Excellence in Ag Finance, Undergraduate Certificate

The Excellence in Ag Finance (EIAF) undergraduate certificate program is a selective program that prepares students for a career in the diverse area of agricultural finance. The banking, real estate, insurance, commercial finance, and commodity markets fields are critically short of highly qualified graduates. The EIAF program is designed to identify and match excellent students with an interest in finance and risk management with career opportunities through high-quality educational and experiential learning opportunities. This is a competitive process based on student performance in courses, a statement of interest, and interviews with the EIAF advisory/faculty panel. If selected, to complete the certificate program, students must:

• Complete a short 2-3 week shadowing exercise with an external partner during the summer after they have been selected. Successful completion of that experience and a positive rating from the external partner is required to continue in that program. 
• Complete an internship with an external partner in the general field of agricultural finance: banking, real estate, insurance, commodity trading, etc., during the summer of a subsequent year of their program. This is a formal internship process whereby the student is expected to engage in the learning opportunity and define, in conjunction with the host firm, a project or professional experience. Students must submit a report based on that project to a faculty committee that will assess student performance with additional feedback from the host firm.
• Complete a set of required online short modules to ensure that students have the necessary background in basic agricultural issues. 

Each student who completes the above requirements will register for an AAEC 4301  course during their final semester to receive a grade for the content learned in the above based on the assessments for each activity. This course will count for one of the required electives in their degree program. Admission to this course and a grade will be only for students who complete these requirements and the courses below to receive their certificate.

In addition, students are required to complete with a grade of C or better:

• AGSC 2301  — Agribusiness Data Analysis and Modeling with Spreadsheets
• AAEC 3302  — Agribusiness Finance
• AAEC 3316  — Applied Risk Analysis and Management
• AAEC 4316  — Agricultural Finance Analysis
• AAEC 4317  — Commodity Futures Trading and Analysis

Students participating in the Excellence in Ag Finance certificate program also have the option to complete either/and the Excellence in Banking and Commercial Real Estate certificate programs (this option is currently only available to Agribusiness and Dual Degree students). Agricultural and Applied Economics students are eligible to complete the Excellence in Ag Finance certificate but are not eligible to complete the other certificate programs in the Rawls College of Business.