Laura Starks

Laura T. Starks, Charles E. and Sarah M. Seay Regents Chair in Finance and co-Executive Director of Social Innovation@McCombs.

She teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on environmental, social and governance investing, global financial strategies, and other finance topics. She has previously served as interim Dean, Associate Dean for Research, Chairman of the Department of Finance and Graduate Advisor. She was also an editor of the Review of Financial Studies from 2008-2014 and has won a number of research and teaching awards in her career.

Her current research focuses on mutual funds, corporate governance institutional investors and environmental, social and governance investing.

She has served on the Boards of Directors of the four national academic finance organizations: the American Finance Association, the Financial Management Association (FMA), the Society of Financial Studies (SFS) and the Western Finance Association (WFA).

She is past president of the FMA and WFA and is currently President of the SFS. She is a past Chairman of the Graduate Assembly for the University of Texas at Austin, the elected faculty council that governs the University’s graduate programs, and served on the Executive Committee of the University Faculty Council. She is an independent director for CREF Retirement Accounts and TIAA-CREF Mutual Funds, serves on the Investment Advisory Committee for the Employees Retirement System of Texas, the Board of Governors of the Investment Company Institute, and the Governing Council of the Independent Directors Council.

She has also served on the 2013 Strategy Council and the 2014 Expert Panel for the Norwegian Government Pension Fund (the largest sovereign wealth fund in the world).