Real Money, Real Experience: Inside the Funds Enterprise

By Amy Carlson Gustafson

When Anna Love was an undergraduate student in Tennessee, studying public relations and psychology, finance wasn’t on her radar. Then, a last-minute internship at an insurance agency in her hometown of Omaha, Nebraska, changed everything. There, she met Ella Barnes, a dual-degree Minnesota Carlson JD-MBA student who had been part of the school’s David S. Kidwell Funds Enterprise.

“She said, ‘I love what I did in the Funds Enterprise, and they have a scholarship if you’re looking to pivot,’” Love recalls. “‘I think you are completely capable and would love the financial aspects of investing.’”

That conversation sent Love on a new path. She enrolled in finance courses her senior year in undergrad, landed a wealth management internship, and applied to Carlson’s Master of Science in Finance (MSF) program. She chose Carlson and the Funds Enterprise specifically because of Barnes’s influence. 

“It’s a unique experience that you don’t get everywhere,” says Love, who received the Financial Leaders of Tomorrow Scholarship provided by the Funds Enterprise.

Love, who plans to graduate from the MSF program in December, is one of dozens of students who gain hands-on investment management experience each year through the Funds Enterprise, where students manage two portfolios — the Carlson Growth Fund and the Fixed Income Fund — totaling $53 million. That figure makes it the second-largest student-managed investment fund nationwide, according to the 2025 Center for Investment Research Ranking.

Open to full-time and part-time MBA students, MSF candidates, and select undergraduate Finance majors, the Funds Enterprise differs from Carlson’s three other Enterprise programs (Consulting, Brand and Ventures), which operate on a semester-by-semester project cycle. In the Funds Enterprise, the work is continuous. Students manage money every day, tracking markets, analyzing companies and making real investment decisions on behalf of real partners that include Securian, Thrivent, Ameriprise, Federated Insurance, Piper Sandler, Wells Fargo and U.S. Bank. 

“It’s all theoretical until you get a student sitting down and realizing, ‘I just bought a million dollars worth of a stock and I did it like that,’” says Susanna Gibbons, Funds Enterprise director since 2014. “Being connected to the actual impact of the decisions they’re making is really meaningful.”

The Fixed Income Fund, which Gibbons calls essentially one of a kind among student-run programs nationally, is a particular point of pride. 

“There really is no comparable program in the world,” says Gibbons, who notes alumni have gone on to careers at partner companies.  

Real Trades, Real Pressure, Real Growth

Nicholas Argento, another MSF student, knows the feeling of a high-stakes moment. A former Gopher varsity pitcher, he sees a direct line between the mound and the trading desk.

“This morning I was executing a trade, and it was moving fast — boom, boom, boom,” he says. “And next thing, you’re like, ‘Oh my god, I just made a decision with a lot of money on the line.’ You almost have to take a deep breath and be like, ‘Cool, OK.’ And then you just keep going.”

Argento sees the ability to recover from mistakes as central to the experience. 

“Finance is an industry where you’ll get ridiculed for your failures,” he says. “Being in a learning environment where we can have the ability to fail is a game-changer. In the industry, you might not get that second opportunity.”

The learning environment doesn’t mean the work is soft. Gibbons, a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) who worked as a fixed income portfolio manager and credit specialist before coming to Carlson, says she doesn’t run the Funds Enterprise like a class. Instead, she runs it like a business, while introducing students to Socratic dialogue and pushing them to think like investigators rather than passive learners. 

“I’m trying to teach students how to ask good questions,” she says, “thinking about this as if they were investigative reporters more than analysts.”

That philosophy translates directly to careers. Argento recently accepted a position as an associate portfolio manager at Next Century Growth Investors, landing the job in part by pitching a stock in his interview that he’d been covering in the Funds Enterprise. Love, meanwhile, secured a summer internship at Bank of America in New York City as an enterprise credit intern, crediting the program’s real-world exposure for her confidence in interviews.

More Than a Class

Even students not headed into investment management see the value of the Funds Enterprise experience. Marie Johnson, an MBA student in her last semester, is joining Deloitte’s strategy consulting practice — but she actively pursued a spot in the Funds Enterprise because she believes that understanding capital markets makes women better leaders. 

“Research has shown that managing a business division with a P&L has an impact on who ultimately makes it to the C-Suite, and unfortunately, many women lack this specific experience, in part due to less awareness of capital markets,” says Johnson.

Johnson’s team in the Funds Enterprise includes MBA, MSF and undergraduate students. 

“It’s been such a collaborative learning environment,” she says. “I am constantly learning from a diverse group of people and in surprising ways. I learn something new every day from my undergraduate colleague.”

The program also integrates sustainability into its investment framework. The Funds Enterprise was the first student-managed investment fund to become a signatory to the Principles for Responsible Investment, and Gibbons has made responsible investing a core part of how students evaluate opportunities. It’s not a separate agenda; it’s a fiduciary consideration.

That sense of stewardship extends across generations. Students today are managing portfolios built by their predecessors over nearly three decades.

“The students who are in this program today are benefiting from the work that students 20 years ago did,” says Gibbons. “And the work that they’re doing today is going to help the students in the future.” 

That work now has a home in the brand-new Glaser Family Experiential Learning Suite, which also houses the Ventures, Brand and Consulting Enterprises. The Funds space — transformed as part of the recent Connecting Carlson building project — features a large meeting area designed for group decision-making, individual and small-group workstations, breakout rooms, Bloomberg terminals and a scrolling stock ticker on the wall. 

“It just makes the space feel very professional and very exciting to be in,” Johnson says. 

For Love, who arrived at Carlson because a fellow student believed in her potential, the impact goes beyond the professional. 

“The Funds Enterprise has changed the direction of my career and the trajectory of my entire life,” she says.