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Morgan, Bowie St. see little fallout from Towson-UB MBA program halt
While the University of Baltimore and Towson University are ending their joint masters of business administration program on the heels of a lawsuit arguing that such partnerships hurt historically black colleges and universities, MBA programs at such colleges aren’t expecting the end of the partnership to have a huge impact on their programs.
“From a competitive standpoint, the marketplace has not lost a competitor,” said Joseph Wells, director of master’s programs at Morgan State University’s Earl G. Graves School of Business and Management.
The joint MBA program’s memorandum of understanding expired Oct. 1. Students in the program will finish their degrees while new students will apply directly to the University of Baltimore’s MBA program.
In 2006, a Baltimore-based organization called The Coalition for Equity and Excellence in Maryland Higher Education Inc., whose mission is to make Maryland higher education more equitable, brought suit against the state for encouraging segregationist policies within the Maryland university system. Two Morgan State students were also named as plaintiffs in the suit. In 2013, Judge Catherine C. Blake of the United States District Court in Baltimore ruled in favor of the coalition.
Last week, the state came out with plans to remedy the problem in response to a mediation order by Blake.
On Tuesday, University of Baltimore President Kurt Schmoke issued a statement about the state’s recommendations and the school’s partnership with Towson.
“As part of its commitment to access and student success, UB has long engaged in targeted partnerships and collaborations with sister institutions to benefit Maryland students,” said Schmoke, also talking about the school’s partnership with Coppin State University.
Critics say Morgan hurt
Critics of the university’s joint MBA program have said that it hurts Morgan State’s MBA program.
But Wells, who became director in January, is focusing on growing Morgan State’s program on its own merits.
“We’re planning here to do things around marketing and promotion to drive and build the MBA and masters programs independent of this,” he said.
The Graves School, which recently opened a new state-of-the-art building, offers an evening MBA program and is waiting for approval to offer an online program. The evening program has 150 students.
Wells wants to market Graves’ offerings and increase the school’s name recognition, with its new facilities, which includes a capital markets trading lab as the crown jewel.
“If additional resources would come our way, that would be great,” he said, “We definitely can be competitive because we offer a competitive program.”
Morgan State is one of four historically black colleges and universities within the University System of Maryland. The other three are Bowie State University, Coppin State University and the University of Maryland, Eastern Shore. Bowie State and Morgan State offer MBA programs.
Too early to tell
Bowie State MBA program coordinator Granville Sawyer said it’s too early to tell whether the end of the UB-Towson program will have any impact on Bowie State’s enrollment.
“Anytime to a new program similar to other programs is created within a system such as the University of Maryland system, that’s a possibility,” he said.
For him, the school is not just competing with other MBA programs within the university system, it’s also competing with private schools.
“There are a lot of MBA programs in this area,” he said. “There’s a lot of competition for graduate business students.”
Bowie State’s MBA program has 50 students and enrollment numbers have been steady for the past few years, Sawyer said.
“I think we’ll have to wait and see how this plays out,” Sawyer added.
