Fuqua extends its reach to teach MBA in Kazakhstan

Duke University, which has long set its sights on becoming one of the world’s first global teaching institutions, is to help Nazarbayev University in the Central Asian republic of Kazakhstan to create a business school. The Fuqua school of business will help the fledgling university launch its first MBA programme in 2012.

All business degrees will be awarded by Nazarbayev University - Duke describes Fuqua’s role as consultative, though some Fuqua faculty will teach in Kazakhstan, which is the ninth largest country in the world and covers an area greater than that of Western Europe. In 2011 the new university enrolled just 500 students, largely in engineering, and the sciences.

The university is working with a handful of university partners to develop departments and programmes: UCL in London has helped establish the first year of the undergraduate programme and the University of Wisconsin-Madison the school of social sciences and humanities, for example.

Newly-appointed Fuqua dean William Boulding says the business school wants to be both embedded in and connected with other institutions. “Embedded entails understanding the key needs of a region and serving it to make a positive difference. Connected means that as we bring the appropriate intellectual resources to serve the needs of a region, we consequently better understand how the world works….This is an ideal opportunity to further the exchange of ideas via civil discourse, promote stability within the region, build appropriate economic infrastructure and create a base for sustainable economic development in Kazakhstan and Central Asia for years to come.”

www.fuqua.duke.edu