Whitman Welcomes Four New Faculty in 2024-25 Academic Year
Adam Fumarola
Professor of Real Estate Practice
Adam Fumarola has previously worked as an adjunct instructor at Whitman and the Syracuse University College of Law. In the Department of Finance, he is teaching Real Estate Principles and in charge of the James D. Kuhn Real Estate Center, while also running Hanover Real Estate Development, which he founded in 2021. Prior to that, Fumarola worked for the University as senior associate vice president, real estate services and asset management, and was senior director of real estate development at Raymour & Flanigan Furniture and Mattresses, assistant counsel at American Financial Realty Trust and an attorney at K&L Gates. Fumarola has a bachelor’s degree in environmental public policy and environmental science from Binghamton University and a law degree from the University of Buffalo School of Law.
Ye Liu
Assistant Professor of Supply Chain Management
While pursuing a Ph.D., Ye Liu co-published research on an unusual topic: hog farming—solving some of the operational issues using foundations of supply chain management. She will continue this research at Whitman, as well as other interests related to AI, risk management, commodity markets and supply chain finance with analytical and data-driven methodologies, such as stochastic optimization, machine learning and deep reinforcement learning. Liu says one of the reasons she was drawn to Whitman was because of the number of women on the faculty who lead research, something she intends to do herself. Liu has a Ph.D. in supply chain, operations and technology from Washington University in St. Louis and holds a bachelor’s degree in supply chain management from Central University of Finance and Economics in Beijing.
Paul Momtaz
Visiting Associate Professor in Entrepreneurship
Paul Momtaz is also head of the Certificate of Advanced Studies in Sustainable Enterprise (CASSE) program for graduate students. His research centers on entrepreneurial finance with a focus on sustainability and digital technologies. Momtaz holds the DSS Endowed Professorship at Technical University of Munich School of Management in Germany and was a visiting professor at The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania; and held the Endowed Chair of Private Equity at the House of Finance in Germany. He has been published in a number of journals and serves as editor at Small Business Economics. Momtaz has a Ph.D. in finance from UCLA and another Ph.D. and a habilitation in economics from the University of Hamburg, Germany, as well as an M. Phil. from Cambridge University in the U.K.
Steven Savino
Assistant Teaching Professor in Marketing
A non-tenure track assistant teaching professor, Steven Savino is teaching Principles of Marketing and Essentials of Marketing. After a 20-year career as a senior executive and marketing consultant working on brands across a variety of industries—including wine and spirits, consumer packaged goods and food, residential real estate and the entertainment industry--Savino made a career change into academia. Prior to joining Whitman, he was a professor of practice and assistant dean for graduate business programs at Lehigh University for 15 years. Savino has a bachelor’s degree in economics from Villanova University and an MBA from Wake Forest University. He and his wife are pleased to relocate to Central New York to be closer to their daughter and grandchildren.