What's the value of an undergraduate business degree?
Business is the largest undergraduate major, but many critics claim that the nature of the degree keeps students from receiving a comprehensive education. A new report from the Carnegie Foundation calls for a rethinking of the undergraduate business degree, and many schools are now focusing on how to integrate humanities into traditional business education in an attempt to create better, more well-rounded students that companies want to hire.
In March, the Aspen Undergraduate Business Education Consortium was held as professors and educators came together to figure out how to change the face of undergraduate business education.
William Sullivan, co-author of "Rethinking Undergraduate Business Education," will join The Daily Circuit Tuesday as we look at how these changes can be made, and what the value really is in an undergraduate business degree. One in five undergraduate students is a business major, he said.
"Business students are disproportionately first generation college students; it's a major route for upward mobility," Sullivan said. "It means that often they don't come from backgrounds that say college is an experience to help you understand the world and think critically. They only hear, 'it's going to give you a job' and that's all."
Matt Statler, clinical assistant professor of management and organizations at New York University, will also join the discussion. NYU's Stern School created the social impact core for it's undergraduate business students to help the curriculum have a broader view of the world, he said.
"You can't underestimate the impact of the financial crisis on ideas toward business and I've seen that in reference to my students these last three years," Statler said. "Each year the students come in more open to the idea that you can do well and do good, that they need not be mutually exclusive. That is a reflection of the broader social milieu; there's an increased expectation of social responsibility."
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