Serkan Sener was recently awarded the Kent Monroe scholarship. Serkan expects to receive his MBA degree in 2006 with a concentration in General Management and Finance. Originally from Turkey, Serkan received his undergraduate degree in business from Bilkent University where he had a full academic scholarship, owing to his 79th rank out of 1.5 million students on the National University Exam in Turkey.

Before coming to Illinois to pursue an MBA, Serkan worked for 5 years as a Tax Consultant/Auditor for PricewaterhouseCoopers in Istanbul, Turkey. While at PricewaterhouseCoopers, he helped multinational clients from a wide array of industries establish tax planning structures. He also specialized in financial corporations and engaged in due diligence and valuation projects. After being promoted to an assistant manager position, Serkan decided to broaden his finance skills and further develop his general management perspective with an MBA degree.

Thanks to the acclaimed faculty who provide an exceptional learning environment and the numerous resources provided by the Illinois MBA, Serkan is confident that he made the right decision. He believes that interacting with top quality students from different backgrounds and sharing experiences with them will be a catalyst for his career advancement and will also create a network of friends all around the world.

In addition to his involvement with the Center for Entrepreneurial Development (CED) and the Illinois MBA Admissions Committee, Serkan also serves as the vice president of the Graduate Finance Association and as part of the Illinois Business Consulting (IBC) leadership team. During the summer Serkan found excellent opportunities to apply what he has learned in class through exclusive projects offered by IBC. In one project he worked with a management consultancy firm to develop a tool to analyze the consultancy needs in different industries and companies, whereas in another project he developed several efficiency metrics to analyze the strategic direction of a leading insurance firm and its competitors.