MELBOURNE Business School is merging with the University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Business and Economics to enhance both organisations’ global appeal. Leon Saw reports.
Melbourne Business School (right) merges with the University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Business and Economics. Photos: matt.davis via Flickr (left) and Ameel Zia Khan via Wikipedia (right)
The renowned Melbourne Business School (MBS) will merge with the University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Business and Economics from May 1, 2013.
Offerings from both organisations will be consolidated into the one Graduate School for business and economics.
The arrangement is expected to boost the organisations’ standings in global rankings.
In a statement, University of Melbourne Vice-Chancellor Professor Glyn Davis said the merger was “a case where where the sum of the whole is far greater than each of its constituent parts”.
“Bringing the capacity of both entities more closely together provides all the necessary ingredients to gain for all business and economics disciplines at least the same top 25 international standing as the University currently enjoys in medicine, law and engineering,” Professor Davis said.
“The University admires greatly what MBS has achieved and is enormously proud of the outstanding reputation of the Faculty of Business and Economics, particularly around research, its Bachelor of Commerce and the impressive suite of graduate programs offered by its own graduate school,” he added.
The merger is also part of a larger strategy to position Melbourne as an attractive destination for business and economics leadership education, for the Asian century.
Professor Zeger Degraeve, who will become a Dean of the Faculty of Business and Economics while continuing as Dean of Melbourne Business School, said “it will position Melbourne as a global hub for leadership development in the Asian region”.
“It aligns, coordinates and focuses existing resources to effectively face the global competitive challenges Australia experiences in advanced level business and economics education,” he said.
Professor Degraeve will lead the faculty, with Professor Paul Kofman who will remain as its dean.
Since MBS has been facing a slow decline, especially in replacing good quality Australian lecturers with lecturers from vastly different educational cultures, a noticeable cultural change has impacted MBS in the past few years.
As an alumni of the school, this is very disappointing. The cause for celebration, though, is that local students have a plethora of choices for postgraduate business education. Hopefully, more courses will actually be related to producing more business owners than simply people fodder for investment banks – this is the responsibility that MBS has backed away from!
The school is in the shambles; Melb Uni will do it a world of good.