Omega Rho

Omega Rho is a North American scholastic honor society for students in the fields of operations research and management science. It was established in 1976 and became part of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences in 1998. Omega Rho has chapters in the United States and Mexico.

History

Omega Rho was founded at the Institute of Management Sciences and Operations Research Society of America joint national meeting in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on April 1, 1976. It is an honor society to recognize students in the fields of operations research and management science and to support study in those areas. Its first president was Clinton K. Ancker Jr. from the University of Southern California.
It was admitted to the Association of College Honor Societies in 1983 with full membership in 1986. It became part of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences in 1998.
In 2012, Omega Rho had an active membership of 181 and a total membership of 8,069 As of 2024, it has 38 active chapters in the United States and Mexico. Its headquarters is in Catonsville, Maryland.

Symbols

The colors of Omega Rho are blue and red. The symbols of the Society are explained in its Bylaws as being a saddle projection superimposed by a tapered, red arrow. Its motto is ''Ad Optimum per OMEGA RHO^®.''

Membership

Omega Rho is coeducational. Potential members are juniors, seniors, and graduate students who are must in the top 25 percent of their class, with a 3.5 GPA. Faculty can join as faculty members. Omega Rho also admits honorary members.

Activities

Each fall, the society hosts the Omega Rho Distinguished Lecture at the annual INFORMS Meeting. Presenters of the plenary lecture include Anna Nagurney.

Chapters

Following is a list of Omega Rho chapters.

Charter date and range	Institution	Location	Status
	Case Western Reserve University	Cleveland, Ohio	Active
	Columbia University	New York City, New York	Active
	George Washington University	Washington, D.C.	Active
	Naval Postgraduate School	Monterey, California	Active
	New York University	New York City, New York	Active
	North Carolina State University	Raleigh, North Carolina	Active
	Southern Methodist University	Dallas, Texas	Active
	State [University of New York at Buffalo]	Buffalo, New York	Active
	University of Illinois Chicago	Chicago, Illinois	Inactive
	University of Pittsburgh	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania	Active
	University of Southern California	Los Angeles, California	Active
	University of Virginia	Charlottesville, Virginia	Active
	Purdue University	West Lafayette, Indiana	Active
	United States Naval Academy	Annapolis, Maryland	Active
	California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo	San Luis Obispo, California	Active
	California State University, Fullerton	Fullerton, California	Active
	Air Force Institute of Technology	Dayton, Ohio	Active
	Babson College	Wellesley, Massachusetts	Active
	George Mason University	Fairfax, Virginia	Active
	Saint Louis University	St. Louis, Missouri	Active
	University of Texas at Austin	Austin, Texas	Active
	University of Cincinnati	Cincinnati, Ohio	Active
	University of Massachusetts Amherst	Amherst, Massachusetts	Active
	Cornell University	Ithaca, New York	Active
	Portland State University	Portland, Oregon	Active
	United States Air Force Academy	El Paso County, Colorado	Active
	Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México	San Ángel, Mexico City, Mexico	Active
	University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	Chapel Hill, North Carolina	Active
	Carnegie Mellon University	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania	Active
	Georgetown University	Washington, D.C.	Active
	Bucknell University	Lewisburg, Pennsylvania	Active
2002	Arizona State University	Tempe, Arizona	Active
	Florida International University	University Park, Florida	Active
	Louisiana State University	Baton Rouge, Louisiana	Active
2005	United States Military Academy	West Point, New York	Active
	University of South Florida	Tampa, Florida	Active
	Saint Joseph's University	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania	Active
	University of Scranton	Scranton, Pennsylvania	Active
	University of Texas at Dallas	Richardson, Texas	Active
xxxx ?–20xx ?	Clemson University	Clemson, South Carolina	Inactive
xxxx ?–20xx ?	Miami University	Oxford, Ohio	Inactive
xxxx ?–20xx ?	Northwestern University	Evanston, Illinois	Inactive
xxxx ?–20xx ?	Oregon State University	Corvallis, Oregon	Inactive
xxxx ?–before July 2011	Polytechnic Institute of New York University	Brooklyn, New York	Inactive
xxxx ?–before July 2011	University of Delaware	Newark, Delaware	Inactive
xxxx ?–20xx ?	University of Maryland, College Park	College Park, Maryland	Inactive
xxxx ?–before July 2011	University of New Haven	West Haven, Connecticut	Inactive
xxxx ?–20xx ?	University of Texas at Arlington	Arlington, Texas	Inactive

Notable members

Collegiate and faculty members

Name	Chapter	Notability
Steven Nahmias		Professor of operations management at Santa Clara University

Honorary members

Following are some of Omega Rho's honorary members.

Name	Initiation date	Notability
Russell L. Ackoff	1992	Organizational theorist, consultant, and management scientist
Robert Bixby	2007	Professor emeritus of computational and applied mathematics at Rice University
Alfred Blumstein	1988	Professor at the Heinz College and Department of Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University
Seth Bonder	2004	Engineer who made substantial contributions to operations research for the US military
Jonathan Caulkins	2014	Drug policy researcher and professor at Heinz College at Carnegie Mellon University
Abraham Charnes	1987	Mathematician
Erhan Çınlar	2003	Probabilist and professor meeritus at Princeton University
David S. C. Chu	1996	US Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness and US Assistant Secretary of Defense for Program Analysis & Evaluation
William W. Cooper	1997	Founding president of The [Institute of Management Sciences]
Richard Cyert	1985	Economist, statistician, organizational theorist, and President of Carnegie Mellon University
George Dantzig	1992	Mathematical scientist known for his development of the simplex algorithm
Ralph E. Gomory	1989	Applied mathematician and IBM researcher and executive
Stuart L. Hart	2005	Academic, writer, and theorist
Karla Hoffman	2013	Professor of systems engineering in the Volgenau School of Engineering of George Mason University
Ronald A. Howard	1999	Emeritus professor in the School of Engineering at Stanford University
Edward H. Kaplan	2000	Professor at the Yale School of Management, Yale School of Medicine, and Yale School of Engineering and Applied Science
Richard M. Karp	1998	Computer scientist and computational theorist at the University of California, Berkeley
George Kozmetsky	1984	Technology innovator who co-founded Teledyne Inc.
Gilbert Laporte	2009	Professor of operations research at Université de Montréal
Richard Larson	1998	Engineer and operations research specialist known for urban service systems and disaster planning
Judith Liebman	2003	Operations researcher, civil engineer, mechanical engineer, and professor emerita at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign
John Little	1997	Institute Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Robert E. Machol	1989	Professor of systems at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management of Northwestern University
Thomas L. Magnanti	2001	Institute Professor and former Dean of the School of Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
William L. Maxwell		Professor of industrial engineering at Cornell University
Thomas J. Murrin	1983	United States Deputy Secretary of Commerce
George Nemhauser	1987	Professor of industrial and systems engineering at Georgia Tech
N. U. Prabhu	1992	Mathematician, known for his contributions to queueing theory
Alan Pritsker	1982	Engineer and one of the founders of the field of computer simulation
William R. Pulleyblank	2001	Professor of operations research at the United States Military Academy
James G. Roche	2002	20th Secretary of the Air Force and executive with Northrop Grumman
Herbert A. Simon	1986	Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences
Robert M. Thrall	1985	Mathematician and a pioneer of operations research
John A. White	1990	Chancellor of the University of Arkansas and dean Georgia Tech's College of Engineering