Dive Brief:
- Ohio business schools are revitalizing degree offerings to remain competitive in enrollment objectives, Crain's Cleveland Business reports. Officials say that changes in student attitudes and marketplace needs are forcing the initiatives, but that colleges are studying and implementing ways to be nimble in response to students' seeking programs that offer classic business training, but also focus on doing social good and providing a view of the global marketplace.
- The University of Akron Professional Development Center is among the top responses to these new recruitment realities, according to the Crain's article. The center will help students become proficient in soft skills to be more marketable to diverse employers upon graduation.
- Kent State University is developing new facilities for its College of Business Administration, which officials say will be financed largely through a public-private partnership (P3) as part of its master facilities plan. And John Carroll University is looking to turn a $10 million gift into a capital campaign designed to create a school of accountancy and information science and a school of leadership and social innovation.
Dive Insight:
These universities' growth in business training runs counter-cultural to some ideas that business education is outdated, according to a recent Guardian podcast edition featuring a business school professor. But others say the business school remains one of the cornerstones of American higher education, with the MBA being one of the nation's most popular degrees and with enrollment steady nationwide in these programs.
And business schools are emerging as training hubs for innovation outside of the collegiate classroom. Purdue University Northwest was recently awarded the global Business Innovations That Inspire award for its service project that placed college business students in high school classrooms along with industry professionals to impart valuable lessons in workforce readiness.