Understanding the MBA Degree

It is a field of graduate study that specializes in business administration after a student receives their undergraduate degree. Many consider an MBA to be one of the world’s foremost postgraduate degrees.  It is an advanced level degree in business management theory and practice, and it is a broad study of all the main aspects of business management.

The first MBA was introduced by Harvard University Graduate School of Administration in 1908 (now Harvard Business School). Reports shows that the USA is the world’s largest MBA ecosystem with around 125,000 enrolled students in over 500 colleges. It has become the most popular postgraduate degree in the USA, totaling about 25% of all Master’s degrees awarded.   India is number two with more than 3,000 MBA colleges.

About on-line MBA’s – a recent study by NorthEastern University found that:

• 61% of HR leaders believe that online learning is of equal quality to more traditional methods.

• 71% of organizations said they had hired applicants with an online degree.

• 52% believe that most advanced degrees will be completed online in the future.

Cost of the MBA Degree

Over the past 10 years the main change in MBA tuition is that online tuition prices become more affordable. There are many MBA schools that offer their online study programs for around $20 000, versus the on campus cost of  $40 000 to $60 000. 

1. The Metropolitan university in the UK recently offered their online MBA at $5000
2. Nexford University (www.nexford.org/) in Washington D.C for $2400

Massive Open Online Courses (moocs)  started to offer short MBA programs and nearly all of the major mooc type edTechs like Udemy, edX, Udacity, Skillshare, Simplylearn and Coursera now offer mini-MBA type courses.  MOOCs are considered by many academics to be the future of education.

The University of the People (UOP)  is a successful virtual business school created by e-learning entrepreneur Shai Reshef in 2009 that offers tuition-free education.

But in the end UOP is not totally free. The 2 year Associate degree costs $2,460 and the 4 year Bachelors cost $4,860. These cost are made up from $100 exam fees per subjects and registration processing fees.

On a global front both the Wold Bank and UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) provide funding and support for  low-cost / no-cost education to the masses.

There are mini-MBA’s offered by very reputable instances like PWC which they describe as a program offers “the most important business skills”. paste this link into your browser -> (https://www.pwc.rs/en/academy/MNE-Academy/Mini-MBA-brochure-CG-ENG.pdf)   But just like the full-length MBA, the Mini MBA’s are costly.

Quality of an MBA Degree

General misunderstanding that expensive MBA’s means “higher quality”. Business schools spend about 20% of their time and resources on teachingand the other 80% on research. Only the teaching 20% brings in any revenue and therefore have to charge 4 to 5 times more for an MBA degree, so that the school can fund the 80% of research overheads. This means that a $60,000 Mba is actually only worth $10,000.

This explains why some Business schools can offer cheaper programs without compromising the quality of the education. Online has even less costs associated to the delivery of the lessons and can often cost a business school between 75 and 50% less than having a full complement of class-room based lecturing staff, which is why there should be no stigma of “low quality” attached to MBA’s that only cost $2500 or $5000. However even these low cost offerings are still TOO EXPENSIVE TO HAVE A GLOBAL IMPACT. There must be strenuous efforts made to create a ZERO COST MBA FOR THE BETTERMENT OF GLOBAL SOCIETY.

In the end we really have no offerings that qualifies as a globally FREE ONLINE MBA since all of the existing offerings fall short in one way or another.

MAKING A FREE MBA PROGRAM WORK

Most universities and Business Schools are very set in their ways of thinking which does not make them fast responders to change. They also have vested interests in their brick-and-mortar existence which is largely dependent on donation and government funding, and they have a vested interest in protecting and maintaining their existing operating models. It is therefore not very conceivable that a major thrust towards free MBA training will come from this very established higher education sector.

Some governments have seen the need and put effort into developing more affordable education.

The Malaysian government created the Universiti Tun Abdul Razak (UTAR) (https://utar.edu.my) which was constructed in the 1990’s around “the latest information technology”.

in 2002 the Pakistani government created the Virtual University of Pakistani ( https://vu.edu.pk)  to promote distance education using modern information and communication technologies as its primary objective.

The Philippines government created the TESDA Online Program which is a web-based platform that offers free mooc’s for technical education and skills development to all Filipino workers (https://e-tesda.gov.ph) but the courses are all at basic level.

Which brings us to the final conclusion that at national government level there is also nothing available that can lead to a FREE ONLINE MBA.

An MBA Program built from existing Open Source information

As long back as 2014 Dustin McKissen, a LinkedIn Top Voice & Strategist, published an article asking whether there could be a Free, Collaborative, Open-Source MBA that provides a world-class business education, based on a collaborative model that uses social media to deliver lessons to the disenfranchised.

Now we have made it happen – A FREE MBA!

We are levelling the playing fields and eradicating “higher education privilege” to create an equal opportunity for all

and Remember to BtB

Please join out facebook group, where you can interact with the other course participant and the lecturers by asking questions and sharing information.    (Click here -> MBAone Global OpenServe Business School | Facebook