Global Connections
University of Ghana EMBAs earn international business certificates at Fox School

Through a unique, international partnership, Executive MBA students from the University of Ghana earned certificates in international business at a two-day conference hosted by the Fox School this February.

Eighty-one students and faculty from the University of Ghana heard from world-class Fox faculty and renowned guest speakers who spoke on everything from understanding cultural differences to international supply chain management and the global financial crisis. Speakers included the founder and president of the U.S.-Kenya Chamber of Commerce, the chairman of the Mayor’s Commission on African and Caribbean Immigrant Affairs, a senior analyst of energy acquisition at PECO Energy, and more.

Organizers hoped that the theoretical mixed with the practical would provide attendees with useful tools they can implement when they return to Ghana, said Nicole Riley, the Fox School’s associate director of International Programs, CIBER/IGMS.

The University of Ghana EMBA students, “see themselves as really on the precipice of developing beyond what they have now, and they really see their current situation as an opportunity to maybe take lessons from India or China and apply that to their own economies,” Riley said.

She said what the students do with their international business certificates will be as varied as the wide range of industries, experiences and career tracts they represent – from private-sector positions to public service, finance, media and more.

“Coming from where we come from, we are only in one country, but you get here and you get information from all different parts of the world,” said Mary Anane, an EMBA student from Ghana. “We are learning about the United States, Kenya, Japan. And you can apply all that you learn to business you are doing in your own country.”

Bilson Jahdab Atagba, a revenue collector with the Ghana Revenue Authority customs division, said he was happy to be exposed to new ideas.

“We are now seeing what the world is thinking,” said Fred Abeku Arkorisul, another Ghana Revenue Authority collector.

This is the third year Fox has hosted University of Ghana EMBA students for the international business certificate program – a venture made possible by the Fox School’s Center for International Business Education and Research (CIBER) and MBA International Programs division.

– Christine Fisher