As a business communication scholar and practitioner, I tend to view my work in the Mendoza College of Business through a narrative lens. As defined in the communication discipline, narratives give meaning and assist individuals as they seek to understand their interactions with the world in which they live.

From this perspective, in my new role as academic director for undergraduate studies, I’m entering into an already existing narrative that continues to evolve in response to the demands of the current historical moment. As with most narratives, an undergraduate curriculum narrative shifts over time by competing and converging to shape meaning and ongoing communicative engagement.

Narratives are powerful because they encourage a shared language that creates coherence and a sense of truthfulness to the story. For example, the most recent iteration of our College’s mission, vision and goals statements describe our responsibility to “provide an unsurpassed educational experience that contributes to the formation and preparation of undergraduate students who will meaningfully contribute to the world.”

The seriousness of this task is announced in the phrase, “unsurpassed educational experience.” To meet this weighty charge, the current narratives of the undergraduate curriculum coalesce around the ideals of being Student-Oriented, Integrated and Innovative.

The new Business Core curriculum offers greater flexibility and expanded choices as students discern their plans of study. Students will have more opportunities to specialize in a secondary discipline to further explore their academic interests and career aspirations. The newly approved Accountancy-Finance double major serves as one example for students to acquire a strong foundation in the fundamentals of accounting and finance while also offering the flexibility to pursue additional interests in more depth.

Designing an integrated curriculum is important to Mendoza because it demonstrates a commitment to simultaneously pursuing analytic excellence while emphasizing a focus on ethics and Catholic social teaching. These commitments interplay with the business disciplines that serve as the foundation of our students’ learning.

Lastly, the new Business Core curriculum is designed to encourage course innovation. For example, departments have additional opportunities to develop minors that would be open to all business majors, cross-disciplinary minors that depend on courses across multiple departments, as well as cross-College minors. The recently launched Foundations of Business minor and the recently approved Business and the Common Good minor represent just the beginning of the possibilities for course innovation and cross campus collaboration. The College’s investment in experiential learning endeavors and study abroad immersions will provide additional course innovations.

Implementing these ideals each and every day would not be possible without Mendoza’s departmental directors of Undergraduate Studies, and our operations and student advising teams. These teams provide the curricular insight, logistical expertise and student support that are central to the learning experience. We are fortunate to have the finest professionals working in these roles across the College.

Although promoting this narrative that is attentive to being student-oriented, integrated and innovative is a community effort, the academic director serves an important function here for protecting its purpose. One of the most significant ways to protect this narrative is through a systematic process based on business accreditation standards. The Assurance of Learning activities involve assessing student learning and ensuring that student learning goals align with the learning activities featured in the course. Our College’s commitment to Assurance of Learning is demonstrated in many ways, from the faculty members who design and deliver courses to the various undergraduate curriculum committees that ultimately review the learning goal assessment reports.

Over the next year, I will be working closely with our directors of Undergraduate Studies and various stakeholders to prepare the necessary deliverables for our next accreditation visit. All of this work is done in the spirit of creating the best possible learning occasions for our students.

Former dean Carolyn Woo once discussed our business curriculum in terms of being “worthy of our students” and “worthy of our students’ parents’ sacrifice.” By promoting and protecting our undergraduate curriculum narrative, we are able to meet the challenges that curricular changes often bring and rely on our shared commitments when competing interests arise. I look forward to contributing to this ongoing narrative as we strive to make our curriculum “worthy.”

Amanda G. McKendree, Ph.D.

Associate Teaching Professor of Management
Academic Director for Undergraduate Studies
Arthur F. and Mary J. O'Neil Director, Fanning Center for Business Communication