AACSB Grants Reaccreditation to Sykes College of Business

The University of Tampa Sykes College of Business has maintained its business accreditation by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB). AACSB International is the longest serving global accrediting body for business schools that offer undergraduate, master's and doctoral degrees in business and accounting.

The reaccreditation report noted several of the College of Business’ (COB) strengths and effective new initiatives, including:

The Strategic Analysis Program, in which all COB students work in teams to write and present a strategic analysis and develop a strategic plan for an actual business.
The new, high-profile COB Research Day;
The Professional Expectations Partnership, which supports the University’s priority on ethical behavior and integrity in daily interactions through outlining faculty and student responsibilities both in and out of the classroom;
EMBA Boot Camps, which are designed to refresh the basics for those individuals who have been out of the classroom for some time;
The Introduction to Global Business Course, which is a survey course developed to address the functional areas of business in an international framework.

AACSB requires all accredited schools to undergo a peer review process every five years in order to maintain accreditation.

With the reaccreditation, UT students will continue to earn accredited degrees in such undergraduate programs as accounting, finance, information and technology management, marketing, entrepreneurship and management, as well as MBA and other master’s degrees.

“Our reaccreditation reaffirms our efforts in meeting high standards of business education and research,” said Sykes College of Business Dean Frank Ghannadian. “AACSB is the gold standard in accreditation and keeps us in a prestigious group of business schools worldwide.”

AACSB Accreditation is the hallmark of excellence in business education, and today, there are 687 business schools in 50 countries and territories that maintain AACSB Accreditation.

“It takes a great deal of commitment and determination to earn and maintain AACSB Accreditation,” said Robert D. Reid, executive vice president and chief accreditation officer of AACSB International. “Business schools must not only meet specific standards of excellence, but their deans, faculty and professional staff must make a commitment to ongoing continuous improvement to ensure that the institution will continue to deliver the highest quality of education to students.”

UT was first accredited for all its undergraduate and graduate programs in 1998.