Currie gift to attract business faculty recruits

Peter and Lisa Currie of Houston have always cared deeply about the impact of business education and the dual practices of teaching and research. That’s why they established the first $3 million faculty chair at Mays Business School.

The Curries’ gift creates the Lisa Huddleston Currie ’85 and Peter H. Currie ’85 Chair in Business and helps fund faculty recruitment efforts at Mays.

An appointment to an endowed chair is one of the highest honors that can be bestowed on a faculty member. The highest level of performance in research, teaching and service, based on national and international standards, is required for such an appointment.

Gift agreements with donors may specify the criteria for a position; however, in the absence of such specification research and publication will be given primary consideration.

Peter Currie received a bachelor’s degree in 1985 from the Department of Management at the business school. Lisa Currie received a degree in 1985 in educational curriculum and instruction.

Mays Dean Eli Jones said their gift will help the school boost its efforts to continue offering high-impact research, teaching and learning. “The Curries are wonderful partners in our efforts to continue building Mays by attracting the highest-quality faculty members we can,” he said.

Mays is nationally ranked among public business schools for the quality of its undergraduate and MBA programs and the faculty scholarship of its 120 tenure-track professors in five departments.

Currie said he worked with leaders at Mays to determine the best way to contribute to its mission of advancing the world’s prosperity. “With our gift, we hope we can attract one more strong candidate professor who lives by the same creed that we all live by as Texas A&M graduates,” he said.

Currie currently serves as CEO of Posse Resources, a privately held oil and gas partnership, as well as president of Traditions Club and the surrounding Atlas development in Bryan/College Station. He also serves as a director of Green Bank and Municipal Energy Resources Corporation. He recently sold his interest in CIMA ENERGY LLC, an Aggie 100 company for the past several years. He also serves on the Dean’s Advisory Board for Mays.

His wife Lisa, a former 400-meter track record holder and Texas A&M track team member, taught seventh-grade Texas history and coached middle school track, basketball and volleyball before turning her attention full-time to raising the couple’s three children, who are now Mays Business School graduates: Mitchell Currie ’10, Jordan Currie Bredthauer ’11, and Joshua A. Hood ’11. Lisa has chaired committees for and been involved with numerous nonprofit organizations, youth athletics and school booster clubs.

Peter and Lisa also enjoy being entertained by their grandson’s Grayson Currie Bredthauer, Logan Paul Bredthauer and William Wyatt Currie – who they feel certain will someday be Mays graduates.