Dr. August Ralston, interim chair of both the Department of Finance and the Department of Accounting, is involved in international projects that may ultimately help Russian and Eastern European economies to improve.

Ralston, who has been at Iowa State since 1982, has directed projects at the State Agricultural Academy in Nizhni Novgorod, Russia. ISU has a faculty exchange program with the Academy’s Continuing Education Center. Seminars and consulting services are offered there to allow an exchange of information between Russian and American faculty.

“It’s really quite interesting because, in the past under the Communist system, the [Russian] universities essentially knew exactly what they should teach, because they knew where their graduates were going to go,” Ralston said. “Graduates were placed within the planned economy system. So now there is a need for substantial changes in curriculum and also in teaching methods.”

Ralston became interested in information exchanges with Eastern Bloc countries when he was working in Vienna in the fall of 1989, when the Berlin Wall came down and many borders opened up in Europe. The current project with Russia is based on work conducted with universities in the Czech Republic and Slovakia from 1991 to 1994.

“After having worked in the Czech Republic and Slovakia and now Russia since 1991, you learn more about what the Communist system and the planned economy does,” Ralston said. “They have less of an understanding of how they can solve their own problems. It doesn’t mean that the way we approach things in the West is directly applicable to solving their problems, but I think some of our methodologies are.”

Ralston took over as interim chair of the Department of Finance and the Department of Accounting when Labh Hira, the previous chair, was named associate dean of the College of Business. Ralston’s appointment is for one year, effective July 1, 1996.

“I’ll be interested in maintaining and improving external relations, acquiring resources externally for the departments,” Ralston said. “There will be some curricular issues that will be looked at.”

Ralston intends to work closely with outside businesses and alumni for fund raising purposes. He has no plans to become the permanent chair of either department, and a search for a permanent chair will be conducted during the next academic year.

“I am pleased to serve the role as interim [chair], because I have over the years had a fair amount of administrative experience,” Ralston said. “I know the faculty in the two departments pretty well.”