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 Although
the high-tech meltdown may have given the lie to some of our most
fanciful Internationalist dreams—a world made one through the power
of the Internet—the fact remains that the world beyond American
borders is more important than ever to the success of the American
economy, American businesses, and American businessmen and women.
Area schools are also convinced that working with their overseas
counterparts will benefit their students. Business students at schools
such as Saint Louis University, Washington University and Webster
University, enjoy both traditional opportunities to gain international
perspectives—such as those provided by a semester abroad, or by
meeting foreign students and faculty on campuses here—and cutting-edge
opportunities made possible by e-mail, live chat and ideoconferencing.
As a result, their education is made more relevant than ever in
a world where borders are melting and success is measured in the
ability to meet the challenge of global competition.
Saint Louis University
The John Cook School of Business at Saint Louis University provides
its students with a variety of ways of gaining international experiences,
including studying at exchange programs in France, Belgium, Spain,
Sweden, Denmark, and China.
But the school is most innovative in its aggressive use of technology
in the Global Classrooms course taught by Prof. John Zhao for students
in St. Louis and in Hong Kong.
Zhao’s course brings together students in St. Louis and students
at the City University of Hong Kong through videoconferencing and
e-mail.
The reason for integrating technology to such an extent in the classroom?
According to Zhao, it’s all about preparing students for the real
world, about “overcoming the limits of the classroom and the textbook.
“Since this is a course on the global business environment, [the
use of technology] exposes our students to a real-world situation
where our students can meet and negotiate with international partners
directly,” notes Zhao in Hong Kong.
The students in the course form “an international community,” Zhao
explains, and work jointly on international projects, with videoconferences
and e-mail providing the forum for exchange of proposals and ideas.
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Professor
John Zhao
Saint Louis University
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Some practical
issues arise through the use of videoconferencing, such as juggling
time zones, which can be “tough,” Zhao says. But the same issues
arise outside the teaching environment in the real world of business,
he adds.
Approximately 20 students from St. Louis and 24 from Hong Kong participated
in the first run of the course during the spring semester, Zhao
says. In the future, the numbers will grow as the technology is
made available to students taking other classes.
“Students are expected to learn to work with international partners
from different cultural backgrounds,” Zhao notes, “and embark on
projects that require them to understand and cope with different
economic systems.
“Companies small and big need business students to have a broader
skill set and a global perspective to understand diverse and dynamic
business environments to accomplish their tasks effectively,” he
says.
Washington University
At Washington University’s John M. Olin School of Business, a similar
array of opportunities is afforded both full-time MBA students and
those in two part-time MBA programs, says Joe Fox, the school’s
associate dean of MBA programs.
In addition to interactions at the campus here in St. Louis, where
around one-third of the students come from abroad, students can
participate in exchange programs in Spain, Germany, Venezuela, England,
and other countries.
Students may also take part in two-week programs abroad, both as
part of courses in the regular school year and during the summer,
in which they do research on issues in international business.
One of the more dramatic developments at the Olin School of Business
has been the opening in 2002 of the school’s campus in Shanghai,
China, in a partnership with Fudan University.
The students participating in the program there (a part-time MBA
program for executives with classes mostly on weekends), will be
mostly Asian business executives looking for training in Western
business methods, Fox says. They also will be able to enjoy direct
contact with EMBA students at the St. Louis campus through the use
of e-mail and other technologies.
“We expect to have students in China and St. Louis partner with
each other electronically and work on projects together,” Fox says.
“This is the way to complete the circle of a truly international
business education—to have students learning what they will eventually
have to do on their jobs.”
The school has not yet added videoconferencing as a way of bringing
students together, but Fox expects the addition of that and other
technologies as they are proven to work.
“We hope to do things like that, we’ll just see how they work first,”
he says. “We’re of the mindset that whatever technologies become
available and are reliable, we’ll see how we can incorporate them
into our programs.”
 Webster
University
Webster University is one of a handful of truly global educational
institutions in the world, according to Benjamin Akande, the Nigerian-born
dean of the Webster School of Business and Technology.
“Webster University has established 11 international campuses that
are truly embedded in the communities where they are located,” Akande
says. “These campuses have been there 25 years or more, and bring
together students and professors from more than 125 nationalities.
“This is how American students can acquire a global perspective,
by studying in these environments,” he says, adding that Webster
University was the first American university to offer an MBA program
in China, having established its program seven years ago.
A rare, perhaps even unique, feature of Webster University’s approach
to business education, is giving American students the opportunity
to earn their degrees while studying abroad entirely.
“Our students are permitted to decide to take their entire course
of study at one or another of our international sites,” Akande says.
“Some that we call our ‘journeymen’ even move from one campus to
another, to seek even more international perspectives.”
The ultimate goal of this kind of business education, Akande says,
is to prepare students for a world in which distance hardly matters.
“We are trying to use every means at our command to allow students
to break down barriers, to work together collaboratively, to share
ideas and perceptions.
“Whether it is studying together at the same campus, or working
on joint projects by e-mail and other technologies, we’re trying
to bring students together in a world that is getting smaller every
day,” Akande says.
Christopher Brown is a St. Louis-based free-lance writer.
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