New Master of Engineering (Specialization with Business) courses

[Hancock]

Has anyone heard of this new style of courses? I went on the Melb School of Engineering website today and apparently it's going to be implemented next year for B.Sci and B.Env grads to have some integrated engineering business subjects. They've said that they are:

- Advanced electives in the Master of Engineering (technical streams) are replaced by 5 “business engineering” subjects.
- The 5 “business engineering” subjects will be tightly integrated with the other technical subjects giving students a good understanding of the business side of engineering applications.
- The 5 “business engineering” subjects are developed with engineering applications in mind.  They are not stock standard subjects from other faculties
- Students doing the relevant majors in the Bachelor of Science and Environments will be able to complete the corresponding “with Business” specialisations in 2 years.
- The 5 “business engineering” subjects are co-developed by Melbourne Business School.
- Students from the Bachelor of Commerce who have done the relevant Breadth track in engineering studies will need a further studies of up to 2.5 years to complete the corresponding “with Business” specialisations.

Seems kind of interesting to me, and I'm going to give it some thought next year whether I want to do the straight M.Eng(Spec) or the M.Eng(Spec with Business). It is also good to note that these subjects are actually tailored with the engineering faculty and not just Bus/Eco subjects from the Commerce faculty tacked on. This is reinforced by the fact that B.Com(Eng Breadth) students need to complete a longer M.Eng to get this with Business specialization.

New courses for next year:
Master of Engineering (Chemical with Business)
Master of Engineering (Mechanical with Business)
Master of Engineering (Civil with Business)
Master of Engineering (Software with Business)
Master of Engineering (Electrical with Business)
Master of Engineering (Biochemical)    - Replacing Biomolecular stream of M.Eng post 2014.

I also wonder whether or not these subjects will be broad across all disciplines of engineering. It'll be interesting to see how it is implemented and I'm happy that I'll have a year to see how the course goes for others before committing to either the full engineering version or the with business version.

What do you guys reckon?

LINK: Specialization with Business
http://www.eng.unimelb.edu.au/study/graduate/specialisation-business.html?utm_source=homepage&utm_medium=banner&utm_campaign=specialisation-business
LINK: New M.Eng (Biochemical)
http://www.eng.unimelb.edu.au/study/graduate/master-eng-biochemical.html?utm_source=homepage-banner&utm_medium=banner&utm_campaign=biomedical-promotion

[Hancock]

I doubt it'll make that much of a difference, but it does provide an alternative way of doing a more engineering focused engineering/commerce style degree structure. The more I think about this, the more I legitimately get excited.

[hobbitle]

I think it depends a huge amount on whether the accreditation is granted under the "with Business" scheme...

[Hancock]

Well yeah, that's a big part. The way I see it, if double degree structures can get away with doing 16 courses of Commerce and have accreditation, then 5 shouldn't be an extra issue with the added breadths being 4-6 in a standard Bachelor's degree at UoM. On the site it says that "They're convening with EA" to get accreditation, but of course prospective students will not even touch the structure if it's not looking like it's going to achieve full accreditation.