Melbourne Business School makes peace with university

After years of wrangling, Melbourne Business School and the University of Melbourne have agreed to forge closer ties with the creation of a single faulty, under the auspices of the university’s Faculty of Business and Economics. In return, it will be Melbourne Business School that will offer all postgraduate business degrees, including the MBA.

This will eliminate the need for two different faculties for business and economics, and also prevent the two organisations teaching competing programmes.

Under the collaboration, Paul Kofman will continue as dean of the Faculty of Business and Economics and former London Business School professor Zeger Degraeve will continue as dean of Melbourne Business School and will also become Dean of the Faculty of Business and Economics. The two will have joint leadership over the shared academic staff.

As well as running an MBA and Executive MBA programme, Melbourne Business School has been particularly strong in executive short courses, through its Mt Eliza campus and brand.

Prof Degraeve believes the agreement will help create a global hub for management development in Australia. “It aligns, coordinates and focuses existing resources to effectively face the global competitive challenges Australia experiences in advanced level business and economics education.’’

The aim is to put the new structure in place by 1 May 2013.

www.mbs.edu