Southeastern MBA Program revises admission criteria to expand access
Monday, March 21, 2016
by: Rene Abadie
HAMMOND – The Southeastern Louisiana University Master of Business Administration
(MBA) program has released new methods and criteria for admission, expanded offerings
and prescribed personalized advising to help attract a more academically diverse set
of students, College of Business officials announced.
The move includes a redesign of course offerings to better match the needs of
the regional marketplace and is intended to expand the profile of potential MBA students
to include graduates from a variety of fields of study in addition to the traditional
undergraduate business majors, said Andre Honoree, director of the MBA program.
“Southeastern’s MBA program offers a ‘generalist’ degree; it is designed to build
upon undergraduate degree programs from any discipline, such as the sciences, liberal
arts and other areas,” he explained.
To facilitate the inclusion of students with degrees from varied disciplines,
the College of Business has modified both its prerequisite courses and standardized
testing requirements.
Students with undergraduate degrees in business from accredited business schools
will likely already have completed the three prerequisite courses for the program.
Those courses are principles of finance, accounting principles and statistics.
Under the new standards, Honoree said students who have not taken those prerequisite
courses will be allowed to take graduate business courses while completing their undergraduate
prerequisites.
Additionally through the redesign, the program will now also accept students’
scores from the Graduate Record Exam (GRE), where previously only scores from the
Graduate Management Admissions Test (GMAT) were utilized.
“Many students earn their undergraduate degrees and take the GRE, not being quite
sure in which they to go to graduate school,” he said. “We are now able to use the
Educational Testing Services’ GRE Comparison Tool for Business Schools. When combined
with an examination of the student’s grade point averages, we are better able to predict
the probability of success in the MBA program.”
The program is also using new methods for admission to address undergraduate and
graduate students who may already have a master’s degree and for students graduating
with high grade point averages. Honoree said both application methods will help identify
highly qualified students with great potential to succeed in the program. Details
on the new admission methods can be found on the website southeastern.edu/mba.
“In our redesign, we have also developed a number of new courses and personalized
advising for students,” Honoree said.
Among new courses added are Advanced Health Care Administration, The Art and Science
of Negotiations, Project Management, Investment Analysis and Entrepreneurship, along
with other courses as electives.
In the area of advising, each student will be personally advised by the MBA director
to develop a customized degree plan, allowing students to more effectively plan to
take the electives they desire and know when they can expect to complete the program.
The Southeastern interdisciplinary MBA program is accredited by the AACSB, which
is considered the highest level of business accreditation and is awarded to only 755
schools worldwide. The degree involves completion of 33 hours with eight required
core courses and three electives. Eligible students can join the program in any semester.
For more information, visit the website or call 985-549-2146.
