Academics
The Smeal College offers the Master of Business Administration (MBA) and Master of Science (MS) as well as doctoral programs in accounting, finance, real estate, management, and organization, supply chain and information systems, and marketing, and joint degrees in health administration (MBA/MHA), quality manufacturing management (QMM), law (JD/MBA), and hotel, restaurant, and institutional management (MBA/MHRIM). Other programs include a 3-2 degree in science (BS/MBA) with the Eberly College of Science, summer internships, and joint research. The strongest areas of study are corporate finance, marketing, strategic leadership, portfolio management, supply chain management, corporate innovation, and leadership. The most popular courses are Communications, Corporate Finance, Financial Statement Analysis, Strategic Leadership, Strategy Implementation and Organizational Change, Business Planning, New Product Development, and Integrated Market Communications. Regular programs bring distinguished speakers and visiting professors to campus. A number of specific lecture series bring in high-level executives each year, as do individual faculty members who feature businesspeople as classroom guest speakers.
Forty-eight total credits are required to complete the MBA, including 22 elective credits. Required courses include:
- Introduction to Managerial Accounting
- Management
- Teams
- Communication Skills for Management
- Financial Accounting
- Economics for Managers
- Risk and Decision
- Introduction to Finance
- Supply Chain and Operations Management
- Marketing
- Global Perspectives
- Information Technology
- Strategies for Converging Economies
- Negotiations
- Ethical Leadership
Business students may take relevant nonbusiness courses in other departments. The minimum time permitted to complete the master’s degree program attending full time is 21 months; maximum, 96 months.
There are 89 total full-time graduate business faculty, all of whom hold a doctorate; there is 1 part-time faculty member, who holds a doctorate. Faculty salaries are rated average for Category I institutions, based on the AAUP rating system. Average number of credit hours faculty teach is 9; average business class size is 33.