Steinberg Receives Rising Star Award

(L-R) Nadine Francis West, vice president, MetroHartford Alliance; Marilyn Risi, executive director, Upper Albany Main Street; Margery Steinberg (holding her Rising Star Award); and Oz Griebel, president, MetroHartford Alliance.

Margery Steinberg, associate professor emerita of marketing, Barney School of Business, received the Rising Star Award on June 9 at the Breakfast of Champions as part of the Connecticut Business Expo.

The award was given by the MetroHartford Alliance for Steinberg's noteworthy work in the Upper Albany community. The inscription on the award reads: "Rising Star Award to Dr. Margery Steinberg in recognition of your role as founder of the Micro Business Incubator and your exemplary contribution to the Upper Albany Neighborhood."

In accepting the award, Steinberg said that the idea for the Micro Business Incubator grew out of a conversation she had about 10 years ago with University President Walter Harrison, in which he challenged her to identify ways that the University could further its mission of being "a private university with a public purpose."  Steinberg met with business owners and residents of the Upper Albany community to learn how the University could be helpful to them.

"An apparent need emerged: the neighborhood small businesses needed help in upgrading their skills and learning how to better serve their customers," Steinberg said in her acceptance speech. "And, I also realized that University of Hartford students actually share similar needs – they want to learn about business and how to apply what they have learned in their courses in a real world setting. The mutual benefits were apparent. Thus the MBI was born."