A bit more than a decade has passed since I stepped onto The Ohio State University campus for the first time. It has certainly been an exciting ten years for the college of business—and for me! For example, during the past ten years we became the first named college at the university—the Max M. Fisher College of Business. We achieved this by establishing new priorities through the Agenda for Action. Those priorities included:

• Excellence across all lines of activity

• Brand recognition for value-added quality

• Executive Education as a core competence

• International recognition for excellence in scholarship, reflected in teaching programs consistently rated in the top 20 nationally and among the top ten at public research universities

Over the past ten years the Fisher College has worked to achieve these goals and to respond to the pressing need for innovative business education in today’s global environment. As you will read in this year’s annual report, answering those needs has taken the Fisher College down a number of paths that have included expanding existing programs, developing new programming, establishing new partnerships and utilizing new technologies.

Many of our efforts have been funded by dollars raised during the college’s $100 million capital campaign, which concluded last year as one of the most successful fundraising campaigns in Ohio State’s history. With the opening of The Blackwell, our executive residence scheduled to start business in June of 2002, the college will have completed construction of one of the few fully integrated business campuses in the nation.

The results of our redesign have been satisfying. Our MBA program is ranked 23rd in the nation by US News & World Report, placing it fourth among the Big Ten and sixth among all public universities. Average MBA starting salaries are over $85,000, with starting bonuses bringing that first-year total above $103,000. Eighty-two percent of Fisher undergraduate students complete at least one internship before graduation. And in a Wall Street Journal survey published April 30 of this year, recruiters ranked the college 14th best in the nation.

While our accomplishments since 1991 demonstrate the college’s commitment to excellence, increased competition among business schools has stepped up the need for improving program offerings and delivery methods. Supporting faculty development and research remains an ongoing priority as funding opportunities continue to present a challenge. The ability to recruit top MBA students with incentives such as student fellowships is crucial to the continuing success of that program.

Support for innovative course development also continues to be a priority, as is the development of technology applications in areas
such as e-commerce and long distance and self-paced learning. The
creation of leading edge executive education programs is primary to
our continuing commitment to management education and can be seen in our innovative Executive MBA program. Finally, we will continue to focus on reshaping and fine-tuning our highly ranked undergraduate program. Activities such as our recent undergraduate emerging markets experience and expanded honors opportunities will further enrich this successful program.

We have come a long way. We arrived at the end of a decade with an extraordinary record of accomplishment, one which should be a source
of pride for us all. Around the world, Fisher graduates are changing the way people do business. Our work in preparing effective leaders who
can prosper in times of rapid change has never been more important.
As the next ten years unfold, we will build on this foundation and continue to aggressively find ways to be a major resource for worldwide executive leadership.

Joseph A. Alutto
Dean and John W. Berry, Sr. Chair in Business
Fisher College of Business

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