August 16, 2002
Business majors give
their input on how to make
a strong school even stronger
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| Students work together on a project for the School of Business. |
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — More than two dozen seniors in Indiana State University’s School of Business spent their summer helping to shape not only their own future but also the future of the entire school. [video]
As
part of a capstone class that provides practical applications for
four years of classroom study, senior business majors normally
partner with local businesses on a variety of projects, but this
year’s focus was solely on the School of Business.
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Twenty-six
students conducted a thorough analysis of the school and the
business schools or programs at Ball State, Eastern Illinois,
Indiana and Vincennes universities as well as Indiana
University-Purdue University at Indianapolis, Ivy Tech State
College, the University of Illinois and the University of Southern
Indiana.
“The
more we learn about other schools, the better we can make
ourselves,” said Raechelle Spurlock, a marketing major from
Muncie.
The
project is intended to help Ronald F. Green, the school’s new
dean, identify ways to help an already strong school become even
stronger, said Arthur Sherwood, assistant professor of management
and instructor of the capstone class.
The
students focused on areas related to three core missions of the
school: teaching excellence, practical applied research and business
community service.
The
study involved a “full analysis of the school in terms of its
strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, which is a typical
business analysis,” Sherwood explained.
“We’ve
progressively made this course more experiential in line with the
direction ISU is going as a whole. It’s very important for
business students because this is what they do when they graduate
and this turns out to e very much like a real job.” Sherwood said.
“The School of Business has a lot of very strong attributes to it and we think it’s important to take pro-active steps toward bringing the image of the school up and even with the actual reality of what’s going on here,” Sherwood said.
“We
have a lot of quality here and good professors,” said Mia Hester,
a management information systems major from Indianapolis.
“They’re all experts in their field and they really do help out
and we learn a whole lot. A lot of people don’t know about it, but
that’s what we’re trying to advertise.”
The
capstone class “introduces you to the real life experience that
lots of colleges and universities lack,” said Nader Alwehibi, an
insurance major from Saudi Arabia.
“We
went deep into the market. We analyzed every aspect,” Alwehibi
said. “We tried to reflect that we are moving toward
excellence.”
Encouraging
greater interaction between students and instructors outside the
classroom and expanding internships are among the students’
recommendations.
Placing
more students in internships would give the school a better feel for
what businesses need and enhance the job prospects of Indiana State
graduates, said Hester.
Another
recommendation is to improve the physical appearance of the
school’s building, already a goal for the university.
“Dr.
Sherwood has taken a risk with this class and it’s been a
worthwhile risk because he’s learning from it, we’re learning
from it and our dean is learning from it,” said Spurlock. “This
is one of the best classes I’ve ever taken.”
And
if the school follows up on the students’ recommendations, “it
will be one of the top business schools in the Midwest,” said
Alwehebi.
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Writer:
Dave Taylor, ISU
Public Affairs, (812) 237-3743.
ISU
Public Affairs:
(812) 237-3773 or http://isunews.indstate.edu