The W. P. Carey School of Business will begin offering a new master’s degree program as well as two Bachelor of Arts programs in 2010, school officials said Friday.

The programs will be a one-year Master of Science in Commerce for non-business students and two Bachelor of Arts in Business programs with concentrations in law and global politics.

Through the new programs, the school is finding new ways to deliver business education to students at ASU, executive dean Amy Hillman said.

“We’re ... recognizing that business is really a part of a lot of careers and anything that people would want to do,” she said. “We’re trying to give [students] exposure while not making that the sole purpose of their studies.”

The Master of Science in Commerce program for people who earned non-business undergraduate degrees is designed to teach business basics and leadership training and will include a capstone consulting project.

“We’re looking for people who clearly have got other interests in their life,” she said. “They’ve gotten their undergraduate degree in an area outside of business but they know that business is part of bringing whatever they aspire to do into their life.”

The school will also add law and global politics concentrations to a Bachelor of Arts in Business program started by the school in 2008, which offers concentrations in areas outside of business, said Tim Desch, assistant dean for undergraduate admissions at the W. P. Carey School of Business. Students can start these programs in the spring.

Desch said knowledge of law is an important skill within the business
world.

“Whether it’s in contracts, whether it’s in human resources, any number of areas within business depend on some degree or knowledge of law, so for individuals who are going into corporate business environments, we believe that this would be a particularly useful application,” he said.

The law concentration, which is only available to current freshmen and future students, will include six courses designed and offered by the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law.

“What makes this one unique, even from the others, is that the others include courses that are offered through other undergraduate colleges,” Desch said. “These are undergraduate courses but, of course, they’re coming from a school of law.”

The global politics concentration, which will include courses from the School of Government, Politics And Global Studies, is designed to give students a better understanding of world issues as they relate to business, he said.

“Business is now such a global enterprise,” he said. “We want our students to have a better understanding of everything from customs to language to traditions and, in this particular instance, in the global politics that have implications within business.”

The Bachelor of Arts in Business programs go beyond the traditional bounds of what a business school typically offers, Desch said.

“In many ways, it’s a good example of the transdisciplinary approach that the entire University is taking,” he said. “We’re proving that you can make business relevant within pretty much every discipline that the University offers.”

Announced earlier this year, the W. P. Carey School of Business will also begin offering a Master of Public Health degree next fall that will focus on urban health, Hillman said.

“More and more people are living in cities, and with all of the problems we’re seeing with H1N1 and a number of diseases that are communicable, public health in an urban environment is even more challenging,” she said.

Most Master of Public Health degrees are not taught out of business schools, but in order to change people’s health habits, business techniques are necessary to market them, Hillman said.

“We really believe that some of the skills that we teach in business schools are going to be very valuable,” she said.

Reach the reporter at salvador.rodriguez@asu.edu.