Dr. Tom Smith of the HopeCollege management faculty has received the 10th annual "Favorite Faculty/Staff Member" award presented by the student body.

                        Smith received the award on Saturday, Oct. 15, during halftime of the college's Homecoming football game at Holland Municipal Stadium.

                        Recipients of the "Favorite Faculty/Staff Member" award are chosen through a vote open to the entire student body and conducted at the same time as elections for the Homecoming court and king and queen.  The students are not provided with a list of candidates for the award, but rather are asked to write in the name of the person that they feel should be honored.  The award was first presented in 1996.

                        Smith, an associate professor of management, has been a member of the Hope faculty since 1993.  During the current semester he is teaching two sections of the department's introductory course Management Decisions as well as the upper-level course Readings in Operations Management.  From 2001 through the spring of 2005 he also served as coach of the women's golf team.

His research interests include the strategic use of operations management, and the incorporation of biblical principles in management theory and practice.  He has had articles in publications including the "Journal of Operations Management," the "Journal of Production Research," the "Journal of Biblical Integration in Business," "Christian Higher Education" and the "Sporting News."

For the past few years he has also been working with Herman Miller Inc., primarily facilitating workshops for their Leadership Development Program.

Smith completed his Bachelor of Business Administration degree at the University of Michigan in 1980, his Master of Business Administration degree at the University of Iowa in 1983 and his doctorate in business administration at the University of Michigan in 1994.  Prior to joining the Hope faculty he had held a variety of management positions with Data General Corporation and had served as an internal manufacturing consultant with both EDS Corporation and the Ford Motor Company.

He joined the Hope faculty as an assistant professor and was promoted to associate professor in 1999.

Smith and his wife Cheryl, who is employed by the college's health clinic, have two daughters, Corrie, who is a senior at Hope, and Erin, who is a high school senior.