acceptance. The class is a year round class which meets once a week to track the fund and to research potential investments. Each year, students in the fund are required to research and analyze a company of their choice in the first semester, present this company to the class and write a paper on it.

For the 2005-2006 class, there was some question as to the program being offered the second year. This was due to a loss of several professors and realigning the classes that were taught. In the end, the class was offered but had a very late start. Only 5 students qualified for the class. This was a difficult year for the market in which the DJIA lost 11.4%, and the class lost 9.78%. Not the best showing, but still outperformed the DJIA and was a little behind the S&P 500.

The third year class, 2006-2007 is in progress now. There are 7 students involved and we have designed this web page and will continue to use technology to get the word out on the class. To date- 9/21/2006 the portfolio is up $1,230 dollars, or up 2.46% for the first month of operations. Please look at the bio’s on the students to see that were all different types applying different sets of investment objectives.