In a press release on Tuesday, Columbia announced the creation of a new business school for undergraduates, to be housed in Uris Hall after the graduate school finishes its move to the “swanky” new Manhattanville campus. Though the release did not provide many details about the new school, it did note that it would “place a special focus on training future leaders to work at the intersection between business and politics,” and that its students, while fully part of Columbia University, will “almost definitely” be exempt from the Core.
Spectador has learned that the school is planned to open in Fall 2023 in order for outgoing President Lee Bollinger to avoid controversy. The school will host around 1000 students, some of whom may be housed in repurposed Barnard dorms. Though President Beilock has heard “literally nothing” about this development, the University promises that the impact will be minimal as most students are expected to be internal transfers “entering as early as the middle of the first semester.”
“This move will help us better prepare students for the fields in which they will one day work,” Provost Mary Boyce said in the release. Though some have found the move controversial, she responded by stating that “the creation of a business school for undergraduates came from pressure to better prepare students for their careers at Goldman Sachs or Morgan Stanley, allowing them to skip the dreaded ‘exploration’ stage of college.”
The move will make Columbia only the second Ivy League to house a separate undergraduate school for students focusing on business, though that figure does not include Cornell. There is no current name for the school, but with the University courting new potential donors, it is possible we may soon have a Kushner, Sackler, or Nestlé Business School.
