Ting Zhang, associate professor of economics in The University of Baltimore's Merrick School of Business and associate director of the University's Jacob France Institute, has been awarded a fellowship in Entrepreneurship Policy from the Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management (APPAM). The fellowship is supported by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and will explore relationship between public policy and entrepreneurship.
Prof. Zhang was one of the four professors who were chosen for the inaugural cohort of APPAM faculty fellows. There were also five doctoral candidates who were named as student fellows. She will contribute the creation of curriculum for the student fellowship recipients. The curriculum development will delve into topics such as the impact of public policies on the business environment, how economics and program structures and frameworks should take the entrepreneurial perspective into account, and what the future holds for the role of business in public policy.
Zhang is a sought-after speaker on the topic of aging and entrepreneurship and is the author of the articles "Elderly Entrepreneurship in an Aging Economy: It's Never Too Late," and "Entrepreneurship and Economic Growth in China." She also has amassed more than 40 funded grants and sponsored research projects totaling nearly $9 million in support during her university tenure, with more than $7 million of that total coming from projects in which she served as primary investigator or co-primary investigator.
"I feel really lucky to be selected, knowing how much more achieved the other fellow faculty members are," Prof. Zhang said about the APPAM recognition. "I hope to be able to add some value to the curriculum on age and entrepreneurship, as well as social entrepreneurship, and I look forward to learning further from experts in the area of entrepreneurship and public policy."
"We are so proud of Dr. Zhang," said Merrick Dean Murray Dalziel. "She exemplifies what we believe the Merrick School of Business stands for: outstanding research that has immediate impact on students and deep implications and applications for our community and society at large."
Zhang's research interests include entrepreneurship and aging, workforce development, education and labor, welfare-to-work, business and employment dynamics, and the regional economy. In 2015, she won a prestigious research grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to conduct research on Baby Boomer-era entrepreneurship. Her recent work includes research in health and later life entrepreneurship, housing variability and regional economy, skill-gap and mismatch, location impact on welfare-to-work propensity, profiling Maryland employment and business dynamics, examining recession impacts, tracking worker placement, exploring geographic dynamics of Maryland economy and its impact on public policy, diagnosing data quality using administrative records, and conducting researches using linked longitudinal administrative records.
Prof. Zhang earned her Ph.D. from George Mason University. She teaches in the UBalt MBA program.