Mendoza revamps the undergraduate business core curriculum

Starting in fall 2022, undergraduate students at the University of Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business have a lot more flexibility in choosing their plans of study. The College introduced a major redesign of its Undergraduate Business Core that reduced the number of required business classes almost by half.

“The new core curriculum meets our ultimate objective to expand students’ academic opportunities and improve their journey here at Notre Dame,” said Martijn Cremers, Martin J. Gillen Dean of the Mendoza College of Business. “The curriculum provides our students with greater choice in their individual curricula, enabling them to better design a curriculum suited to their particular academic interests and career aspirations.” The Business Core includes the business courses that all undergraduate business degree students must take regardless of their major. The key change is a reduction in the number of required courses from 49.5 credit hours to 25.5 credit hours. Importantly, all undergraduate students will still experience a foundational course from each business discipline. The reduced number of core courses primarily involves the upper-level courses currently required; these in part have been replaced by nine new credit hours of “broadening” business electives that students will take in multiple departments outside of their own major’s department. The changes to the curriculum provide students with more opportunities to specialize in a secondary discipline, both in other colleges and within the business school, while maintaining the overall balance between liberal arts and business coursework. The reduced requirements and enhanced flexibility also will enable further course innovation in the future, allowing faculty to offer new courses aligned with their academic and social interests. The new Business Core and major requirements to apply to the new First Year business students starting in Fall 2022.