Eastern Illinois University - Lumpkin College of Business and Technology

The MBA Program at Eastern Illinois University is one of 11 Illinois universities accredited in Business and Accounting by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB).

Our program prepares students for employment in positions of leadership in small and large businesses, industry, government, and non-profit organizations in a contemporary global environment. The program emphasizes the application of analytical tools and related skills that are essential for making informed business decisions.

MBA Graduates continue or enter their professions in accounting, finance, operations management, consulting, human resource management, marketing, sales, and information technology. Our alumni are often promoted into executive-level positions or are hired into analyst or supervisory positions, upon graduation. Our 2018 School of Business placement data (with a 60% response rate) indicated that 100% Applied Management and Research Option and 92% Business Administration MBA alumni were employed in career-related positions within 3 months of graduation.

According to Dr. Michael Dobbs, Associate Professor of Management and Graduate Faculty in our MBA program, "The very first MBA program was established at Harvard in 1908 as a professional degree program similar to schools of law or medicine. The faculty provided instruction in various business disciplines, but the primary goal was to train students to think in a broad, comprehensive way.

The EIU MBA program embraces that purpose and legacy by having a unique structure: courses in the various business disciplines (e.g., finance, marketing, accounting, etc.) are book-ended by two courses designed to encourage and develop a broad, comprehensive way of thinking. The MBA 5000 Strategic Management course is designed to be taken in the student's first semester and serves as an introduction to all the various disciplines. In the student's final semester, MBA 5900 Management Simulation provides students with opportunities to bring the full range of their newfound knowledge and training to bear on a series of simulated business challenges.

Most MBA programs in the US have a course like one of these, but only a few have both courses. This structure makes the EIU MBA program not only different than most but true to the legacy of training managers to think in broad, comprehensive ways so important to the early developers of the MBA program at Harvard¹."

source: eiu.edu