| Business schools and programs attempting to become accredited by the Association of Business Schools and Programs (ACBSP) have been required to demonstrate a global context within the core business curriculum. However, no prescribed methods for reaching this standard are stated in the accreditation guidelines. The purpose of this study was to determine the methods and extent of internationalization of business schools and programs in order to fulfill this ACBSP accreditation requirement. A secondary purpose addressed in the study was the need to develop an index by which business schools and programs might be ranked according to level of internationalization, then to identify those institutional factors which make the greatest statistically significant difference in the ranking of business schools and programs according to internationalization.;The data for the study were gathered from a survey instrument developed for the ACBSP Global Business Education Committee. The survey was mailed to 441 ACBSP member institutions, and 129 were returned, a response rate of 29%, which was inline with response rates of three previous descriptive surveys commissioned by ACBSP. Of the 129 returned, 119 were deemed usable by virtue of being at least 80% complete.;Based upon a literature review, 10 elements were selected as being the most critical to successful internationalization. Those 10 elements were then analyzed by frequency analyses to answer Research Question One. To answer Research Question Two, the frequency analyses were used to divide the data along natural divisions into categories for each of the 10 elements, and then the categories were weighted from 0--5 to arrive at the Internationalization of Business Component Index (IBCI) for each institution The IBCI was then sorted for ranking institutions according to their respective indices from most to least internationalized. The resulting rankings ranged from 0 to 48, with a possible high ranking of 50. The IBCI then became the dependent variable in the one-way ANOVA of the 16 institutional characteristics tested by the hypotheses, and when there was significant difference, the Duncan post hoc test was used to determine where the differences existed within the institutional characteristic.;On the IBCI scale of 0 to 50, it was found that three-fourths of two-year institutions ranked at 20 or below, while two-thirds of the four-year institutions ranked at 21 and above. International degree options within the business component, foreign languages required in the business programs, and study abroad experiences for students were found to make significant differences in the internationalization process. Faculty international experiences and other faculty development activities were seen as making a greater difference at four-year rather than two-year institutions. Inclusion of international instructional methods within the standard curriculum was the element most often utilized to achieve internationalization. |
