Wake Forest University School of Business

Wake Forest University
School of Business

Type	Private
Established	1969
Dean	Charles Iacovou
Academic staff	90
Administrative staff	100
Students	1,300
Location	Winston-Salem, North Carolina, United States
Campus	Urban
Colors	Old gold & Black
Website	business.wfu.edu

The Wake Forest University School of Business was formerly the Babcock Graduate School of Management and the Calloway School of Business and Accountancy. Established in 1969, the Babcock School admitted its first classes of full-time and executive students in 1971 and presented its first graduating class in 1973. The Babcock School was established with a gift from the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation and named in honor of Charles H. Babcock, a noted businessman and philanthropist who influenced civic, cultural and business development in Winston-Salem and North Carolina.

In 1985, the Babcock Graduate School of Management earned its accreditation from the AACSB, and in 1993, the school moved into the newly constructed Worrell Professional Center, the first building in the nation to house both graduate business and law schools under one roof. In 1987, Babcock launched its evening Master of Business Administration (MBA) program in Winston-Salem, followed by an evening MBA program in Charlotte in 1995 and a Saturday MBA program in Charlotte in 2004.

The Wake Forest University School of Business has long-standing relationships with international business schools including eight international programs that allow faculty and students from each school to teach and study at the other. The partner schools are Bordeaux School of Business, France; EM-Lyon Graduate School of Management, France; European Business School, Germany; Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta, India; Institute of Business Studies, Russia; University of Kaiserslautern, Germany; WHU-Otto Beisheim Graduate School of Management, Germany and Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, Austria.

The Wake Forest University School of Business houses several centers and institutions.

Each year, the Babcock School hosts a Marketing Summit which includes an MBA case competition, undergraduate case competition and a marketing forum.

For the MBA case competition, major corporations submit marketing challenges in a business case format. For example, in 2008, (judged by Bingham Willis) the event was sponsored by PepsiCo and students were challenged to develop new business opportunities for its True North snack food brand. In 2007, Motorola challenged students to create a marketing plan for its new Q product for small and mid-size U.S. companies. MBA student teams have 36 hours to create a marketing solution that is presented to a panel of judges and the sponsor's representatives. Past sponsors have included Motorola, Yahoo!, Coca-Cola, Lowe's Home Improvement Store, Apple Computer, Sara Lee, GlaxoSmithKline, Heineken, Microsoft, DISH Network / Echostar Communications and R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. The first-place team receives $5,000; second place, $3,000; and third place $2,000. In addition to prize money, participating students get great exposure to some of the world's best companies. Resumes of participating team members are published in a book that is distributed to the sponsor, panelists, judges and distinguished guests attending the Summit. Moreover, communications to senior marketing executives and recruiters at the country's 1,000 largest corporations highlight the competition and encourage executives to review participants' resumes. Past participants in the MBA case competition include teams from the University of Washington, University of Virginia, Michigan State University, Indiana University, Hong Kong University, Dartmouth College, University of California-Berkeley, and the Babcock School.