To William Franklin, the idea of change, which was the theme of President Barack Obama’s campaign, took on even greater meaning as he watched the presidential inauguration from the National Mall. The South Los Angeles native met several attendees who had previously been in Washington D.C. on another historic occasion: the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. The director of the Educational Opportunity Program (EOP) and TRIO programs at California State University, Dominguez Hills, Franklin has the chance to witness change everyday in the students he and his staff help.

Franklin Strier had his article “Rating the Raters: Conflicts of Interest in the Credit Rating Firms,” published in the Dec. 2008 issue of Business and Society Review. In it, the professor of business law at California State University, Dominguez Hills examines one of the key causes of the sub-prime mortgage crisis and related solutions.