“Tomorrow’s managers need something extra. Employers expect graduates who join them as potential managers to have more than a degree. They also expect them to have the commercial awareness and personal skills to enable them to make a useful contribution from the start. ” (Sunday Times) The Management Charter Initiative, a body of leading British employers, have defined management as “the process of getting activities completed efficiently with and through other people. The functions or primary activities engaged in by managers are …

planning, organising, leading and controlling. ” Bangor degrees enable you to develop the vital skills required to manage people, manage information and manage finance. All of our courses relate theories and techniques to practical, ‘real world’ issues and situations. Case studies involving businesses of various sizes operating in a range of sectors, in both domestic and global markets, form an integral part of all of our courses. You will work through some of these individually, while others will be tackled in groups.

As well as illustrating principles of management in a realistic and up-to-date setting, the case studies help you to develop commercial awareness, as well as leadership, communication, teamwork and presentational skills. Business Studies and Economics. The BA (Hons) Business Studies and Economics degree offers you the opportunity to combine a broad programme of study in business with a specialism, which focuses on the economic context of business decision making. Almost all questions of government policy involve some economic dimension and can be analysed using economic techniques.

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As well as the big issues of government policy, economics also analyses the motives and behaviour of individual households and businesses. Indeed, many economists argue that an understanding of economics at the ‘microeconomic’ level is essential before the larger ‘macroeconomic’ issues can be addressed properly. Business Studies and Economics will appeal to anyone who combines a desire to develop practical skills for a career in business, with a broader interest in how the economy works at the local, national and global levels. Why is Business Studies Useful?

Business Studies provides a bridge between educational needs and The needs of life after school both in the context of employment, and as a means for providing a useful background for coping with business related problems and modern adult life. A Level Business Studies will be of interest and assistance to both males and females; to those going on to higher education and to those who are not; to those who may plan to go into business and to those who may pursue other careers in Accountancy, Banking & Finance, Estate Management, Travel & Tourism, Production and Retail Management.

Profit motive Stephen Hoare charts the rise of a subject that relies increasingly on the internet Tuesday March 5, 2002 The Guardian Business has never been so popular. Last year in the UK slightly over 209,000 students took exams in business studies, just under half of whom were taking the subject at GCSE: 37,000 took the subject at A-level. Post-16, business studies is the biggest single subject area by far, according to the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority.

Taught extensively in sixth forms and further education colleges, business studies owes much of its popularity to imaginative use of ICT which is enabling students to set up virtual companies, track shares or model the economy. The launch of the advanced vocational certificate in education (AVCE) and the increasingly popular business studies A-level are attracting students who might in the past have studied economics. Use of ICT differs according to whether the subject is being taught in a vocational or an academic context.

Epsom and Ewell High School offers GNVQ foundation to its less academic pupils in year 10. According to Chris Goodall, head of business studies: “The courses are more practical and vocational than a GCSE and they’re popular with our less able students. Pupils use the internet for research and the school has set up a link with local company, Surrey Waste Management. ” On the other, more academic side, 50 students are taking business studies at GCSE, many of them moving on to A-level. Here use of ICT is more varied. Excel spread sheets, graphs and tables and lesson formats devised by the teacher.

The net is used for research and pupils are also directed to websites from where they can download business simulations – computer models of how businesses are changed or adapt to external pressures , such as changes in the market, price fluctuations and so on. There is a clear progression to vocational qualifications which boosts numbers entering the school sixth- form. GNVQ intermediate provides a stepping stone. Schools that are well-equipped with ICT are at an advantage. Epsom and Ewell High has a dedicated, small business classroom of 10 internet computers set up with help from a local sponsor.

The school shares the facility with local small businesses which can come in and use the room out of school hours or when there are no business lessons timetabled. There is, too, a dedicated business studies classroom with 25 workstations. ICT is also key to making business studies interesting and accessible. St Francis Xavier College in Liverpool, an 11-18 boys comprehensive with a co-ed sixth form, wants to go for specialist college status in business. The school has seen business studies grow from one subject co-ordinator to a department of three and a rise in student numbers along with its investment in ICT.

Headmaster Brother Francis says: “We have just over 100 sixth-formers doing AS, A2 and advanced GNVQ in business studies – that’s around half of the sixth form. “Students have a special ICT commonroom and classrooms equipped with IBM computers. All coursework is word-processed and we have strong training links with Ford and Jaguar. Business studies is an ideal combination with ICT, maths, psychology or foreign languages. ” South Dartmoor Community College offers a range of post-16 business courses and has developed a special web site for the 80 students who study the subject in the college’s sixth-form block.

“We can have 30 students at a time editing our site,” says head of business Samantha Memory. “They publish pages on economic problems and business case studies. I take quite a few of my lessons in the IT suite. ICT is a very good motivator particularly with the lower ability vocational groups. ” Students see the links with business as providing a route to employment. So do employers, many of whom are keen to sponsor business studies through online resources and CD-roms.

Enterprise Insight, a new joint venture by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), the Institute of Directors and the local Chambers of Commerce network, has just secured i?? 50,000 in funding from the Treasury to bring schools and businesses closer together. “Artists, sportsmen, tradesmen, it doesn’t matter what you study at school or college – everyone needs to learn about business,” says Oonagh Harpur, EI’s chief executive. “ICT is a big part of making that exciting. ” Support for teachers of economics and business studies comes from two organisations which share a website.

Biz/ed, part of Bristol University’s Institute for Learning and Research, hosts pages on its site for EBEA, the economics and business education research organisation. Both groups help specialist teachers network and share best practice besides providing a new series of interactive online business simulations, the Virtual Learning Arcade. Biz/ed plans shortly to launch online business courses through a virtual learning environment that will be installed on its server and sell schools space on it. Schools will be able to customise the case studies, exercises and questions to suit pupils’ needs.

“It’s an online textbook which schools can edit,” says Beharrel. “It’s an always-on web-based service and effectively we’d be licensing it to them. ” Meanwhile, support from business itself has been flagging. Fewer companies are producing high quality online support materials for business education. Nancy Wall, co-ordinator of the Nuffield economics and business project, says there are almost no online teaching materials or business websites suitable for the pre-16 age group. “There are fewer simulations now as the cost of producing them is so high. It’s a serious cause for concern. ”

wound up after a year its assets – after running costs have been deducted – will be distributed between the shareholders, and local charities. According to the pupil’s link teacher Marianne Gifford the experience is having a big knock on effect in other subjects. She says: “It’s a huge benefit to young people ; it’s developing team skills, communication skills and confidence. They’re getting quite a lot of help from their business mentor Kevin McCarthy, the general manager of the Castle Hotel. ” It is ironic that most participants in Young Enterprise projects are not able to combine their hands-on experience with classroom study.

Oonagh Harpur of Enterprise Insight says: “Most people do Young Enterprise aged 14. Post 16, there is too much going on in college there’s no time for extra curricular activities. ” However there is a strong correlation between business links, involvement in enterprise schemes, and use of ICT which help inform subject choices higher up the educational ladder. The young directors of Phoenix Design will probably move on to business studies when it is available in the sixth form and from there to higher education or employment.