Northwood University means business, literally. Northwood is singularly focused on developing the leaders of tomorrow’s global, free-enterprise society. The university is 52 years old, founded in response to the higher education industry’s focus on cutting back business programs in the wake of the Soviet launch of Sputnik.
“Our founders felt strongly, and we still do today, that no matter what you’re trying to accomplish, you have to have leadership at an organization,” President Keith Pretty says. “You need people that can manage and help people to be their most productive. We are very focused on providing our students with leadership opportunities, and nurture their abilities whether they end up working in large organizations or as entrepreneurs.”
Curriculum building
Northwood has 6,500 students, full-service residential campuses in Midland, Mich., Cedar Hill, Texas, and West Palm Beach, Fla., approximately 25 adult degree centers around the country for working professionals and five international program centers. One of the university’s defining characteristics is its dispersed operating model compared to most of the higher education industry. Northwood makes that model work through a variety of efforts. One strategy is to have strong, focused and consistent curriculum.
“Our faculty has the right and obligation to teach in their own individual way, but with the common philosophy of the university,” Pretty says. “We have a very strong code of ethics and set of outcomes for our mission and vision statements, and those apply across the system and provide great consistency and understanding of what we are no matter what the location.”
Another is consistent communication, and Northwood uses a lot of technology to facilitate that. The senior management group stays in touch on a regular basis from various locations.
“We also hire very good people who understand their responsibilities and are focused on serving the needs of the students first and foremost and the business community secondly,” Pretty says. “Those philosophies have worked well for us.”
In addition, Northwood has extensive interaction with the business community. All academic programs have advisory boards led by faculty and made up of professionals from leaders of industries around the university’s campuses.
“Regular advisory board meetings help us gather information on the needs of various industries, on the type of education we need to provide, how industries are evolving, where we need to reform our curriculum and if there are classes we need to add or retract,” Pretty explains. “This gives us a strong connection to the needs of a wide variety of industries.”
Northwood has invested in a number of curricular areas over the last decade. It added a program for entertainment and sports promotion management, a program that is today one of its largest programs across the system. Additionally, Northwood also provides a major in entrepreneurship at its three main campuses so students can focus on business formation, capital formation, business plans and turning an idea into a viable business opportunity.
“We have a number of programs that are in development right now that we will be adding to our offerings in the next year,” Pretty says. “Even in our graduate program, we’ve added a number of specialty MBA programs. We have worked very closely in partnership with different industries and probably the newest innovation we’ve brought to the market is a combined four-year BBA/MBA degree for very diligent students to complete the BBA in three years attend and complete their MBA through our graduate school of management in their fourth year.”
The right environment
Like all higher education institutions, Northwood must invest in campus improvements as well as curricular enhancements. The difference is it must make decisions about priorities across many different campuses and locations. In the last few years, the university has made several additions to its footprint. In 2008, it opened the 25,500-square-foot Sloan Family Building for Aftermarket Studies in Midland. It serves undergraduates studying core auto industry courses in aftermarket manufacturing, heavy-duty marketing, aftermarket retail/wholesale management, supply chain management, lean distribution, logistics, current industry issues, general education and strategic management.
In 2009, the university received financial support from Three Rivers Corporation to renovate and expand its Bennett Sports Center, also in Midland. In 2010, it opened a new location in Grand Rapids, home to an adult evening MBA degree program. And in May 2011, Northwood University began construction on a 62-bed dormitory in Cedar Hill that opened in the fall.
“We’ve been adding facilities to all of our campuses,” Pretty says. “We have a number of brand-new facilities on the Texas campus, including a student union and an events center as well as most of the funding for a new graduate school building. We are planning a similar building for the Florida campus. Our facilities are quite modern and one of the important reasons why students choose Northwood.”
The university is growing online, as well. It has expanded its online presence, particularly in its adult degree program. It has also been named a military friendly institution, serving active military members, retired military and military family members through traditional campuses, adult degree programs, its graduate school and advances in online learning. In addition, it continues to build international exchange programs to give students an international experience before they graduate. All of these components fit the university’s mission of serving the needs of its students and the business community.
“Northwood operates in a very unique environment that differentiates us from traditional higher education,” Pretty says. “The success of our graduates and our 44,000 alumni around the globe is pretty special. The Northwood network of alumni is a real asset for our graduates. They can interact with one another, and if they need help down the road, they can find a resource in our alumni database. The success of our graduates has helped us to continue to grow the university.”
