19 credits
Business intelligence, systems analysis, IT project management. Five of the six courses are taken in the computer science department.
Bachelor of Arts
(v3) Business
Major | Minor
At Goshen College, this is Business…
Every organization runs on the same question: what are we making, and who is it for? Business is how you learn to answer it, and lead the people who help you build it. You’ll study that inside a liberal arts college, which means you graduate able to think across fields, write clearly, and work with people who don’t see the world the way you do, and that combination is what makes your Goshen College business degree worth something. A business degree gets you the first interview. The rest, how you think, write, and work with people, is what makes you hard to replace on day one, harder to replace tomorrow, and the reason your career keeps building from there. It’s also a credential that travels: wherever you go next, an hour from campus or back across an ocean, the language of business is the same, and your Goshen College business degree comes with you.
Why Study Business at Goshen College?
Because you learn business in a place small enough that people know what you are good at, and broad enough that you learn to work with people unlike you.
In classes this size your professors know your name and your ideas in the first week, not the third year. They are the ones who connect you to the internship, write the recommendation, and tell you honestly when an idea will not work. That is worth more over four years than a bigger building.
Ethics is required coursework here, not a guest lecture. Every business major takes it, because a degree that teaches you to run something without asking what you owe the people it affects is only half a degree.
What sets this program apart
- A concentration, not a general degree. Everyone leaves with a specialization on the transcript, in an area employers hire for by name.
- Ethics in the required core. PHIL 203, taken by every business major. A philosophy course, not a compliance unit, and required rather than optional.
- A defined route into the MBA. At 60 undergraduate credit hours with a minimum 2.50 GPA, you can begin taking Goshen MBA coursework as an undergraduate. Students who formally apply to the MBA program must also meet MBA admission requirements. Goshen alumni receive a 10 percent tuition discount on graduate programs.
Goshen welcomes students of every background, religious or not. Whether your world is an hour from campus or an ocean away, you can belong here as fully yourself while you build something you can take anywhere.
Choose your Concentration
Data and Systems Management
Healthcare Management
18 credits
Hospital administration, healthcare consulting, health insurance, public health organizations. Half the concentration is public health coursework.
Operations Management
18 credits
Supply chain, logistics, manufacturing, process improvement. Includes cost accounting, which operations employers ask about.
People & Culture Management
18 credits
Human resources, organizational development, talent management. This is the concentration that carries Goshen’s peace and conflict studies into a business credential.
Major or Minor: Which One Fits You?
The major is the full degree, a shared core plus a concentration you choose. The minor is the fundamentals, added to whatever else you are studying.
The Business Major: 49 to 50 credits, B.A.
- For students who want business to be the degree and the direction.
- A 31-credit shared core across accounting, marketing, analytics, information systems, economics, ethics, and strategy, plus one concentration of 18 or 19 credits chosen from four.
- Includes a required experience-focused course, dedicated career planning, and a senior strategy capstone.
- Teacher certification in business for grades 5 through 12 is available through the education department.
- You can begin Goshen MBA coursework once you have 60 undergraduate credit hours and a 2.50 GPA.
Two planning notes: you cannot double major in business and accounting, or in business and marketing. And your concentration choice can rule out the matching standalone minor, so choose it with your advisor.
The Business Minor: 20 credits
- For students who want to understand how organizations work without changing their major.
- The foundations: accounting, how customers decide, information systems, and economics, plus nine credits of upper-level business you choose.
- No fixed track after the foundations. You aim the upper-level credits at whatever your major does not already cover.
- Pairs with almost anything. Scientists who will run a lab budget, artists who will price their work, nurses who will manage a unit.
- Ask your academic advisor to map it against your current plan.
One planning note: you will need to meet the minimum grade standard in the courses that count toward the minor.
Common Questions About the Business Major & Minor
The Business Major (49–50 credits, B.A.) is designed for students who want business to be their core degree and primary career path. It includes a 31-credit core, an 18–19 credit concentration, hands-on experience, career planning, and a senior strategy capstone. The Business Minor (20 credits) provides basic foundational knowledge (accounting, consumer behavior, information systems, economics) plus 9 elective upper-level credits to complement any other primary major.
All four concentrations sit on top of the same 31-credit core, so your first year looks the same regardless. Most students declare during the sophomore year, once they have taken accounting, economics, and information systems and have a better sense of which they want more of. Your advisor and the department chair work through the fit with you before you commit.
Yes, with fields outside the business department such as education for teaching certification, a language, computer science, nursing. Business and Accounting or Business and Marketing share too many required courses to count separately, so students aiming that direction typically add a complementary minor like Financial Management or Entrepreneurship instead.
Graduates work as Business Analysts, Operation Managers, Financial Analysts, Human Resources, Supply Chain Analysts, Compliance Directors, Marketing Managers, Project Managers, Risk Management Analyst, Healthcare Administrators and more.
Yes. Once you have earned 60 undergraduate credit hours with a GPA of at least 2.50, you can begin taking courses in Goshen College’s MBA program while still an undergraduate. Ask your academic advisor how to plan for it, since the timing affects your remaining undergraduate schedule.
Scholarships make up a large portion of Goshen financial aid packages, which average almost $26,000 per student, not counting work-study or loans. Enrolled business students may also qualify for endowed awards including the Sauder Scholarship and the Gorseline Scholarship, listed with other scholarships. Run the net price calculator to see your own number, then talk it through with a real person in the financial aid office.
Where You’ll Put It to Work
Goshen sits in Elkhart County, the RV Capital of the World. Around that industry sits everything it requires: suppliers, logistics firms, banks, health systems, and the operations teams that keep all of it running. Your internship does not always have to require relocating.
Every business major is also required to complete at least three credits of experiential learning. You choose how to meet it. Some students take an internship with a business or organization. Some manage Java Junction the student-run coffee bar on campus, and spend a semester responsible for its marketing, purchasing, staffing, and daily operations. Some do job-connected applied learning inside a working organization, and some take on a business process innovation project.
Whichever route you take, you finish the degree with something you have actually run, and experience to strengthen your resume.
Alysha Liljeqvist
Associate Professor of Business
Jorge Montenegro Martinez
Assistant Professor of Business
Andrew Hartzler
Professor of Accounting
Patrick Farran
Associate Professor of Business
Jason Harrison
Assistant Professor of Business
Michelle Horning
Professor of Accounting
Program Director
Department ChairEyob Zeleke
Assistant Professor of Information Technology
Jerrell Richer
Professor of Economics
Carl Kreider Chair and Co-Director of Global Engagement
