Restructuring announcement launches Daniels School of Business into transformative future

WEST LAFAYETTE — The Purdue University Board of Trustees approved restructuring plans for the burgeoning Mitch Daniels School of Business on Friday (Dec. 13) to better serve the needs of students, faculty and industry partners while continuing its tremendous growth.

The new plan, which will go into effect July 1, 2025, will reinforce the five foundational pillars of the Daniels School: academic prowess, integration of STEM and business, transformational student experience, free market and capitalism, and business partnerships.

It will also shift the current two-department structure — which includes economics and management — to a nine-department structure:

• Accounting
• Economics
• Finance
• Management information systems
• Marketing
• Organizational behavior and human resource management
• Quantitative methods
• Strategic management
• Supply chain and operations management

The rationale for the restructuring, which was led by three advisory groups of faculty and staff members, stems from an increase in demand for the degrees offered by Daniels School of Business and the goal to provide better integration between STEM and business.

“Our new structure will provide agility to allow departments to quickly respond to evolving student, faculty and industry needs and better align with the overall campus structure,” said Jim Bullard, the Dr. Samuel R. Allen Dean of the Daniels School. “We believe it will assist in the recruitment of top-tier faculty and open new fundraising and partnership opportunities.”

Applications to the Daniels School grew by over 13% in the last year, with a record-high yield rate for applicants choosing to attend. This growth continues an impressive trend as new-beginner enrollment has surged by more than 150% over the last six years. To meet the increasing demand, construction started in September on a new 164,000-square-foot Daniels School facility. The student-centered project includes large classroom spaces that will be open to units across campus while creating a culture of collaboration and discovery. Plans also are underway for expanded growth of individual academic programs under the Daniels School umbrella, notably with the launch of a cohort of the Integrated Business and Engineering program for fall 2025 at Purdue’s new expansion campus in Indianapolis.

Several Daniels School programs ranked among the top 12 nationally in the latest U.S. News & World Report rankings, including production/operations management (No. 5), quantitative analysis (No. 10), supply chain management/logistics (No. 10) and analytics (No. 12). In the most-recent U.S. News & World Report graduate rankings, production-operations (No. 3), project management (No. 4) and supply chain management (No. 7) maintained or improved their placements.

This February will mark the two-year anniversary of the launch of the reimagined Daniels School, which continues to chart a new course for business education into the future, preparing each graduate as they leave Purdue to found and lead businesses and be the successful entrepreneurs and industry leaders of tomorrow.

About Purdue University

Purdue University is a public research institution demonstrating excellence at scale. Ranked among top 10 public universities and with two colleges in the top four in the United States, Purdue discovers and disseminates knowledge with a quality and at a scale second to none. More than 105,000 students study at Purdue across modalities and locations, including nearly 50,000 in person on the West Lafayette campus. Committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 13 years in a row. See how Purdue never stops in the persistent pursuit of the next giant leap — including its first comprehensive urban campus in Indianapolis, the Mitch Daniels School of Business, Purdue Computes and the One Health initiative — at https://www.purdue.edu/president/strategic-initiatives.