In the spirit of a true entrepreneur, the School of Management has set its sights on Asia in an effort to both expand its market and boost its rankings to become one of the top 50 schools in the country.

"We realized a few years ago that the way to grow, the way to become better, was to export your product," Lewis Mandell, dean of the School of Management, told members of the Faculty Senate on Tuesday. Since that realization, the self-sustaining SOM has honed in on the Asian market, building on its foundation as the first and only accredited MBA program in China with subsequent programs in Beijing-one each at Renmin and Motorola universities-and in Singapore. It also offers a program in Latvia and is working on developing one in Belarus.

Mandell said negotiations under way in Thailand could yield programs at the three top regional universities there, and he expects to start programs in the Indian cities of Bangalore and Hyderbad by 2002. SOM also has fielded interest from universities in Malaysia and Indonesia, and hopes to penetrate the Japanese, Taiwanese and Korean markets in the near future.

"By 2003, we will have more students in Asia than here on campus," said Mandell, noting that because of the Western New York area's demographic, interst in local market-priced programs has died out. "We'll probably be largely an Asian business school as early as 2002."

The school also has been asked by local members of Congress to begin a program in Beirut in 2002, and soon will launch an "Extreme MBA" program in Asia that will immerse students in international business. And back home-on the North Campus-plans for a new student center adjoining Jacobs Hall are nearing completion.

Sustaining Asian interest largely is the reason that bolstering the SOM's Business Week ranking-the school's standardized ranking of choice-is so important. With Asian programs accounting for nearly 40 percent of a roughly $13 million annual budget, Mandell said, providing Asian students with a "verifiable, objective, third-party validation of our claims" is key.

"Without the Business Week ranking, we can't sell product in Asia," he said.

It was only two years ago that UB broke back into the rankings after a 12-year absence, and since then has twice remained in the third tier. Mandell said he expects UB to be ranked in the top 50 in 2002. Bringing up the school's GMAT scores has helped but, so too, has increasing graduates' starting salaries. Mandell said the fact that many students come from Western New York and take jobs at lower salaries in the area after graduation has hurt the school’s ranking in the past.

The school’s latest effort in India is an example of how UB is finding its way up the chart. M&T Bank executives in Buffalo have paired with the school to offer major incentives to Indian information-technology graduates in an effort to recruit and retain the world’s top programmers in Buffalo.

Ten students from India—graduates of the Indian Institute of Technology, comparable to the U.S.’s MIT, and with four to five years of C++ and JavaScript programming already under their belts—will receive a full scholarship to the MBA program and will be guaranteed a job at M&T after graduating at a starting salary of $75,000, about $20,000 more than the school’s average starting salary last year.

With a spot among the top 50—which would be UB’s first appearance in 14 years—the SOM would be in the top 12 percent of the country’s business schools.

“Here, in the United States, we may only be the 50th-ranked business school,” Mandell said. “In Asia, they think we’re No. 1. We don’t tell them any different.”

And compared with other prestigious American universities that have begun to infiltrate the Asian market, Mandell said, UB is “eating their lunch” with a quality program at a reasonable price.

Given its success in Asia, the school is getting ready to launch what Mandell called an “Extreme MBA” program—due to its exotic locations—and will solicit students from the cream of the domestic business-school crop.

Students would be on rotation in Asia, spending six to seven weeks in one location while taking a class and serving an internship.

“It’s met with phenomenal, fantastic approval,” he said.

The school’s plans to add a new, steel-and-glass, atrium-style student center resulted from the desire to build something modern—less stark in appearance and more closely resembling the aspirations of students, Mandell said—where students could hang out and relax.

The three-story addition to Jacobs would be built in a semi-circular design and face Putnam Way.

Construction could begin as early as winter 2002.

In other business, William H. Baumer, chair of the senate’s Grading Committee, presented the panel’s Class Absence Policy, which raised questions concerning its rigidity, and the policy’s seeming allegiance to athletics over academics.

“Academic matters ought to take priority over athletics, but this assumes that it’s the other way around,” said Daisie Radner, associate professor of philosophy. “That is, whenever there’s a conflict between an exam and a game, the accommodation has to be made on the side of the exam,” she said, noting that perhaps the Faculty Senate ought to pass a resolution stating that students on athletic scholarships should not be penalized if they’re absent from an athletic event due to an exam.

Melvyn Churchill, professor of chemistry and a member of the Grading Committee, questioned faculty reluctance toward alternative exams.

“I think one should ask oneself whether we wish to be essentially a student-friendly university, or adversarial under the circumstances,” he said. UB, he pointed, out is not a private college for whom students’ parents are paying their way. Some students work 20-40 hours per week, and many experience “all sorts of troubles” that preclude them from always attending class, he said, ranging from unforeseen work demands to someone’s husband being killed.

Churchill said giving make-up exams is not only expected, but “quite reasonable.”

Finally, the presentation of a resolution on faculty responsibility from the Tenure and Privileges Committee was postponed until the committee has a chance to meet with Provost Elizabeth D. Capaldi.

Only a report providing background on the issue was presented at the meeting.