Chairman's Award
2008 Recipient
Robert Tosterud
Robert Tosterud is currently the Freeman Chair of Entrepreneurial Studies and a professor of economics at the University of South Dakota. He served as the director of UGPTI for six years during the 1970's. Under his leadership and direction, the institute diversified its activities and began to garner national attention. His entrepreneurial skill laid the foundation for the Institute's current research program.
Tosterud is the founder of the National Council of Entrepreneurship Chairs, a director of the international Institute for Entrepreneurship Development and former chair of the Nontraditional Academics Committee and the Distinguished Chairs Committee of the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Before coming to the institute Tosterud received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in business economics from NDSU and his Ph.D. in Agricultural Economics from the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg.
Before moving to South Dakota in 1991, he was the economics program officer for the Ford Foundation in New York City. Before that, he served for seven years as senior economics and staff director of the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress and for four years in various positions at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Tosterud also founded the Community and Family Enterprise small town development program, the University of South Dakota-Sitting Bull Tribal College Entrepreneurship Partnership, and the South Dakota Family Business Initiative. Students have also recognized his gifts for entrepreneurship and teaching. He was selected by the University of South Dakota Student Association as "Teacher of the Year" in 1993 and 2000. In addition to his academic and research work he has started four businesses.
