Comparative Study On Curriculum For Undergraduate Education Of Business Administration Between Sino-American Universities

Education is a purposeful activity; curriculum is an important means for achieving the aims of education. Systematic study on undergraduate programs of Bacherlor Business Administration could be helpful for finding the problem existed and presenting sound reform proposal for business ccurriculum and improving the training quality for business talents.The development of business education of the American university was compartmentalized into four historical periods including the initial and booming phase from 1881 to 1945, the growth from 1945 to 1959, the flourishing from 1960 to 1989 and the improving after 1990. For being affected by changes of regime and economy system, the development of business education in China was totally another story showing the features of discontinuity and could be divided into five stages including the Business category stage (late Qing Dynasty to 1949, excluding Economics), the broad category of financial education phase (1949 to 1987), the economic, management class period (1987 to 1993), stage of economic categories (1993 to 1998, including Economics Classâ…¡and Business Administration Classâ…¡) and management categories (1998 to now, not including the economics category).Throughout the development of Sino-US Business Education, some consistencies were presented such as the root, the academic nature and theoretical basis of subjects. Therefore, the business education in American and Chinese universities is an inevitable event for the social productive forces developed to a certain stage. Industrialization, labor division and the market economy make business education in university happened indispensably.The author presented that Business education in the United States was developed based on internal academic logic law. On the contrary, the Chinese following the external rule for its business education development was instable and lack of academic culture. Therefore, business undergraduate education in Chinese University based on external logic is hard to train its native talents and satisfy the needs of its industrial and commercial management development. In the long running practice, the objectives for American Bachelor Business Administration Education have been evolved on a spiral-type path meanwhile Chinese path is discontinuous even though it is the same with the America that is from generalists to specialists and to generalists. The American perspectives for business education were student-orientation, integration, innovation and ethics; the Chinese ones were knowledge, structure, reference and quality requirements. The students'abilities were the main points of both Chinese and American Bachelor Business Administration, but the highlight was different. The American followed the ability sequence of leadership, innovation and communication, while the Chinese stressed the political quality of students and analytical abilities. For American students being diversified, American Universities granted the students great power to choose courses they would like. The Chinese universities also wanted the students diversified, but there were not appropriated measures to be implemented because the Chinese students couldn't have much more freedom to choose their own courses. The American University has embedded ethics education into lectures, case studies and role-playing and theory courses to enhance students'moral cultivation. Chinese universities took the quality education as the same way with science knowledge. The method was still at the theoretical level of indoctrination, not combined quality education with professional education. In addition, in curriculum implementation, the author believes that American Universities have formed culture for upper and downwards communication between teachers and students. The interaction culture was matched with the requirements for business administration program implementation. Chinese universities presented a downward communication features. This way of communication may be helpful for science program implementation, but may not appropriate for business program that has a specific requirements for students'abilities. In the assessment for business education, the author proposed that a social accountability made the American universities paid much attention on assessment as a result the teaching quality had been improved. In China, educational assessment reflected more scientific values, for the assessments still focusing on the data, conclusions. More indirect assessment methods used had ignored the real value of the course and the degree of social recognition. From the comparative study, the author found that undergraduate education for Business Administration in China has disclosed some non-adaptation, mainly as follows:Business Administration Theory not suited to the development level of the social productive forces, the nature of business management disciplines not matched socio-economic development patterns, Business Administration Undergraduate Education incompatible with the mainstream management philosophy, students ability requirements conflicting to Undergraduate Education Objectives, curriculum implementation incompatible with social culture, and so on. There is no doubt that undergraduate education for Business Administration in China is necessary to be reformed. The curriculum reform for Business Education is a systematic project:it requires other related reform support in the following aspects such as education philosophy, education system and management system. In order to develop localized business talents, Chinese universities could start with finding needs of society first, then according to the needs for designing courses and selecting the appropriate implement ways to make programs really focus on improving students'abilities in self-learning, resilience, adaptability, interpersonal communication, coordination and innovation and furthermore make students have competencies in discovering, analyzing and solving practical problems.