West Virginia University

College of Business and Economics

The goal and vision is to help students learn and to encourage them toward great futures in the global marketplace. Here, you’ll find unique programs for the 21st century and faculty eager to see their students grow, discover and succeed.

West Virginia University offer students an education that helps move classroom ideas onto the "real world" stage. For example, our annual marketing competition puts students under pressure to develop a marketing plan for a local business, a venture capital fair pits student teams against each other to vie for expansion capital, and our statewide Business Plan Competition awards two teams $10,000 each for top new business strategies.

Additionally the students learn about business and economics by visiting China, the Asian economic powerhouse; Germany, an economy adjusting to reunification; Italy, Europe’s seventh largest economy; and Poland and the Czech Republic, among the most stable and prosperous of the post-Communist states.

West Virginia University Center for Career Development maintains close relationships with firms—from accounting to manufacturing to high tech—and brings recruiters to campus to meet students face-to-face for job and internship interviews. It also provides courses that help students focus on interpersonal and interview skills, business etiquette, and resume writing. Additionally, our advising staff has won awards for helping students navigate their way through everything from course registration to making career choices.

The college was founded in 1951, and we have more than 19,000 alumni. Last fall we celebrated the 50th anniversary of our Master of Science in Industrial Relations program. This well-respected degree program has a network of loyal alumni across the globe in senior positions at places such as General Motors, Bayer Material Sciences, Westinghouse and Marathon Oil, to name a few.