The popularity of programs in the College of Business Administration has prompted the business school to devise more opportunities to accommodate student interest. Among new delivery options for programs in the Chapman Graduate School: the Master of Accounting (MACC) and the Master of Science in Finance (MSF).
MACC moves to weekdays.
The MACC program, well-established as a convenient, ten-month, lockstep, Saturday program, began a new weekday schedule this summer.
“We had many requests from prospective students for a program held during the week, especially for religious reasons.”
—Sharon Lassar, director of the School of Accounting
“We had many requests from prospective students for a program held during the week, especially for religious reasons,” said Sharon Lassar, director of the School of Accounting. “In addition, demand for the program has been increasing over time. As a result of that growing interest, we felt we could admit more students while maintaining the program’s high quality.”
Students in the new group meet at Modesto A. Maidique Campus in the MARC Building, which Lassar describes as “a wonderful facility with the state-of-the-art classrooms such a high-caliber program needs.” Like their counterparts in the Saturday program, students take two classes a week. One takes place on Monday evening, the other on Thursday evening.
“This new structure also differs from the Saturday MACC program by putting greater emphasis on IT, which we achieved by replacing Environment of Accounting and Auditing with a course on information security,” Lassar said.
The School of Accounting added new faculty to handle the additional teaching load.
“We hired six new faculty members, two of them specifically to free other professors for the weekday program,” Lassar said. “We will continue to evaluate student demand to determine the next time to begin a new group.”
MSF grows in its new Downtown Center home.
“Introduced in January, 2001, the MSF-Fast Track (FT) has been structured as a lockstep, eleven-course, twelve-month executive program, enabling participants to benefit from its cohesive and progressive design and from sharing their unique perspectives and experiences with each other,” said Emmanuel N. Roussakis, director, MSF Downtown program and graduate certificate programs in banking.
He actively promoted the reorganization of the graduate program and implemented the MSF-FT when he served as chair of the Finance Department from 2000-2003.
In the past, the college admitted two groups yearly, with different concentrations at two campuses: financial management and corporate finance at Modesto A. Maidique Campus, and investment at the FIU Pembroke Pines Center. Because of Miami’s importance as an international financial center, international banking and commercial bank management became the focus of the MSF program at the college’s Downtown Center.
“With the opening of the Downtown Center and the creation of an advisory board for our program in October, 2006, we saw the possibility of expanding the MSF.”
—Isabel Lopez (MIB ’06, BBA ’03), MSF program manager
“With the opening of the Downtown Center and the creation of an advisory board for our program in October, 2006, we saw the possibility of expanding the MSF,” said Isabel Lopez (MIB ’06, BBA ’03), MSF program manager. “One of Dr. Roussakis’s strongest areas of expertise is international banking, which we knew he could promote to banks downtown. We also knew that our advisory board members would help open doors for us to hold information sessions at their firms and help expand our enrollment.”
In addition to the new location in the Downtown Center, another change has occurred: the MSF is simultaneously admitting students for the Modesto A. Maidique Campus and Downtown Center programs—the first time two groups will start the program at the same time.
