Live classes, once a week
Your program begins in September with a 2.5-day launch experience where you’ll meet your professors, network with classmates, and build relationships with the members of your learning team. This weekend residency requires you to be physically present on Duke University’s campus in Durham, North Carolina. From there, your program moves online. Over the next 19 months, you’ll work through course modules--including readings and pre-recorded video lectures--on your own schedule, complete individual and team assignments, and join your class in real-time video classes each week.
After two terms, you may choose to return to Duke’s campus for an optional leadership intensive. This 2.5-day immersion in a framework for leading others helps you understand your leadership effectiveness and style, and provides guidance on developing solid, enduring leadership behaviors.
Throughout your program, you’ll be able to arrange most course assignments and deliverables around your other commitments, mastering fundamentals within online modules so that you get the most out of class discussions during scheduled sessions.
Collaborative environment
Fuqua’s difference comes from the way we structure professional learning—as peer teams. You’ll be assigned to a group of three to five peers with expertise in different functions and markets, and work closely together throughout your program. You’ll need to learn to trust and rely on each other’s strengths to accomplish your goals, gaining new insights and mastering the collaboration skills that will help you move any team forward. Even in an online learning environment, you are never alone because of our unique collaborative and high-touch approach.
Our Faculty
As with our other programs, the MSQM: Business Analytics program is taught by a team of world-renowned faculty—scholars recognized for excellence in their academic area and their research as well as their industry expertise, with a passion for teaching. Your professors are authorities in core business functions as well as in quantitative methods. They will challenge you with a rigorous curriculum and bring real-world insights that will give you new perspectives on your professional work.
Classroom Dynamics
Professors foster active in-class debates that draw insights from the range of experience in your cohort, so class discussions engage professionals from different sectors. Our learning method draws from cases and exercises that challenge you to tackle issues from multiple perspectives and give you practice in structuring problems based on multiple sources of data and presenting concise recommendations. The academic rigor and fast pace will ensure your time is well spent.
Over five terms, you’ll complete 16 courses: seven in core business functions and nine in data science, quantitative methods, and their applications in specialized business contexts. Each term will have a pre-reading period for you to prepare for the upcoming term. Your professors will give some reading or simple assignments to complete during the pre-reading period so you can hit the ground running once the term starts. You’ll have sufficient down time between terms and during holidays to re-energize.
While the course sequence and timing may shift between calendar years, the MSQM: Business Analytics structure is likely to follow this format:
- Program Launch in Durham, NC (2.5 days)
- Term 1 - Online (12 weeks)
- Programming for Analysis and Visualization
- Applied Probability and Statistics
- Managerial Economics
- Term 2 - Online (12 weeks)
- Business Fundamentals: Accounting and Finance
- Business Fundamentals: Marketing and Strategy
- Data Analytics and Applications
- Optional Leadership Intensive in Durham, NC (2.5 days)
- Term 3 - Online (12 weeks)
- Advanced Data Analytics and Applications
- Operations Management
- Navigating Organizations
- Term 4 - Online (12 weeks)
- Empirical Analysis for Business Strategy
- Digital Marketing
- Decision Models
- Term 5 - Online (12 weeks)
- Financial Risk Management
- Fraud Analytics
- Ethics and Legal Issues in Health Analytics
- Business Communications
Digital Learning
Combining independent study, live classes, and collaborative assignments, the MSQM: Business Analytics curriculum is delivered in a sophisticated and user-friendly online learning environment. The online platform serves as a repository for self-study materials such as pre-recorded video lectures, readings, and interactive exercises. It also enables face-to-face interaction, discussion of case elements, and debate of relevant topics with your classmates during live classes.
A balance of self-study, live classes, and teamwork
For each subject in the curriculum, you’ll work through a set of course materials on your own schedule. In addition, you will attend live, 75-minute class sessions with the rest of your class, during which your professor will present material in lecture format, conduct case discussions, or ask students to give presentations. Team collaboration will also be a significant part of each course, requiring you to coordinate schedules with your learning team to meet virtually and work through class assignments ahead of your next live class session.
The blend of the self-paced, live class, and teamwork elements of each course provides you the flexibility to balance program requirements around your professional and personal commitments while still allowing you to develop and maintain close connections with other students and the faculty. While you should expect to spend at least 15-20 hours a week on schoolwork, you can schedule these elements of your program around other obligations.
One Platform
Throughout the program, you’ll use your digital learning platform to:
- Submit assignments
- Download course materials
- Interact with classmates
- Read class and team bulletin boards
- Take exams
- Contribute to course discussion boards
- Share documents
- Call your teammates
| Month | Date | Event |
| September 2020 | 4-6 | Launch Experience/Orientation in Durham, NC |
| Term 1 - Online (12 weeks) | ||
| September 2020 | 7-14 | Reading Period |
| September – December 2020 | 15-14 | Classes |
| December 2020 – January 2021 | 15-4 | BREAK |
| Term 2 - Online (12 weeks) | ||
| January 2021 | 5-18 | Reading Period |
| January – April 2021 | 19-19 | Classes |
| April | 20-26 | BREAK |
| May (2021) | TBD | Optional Leadership Intensive in Durham NC |
|
|
||
| Term 3 - Online (12 weeks) | ||
| April - May 2021 | 27-17 | Reading Period |
| May - August 2021 | 18-16 | Classes |
| August 2021 | 17-23 | BREAK |
| Term 4 - Online (12 weeks) | ||
| August - September 2021 | 24-6 | Reading Perion |
| September - December 2021 | 7-13 | Classes |
| December 2021 - January 2022 | 14-3 | BREAK |
| Term 5 (online) | ||
| January 2022 | 4-10 | Reading Period |
| January – April 2022 | 11-11 | Classes |
| GRADUATION CEREMONY | ||
| May 2022 | 7-8 | Duke University Campus, Durham, NC |