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From the Dean

College of Business Administration website

Welcome!

As we just celebrated 100 years of Jesuit business education, it is an appropriate time to reaffirm our commitment to educating ethical, socially responsible global leaders who are prepared to excel in a dynamic business environment. Knowing that we cannot predict what future challenges our graduates will face, we equip our students with critical thinking skills and the ability to become lifelong learners. Through applied learning experiences that take place in and out of the classroom, we prepare our students to become competitive, creative and compassionate leaders who make a difference by serving business and society in their personal and professional lives.

With the generous endowment from Jim Keyes, we have begun to implement many of the ideas that emerged from our collaborative strategic planning process. While academic quality remains a top priority, we will implement new program delivery methods and expand our geographic reach through the use of distance learning and social media technologies. Remaining focused on our local markets, we are also establishing new global partnerships with universities and organizations around key academic programs. We will connect our programs and centers with business through innovative applied learning experiences and faculty and student research that has relevance and impact. Our focus on ethics and social responsibility is more than a response to current events – it has been one of the pillars of Jesuit business education at Marquette for a century.

We are pleased that our Executive MBA program is ranked in the top 20 and our part-time MBA program in the top 50 by U.S. News & World Report. Our alumni, who number over 20,000, play key leadership roles in companies all over the world, transforming the way we do business. They do this with their exceptional knowledge, strong leadership skills and, equally important, through an indomitable spirit that puts people first as they seek to be a force for positive change.

I look forward to accomplishing great things with our students, faculty and staff, alumni, members of the business community and friends and supporters, as we move into our second 100 years.

Linda M. Salchenberger, Ph.D.
James H. Keyes Dean of Business Administration

College Mission Statement

The College of Business Administration is dedicated to creating research with relevance and impact, providing innovative applied learning experiences and serving as a valued resource for business and society. Through our Jesuit tradition of scholarship, service and care for the individual, we develop ethical and socially responsible global leaders who are ready to compete in a complex and dynamic business environment. With a focus on applied learning, we create a strong community of researchers and teachers, learners, alumni, business partners and supporters who advance the practice of business through innovation.

Undergraduate Program Description

Professional undergraduate business education at Marquette University provides students with an educational foundation that prepares them to be socially responsible global leaders. This requires a focus on preparing individuals for responsibility in all aspects of their lives in an era of constant change. It implies that we will strive to graduate men and women who not only will become highly competent professionals, but whose careers will be built on integrity and the highest values of professional and personal conduct.

The College of Business Administration stresses three elements of business education: perspectives, knowledge and skills. The first is grounded in the liberal arts traditions of Marquette University and builds on the Core of Common Studies taken by all of our students. It is built on the premise that an effective business leader will develop a deep understanding of the religious, cultural, social, political, economic, international, scientific and technical environments in which individuals and organizations exist. This helps our students develop their own internalized value systems and prepares them to apply these values broadly throughout their lives. It also enables them to place business decisions in a larger context, developing an understanding of the potential impact of business actions more broadly on society. We believe that a liberal education is a necessary part of a professional education, and our curriculum is structured on this premise.

The College of Business Administration builds on the foundational educational experience provided by University Core of Common Studies. It does this through a college curriculum that amplifies and deepens the knowledge, skills and values imparted to students in the nine knowledge areas of the Common Core, and by offering students the opportunity to develop specialized knowledge and skills in a variety of undergraduate majors and minors. The College of Business Administration extends the student’s core experiences and focuses on further learning in pursuit of a specialized degree.

The second element focuses on knowledge of businesses and how they work. Initially, this portion of the curriculum focuses on college curriculum business knowledge required of all College of Business Administration graduates. This provides the foundation for a career as a global business leader. It provides each student with an introduction to the various functions generic to an organization such as marketing and finance and operations and supply chain management. It also stresses development of a clear understanding of the dynamics of the firm and the economy, the basic managerial and organizational concepts necessary to function in an organization, the interaction between a firm and its environment and an overall view of strategy and policy making within an organization. Building on this core, the curriculum provides the students an opportunity to specialize in a specific business area, such as accounting, information technology, human resources or international business. This prepares graduates for entry-level business positions — the start of their business careers.

Third, the curriculum stresses skills building, helping students develop their personal potential and allowing them to grow professionally as their careers progress. The building of skills in areas such as communication, quantitative analysis, team building, leadership, ethical reasoning, critical thinking and global and cultural awareness is an integral part of the curriculum throughout a student’s program of study. The development of these skills prepares graduates to continue to grow and develop in a rapidly changing work environment.