Management program in Germany develops

By Luis Jiménez
Staff Writer

Purdue's German International School of Management — located in Hannover, Germany — is still going well since it opened its doors in the fall of 1999.

The school just had its first commencement of graduate students and will be celebrating its second year next fall.

The German school was created in partnership with a private foundation in Germany. Krannert is the immediate provider of the academic curriculums as well as faculty.

The program began with about 25 students, but according to Richard Cosier, dean of the School of Management, the number of students has almost doubled to 42. "We'll keep the number of programs we already have, but we want to increase the number of students. Our goal is to have 120 (master of science and industrial administration) students and 50 (executive masters of science and management) students," he said.

To handle this increase, more staff members were hired to attend the recruiting duties in Germany. It is also expected that as more students graduate and are happy with the education they received at the school, they will go out and tell other potential students.

Cosier said that the internationalization of the School of Management is important because it sets the foothold in the European business and educational region.

The cultural diversity of the school's students seems to be one of its main appeals to both students and faculty. There are five students in the Germany program who are from the West Lafayette campus. They share classrooms with students from countries such as Germany, Estonia, Mexico, China and India among others. Foreign students at the school can also choose to take courses taught at West Lafayette's campus.

Cosier said that students from Germany, and those from West Lafayette who decide to take courses abroad, benefit from the programs taught at the Germany school because of the enhanced learning environment. "One of the advantages for these students is that they immerse in a multicultural environment," he said. "Students that come to West Lafayette would also get direct exposure of a more traditional U.S. cultural and academical environment."

With such a multi-cultural learning environment, there are mutual benefits for students and faculty. Cosier said that one of the benefits of having faculty teaching overseas is that they gain international teaching experience and enrich their backgrounds. Ultimately, it translates into a better learning experience for students in West Lafayette.

Professors have positive reactions to teaching in Germany. Charlene Sullivan, associate professor in the Krannert School of Management, has taught core and advanced corporate finance courses at Hannover. "I thought it was a wonderful experience," she said. "The students were very uniform in terms of their preparation. They were very enthusiastic, energetic and very aggressive in the way they conducted themselves in the classroom."

Cosier said that the need for more faculty members to teach the courses was remedied by hiring more faculty members, who either stayed at Purdue or traveled to Germany. Visiting professors were also hired to handle the additional load of work.

The Germany management school's long-range goal is to move to a largely self-standing institution in about eight years. However, according to Cosier, when this happens Krannert would still be in a collaborative association with the Germany school.

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