Joseph W. Luter, III School of Business

The Luter School of Business offers a two-year program with four majors: Accounting, Finance, Management, and Marketing. Students apply as sophomores and must have completed prerequisite courses and have a GPA of 3.0 or higher.

Number of Graduates by Major

The Luter School of Business mission drives the curriculum. Program learning goals are derived from the mission objectives of students becoming critical thinkers; articulate communicators and ethical business leaders; achieving multidisciplinary competencies across the core business subjects and acquiring specialized skills in their major fields of study. Assurance of Learning (AoL) is a top priority for the Luter School. We focus our assessment around four key goals that include both formative and summative measures:

Goal 1 – Business Fundamentals: Students will understand and be able to apply core business fundamentals.

Learning objectives:

• Students will understand discipline-specific terms and concepts.
• Students will be able to integrate and apply discipline-specific concepts to formulate business strategies.

Goal 2 – Critical Thinking: Students will have the analytical skills necessary to identify and resolve problems and make decisions based on available information.

Learning objectives:

• Students will be able to recognize and define a problem and identify the information and tools required to solve it.

• Students will be able to apply appropriate analytical techniques to a given business situation, evaluate alternatives and determine a course of action.

Goal 3 – Communication: Students will be effective communicators.

Learning objectives:

• Students will be able to write a well-researched business analysis in a coherent and effective manner. Assessment: Writing assignments in each of the four major capstone courses using a common rubric.

• Students will demonstrate their skills in organizing a presentation properly, speaking effectively and thinking critically.

Goal 4 – Ethics: Students will have the ability to recognize, understand, and evaluate issues and situations in order to identify courses of action that will potentially result in ethical outcomes.

Learning objectives:

• Students will be able to recognize and understand ethical dilemmas.

• Students will be able to apply ethical principles in making decisions.

• Students will be able to demonstrate a recognition of the potential impact of their decisions.

Course-Embedded Benchmarks

Course-embedded assessment allows us to trace learning goals and objectives directly to the source material. This provides us with enriched assessment data and evidence to suggest that course offerings are meeting the requirements of student learning and achievement. The Assessment Committee in conjunction with the Curriculum Committee develops rubrics for faculty to use in collecting assessment data.

National Standardized Testing

The Luter School of Business participates in national standardized testing by the Major Field Test (MFT) for Business. This test provides comparison data for over 500 institutions worldwide. The MFT reports data for nine disciplines. Each year faculty review the data relative to their discipline and note any discernible trends. The Assessment Committee in conjunction with the Curriculum Committee discuss the MFT results and suggest changes to the AoL plan, as necessary. For the past several years, Luter students have performed well above the national average.

Christopher Newport University’s Center for Career Planning collects data from each graduating class. The Luter School of Business results are listed below. “FTE” refers to the percentage of students employed full time, and “Career Outcome” includes the percentage of students employed or attending graduate school within six months of graduation.