School of Management Growth Leads to New Departments

The School of Management at the University of Michigan-Flint will be expanding in 2016 with two new instructional departments.

The University of Michigan Board of Regents approved on Thursday, May 19, the addition of a Department of Accounting, Finance, and International Business, as well as a Department of Management and Marketing.

Both departments take effect in spring of 2016, and represent a major change to the way SOM is structured.

Dean Scott D. Johnson said breaking up the school into departments is something he said he and his colleagues have been thinking about over the last decade or so.

The School of Management has seen increased enrollment over the last two decades. Officials within SOM proposed the new departments because the current structure wasn't keeping up with the school's growth.

The Department of Accounting, Finance, and International Business would include a chair and approximately 12 tenure track faculty and nine lecturers. The Department of Management and Marketing would include a chair and approximately 14 tenure track faculty and six lecturers.

Johnson said the two departments seemed the most "natural" way to break up the school. Having two department chairs, he said, offers a chance for there to be more leadership for junior faculty as well as for students and student groups.

"It's always been a centralized model…I think it will be good to have the department chairs there," he said.

It may also just be the beginning.

"We hope to continue to grow and over time there might even be more (departments)," Johnson said.