PSU Aims to Offer ‘eMBA’ in China
By Richard Read, The Oregonian, Portland, Ore.
Jun. 2–Portland State University managers are negotiating to offer China’s first online graduate business degree in a deal with Peking University that could spawn other offshore programs.
PSU’s School of Business Administration is poised to beat better-known U.S. graduate schools to offer the “eMBA” degree in cooperation with the Beijing university, known as China’s Harvard. The program would address a growing need, as China’s economy booms, for middle managers trained in business leadership.
As many as 55 students, most likely Chinese workers accessing the Internet at their companies, would enter the program next March. After a year of studies in China, the first class would come to Portland for a second and final year, said Sully Taylor, PSU business school associate dean for academic affairs.
“This gives us experience delivering the eMBA in an international setting,” said Taylor, who added that the program could be replicated in other countries. “Saudi Arabia’s interested.”
The venture combines with other Chinese programs launched by PSU recently. PSU offers study-abroad opportunities in China, an undergraduate engineering program in Shanghai and training for Chinese officials on sustainable land-use management. China’s government recently opened a Confucius Institute at PSU to promote Chinese language and culture.
PSU’s business school, which has about 350 MBA students, has offered distance learning for years, a record that attracted managers at PKU, China’s oldest national university.
Chinese students, who will study in English, will pay tuition of $22,000. PSU aims to profit on the deal.
Earl Molander and Linda Zhao, of PSU’s Free Market Business Development Institute, made the pitch to PKU.
PSU awaits approval of the program by its accrediting organization and by the Oregon university system, said Scott Dawson, School of Business dean.
Large brand-name U.S. business schools tend not to offer online programs, other than expensive classes for top executives. So Chinese education officials, who are embracing distance learning, are taking the chance to work with PSU, said Gil Latz, vice provost for international affairs.
“Our business school,” Latz said, “has the combination of being in the right place with the right idea at the right time.”
—–
To see more of The Oregonian, or to subscribe the newspaper, go to http://www.oregonian.com.
Copyright (c) 2007, The Oregonian, Portland, Ore.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.