BEN D. WELCH — Opening Keynote Speaker
Executive Director of Halliburton Programs & Clinical Professor Emeritus | Department of Management
Ben D. Welch serves as Executive Director of Halliburton Programs for the Center for Executive Development (CED) and Clinical Professor Emeritus for the Department of Management in the Mays Business School at Texas A&M University. Ben also served as Assistant Dean for Executive Education for the CED for many years. The CED is a top quality designer and provider of creative and innovative executive education and management programs.
Ben received his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of Dayton, his Master of Science in Human Resource Management from Houston Baptist University, and his Ph.D. in Educational Curriculum & Instruction from Texas A&M University.
He joined the Texas A&M University Center for Teaching Excellence in 1988 and served as their Associate Director before assuming his faculty appointment with the Department of Management, which he has held since 1990. He served as the Undergraduate Administrative Coordinator for the Department of Management from 1990-1994. In 1994, he assumed the Directorship of the Mays College of Business Honors & Fellows Programs, which are the top two premier undergraduate programs within the College. He served in this capacity until 1998 when he joined the Division of Student Affairs as the Director of Student Activities for Texas A&M University. In this role he provided leadership to a progressive department that was responsible for over 750 recognized student organizations, the Student Organization Finance Center, Vocal Music, and Student Government. Ben has made hundreds of presentations to groups at Texas A&M University and has represented A&M as Muster Speaker in Baytown, East Tennessee, Texas A&M University at Galveston, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Chicago, Houston, Oklahoma City, Brenham, Brazos County A&M Club and New York.
Ross Ramsey is executive editor and co-founder of The Texas Tribune. Before joining the Tribune, Ross was editor and co-owner of Texas Weekly for 15 years. He did a 28-month stint in government as associate deputy comptroller for policy and director of communications with the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. Before that, he reported for the Houston Chronicle from its Austin bureau and for the Dallas Times Herald, first on the business desk in Dallas and later as its Austin bureau chief, and worked as a Dallas-based freelance business writer, writing for regional and national magazines and newspapers. Ross got his start in journalism in broadcasting, covering news for radio stations in Denton and Dallas.
