The Rawls College of Business (Jerry S. Rawls College of Business Administration, commonly referred to as Rawls Business) is the

business school A business school is a higher education institution or professional school that teaches courses leading to degrees in business administration or management. A business school may also be referred to as school of management, management school, s ...

Texas Tech University Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public university, public research university in Lubbock, Texas, United States. Established on February 10, 1923, and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the flagship instit ...

Lubbock, Texas Lubbock ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the county seat of Lubbock County. With a population of 272,086 in 2024, Lubbock is the 10th-most populous city in Texas and the 84th-most populous in the United States. The city is in the ...

. Rawls Business offers curriculum for both undergraduate and graduate students (including doctoral) and received its initial business accreditation in 1958 from the

Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) is an American professional and accreditation organization. It was founded as the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business in 1916 to provide accreditation to busines ...

(AACSB). Established in 1942, Texas Tech's business school was originally known as the Division of Commerce. In 1956, the school was renamed the College of Business Administration. Following a $25 million gift from alumnus Jerry S. Rawls in 2000, the school was renamed as Jerry S. Rawls College of Business Administration. The college is organized into five departments, called areas, and a separately accredited professional accounting school. Rawls Business also offers

dual degree Joint degrees are academic qualifications awarded through integrated curricula often jointly coordinated and delivered by multiple higher education institutions, sometimes across different countries. Graduates may receive a single qualification ...

s in conjunction with architecture, agriculture, foreign language, law, medicine, pharmacy, and environmental toxicology. The MD/MBA in Health Organization Management (HOM) allows medical students the opportunity to obtain both an MD and

MBA A Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a professional degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration; elective courses may allow further study in a particular a ...

degree over four years and is ranked in 2009 by ''

Business Week ''Bloomberg Businessweek'', previously known as ''BusinessWeek'' (and before that ''Business Week'' and ''The Business Week''), is an American monthly business magazine published 12 times a year. The magazine debuted in New York City in Septembe ...

'' as 19th among such programs. The International Business program helps Rawls Business students study abroad. In addition, the Executive Education Department develops seminars, conferences, and training programs for professionals and managers in business, government, and industry.

History

Business classes were first offered at Texas Tech in 1927, only two years after the university began holding classes in 1925. Established in 1942, Texas Tech's business school was initially known as the Division of Commerce. In 1956, the school was renamed the College of Business Administration. In 2000, the school was formally renamed as the Jerry S. Rawls College of Business Administration, following a $25 million (equivalent to $ million in ) gift from alumnus Jerry S. Rawls. The new Rawls Business building opened in 2012. The building was constructed on the site of the former Thompson/Gaston Hall. The

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is a Green building certification systems, green building certification program used worldwide. Developed by the non-profit U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), it includes a set of rating ...

(LEED) Gold certified building reused materials from the demolished structure. In 2013, the Area of Accounting became the School of Accounting, the first separately accredited accounting school in the state.

Academic profile

Organization

Rawls Business is organized by field into six departments: five areas and one

professional school Professional development, also known as professional education, is learning that leads to or emphasizes education in a specific professional career field or builds practical job applicable skills emphasizing praxis in addition to the transferab ...

: * Area of Energy, Economics, and Law * Area of Finance * Area of Information Systems and Quantitative Sciences (ISQS) * Area of Management * Area of Marketing * School of Accounting ::In 2013, the Area of Accounting became an independent professional school within Rawls Business. The School of Accounting is one of only about 40 stand–alone accounting schools in the United States, and the first accounting school in Texas to be separately accredited by the AACSB. Prior to completing a Bachelor's degree in accounting, students at

Austin College Austin College is a private liberal arts college affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA) and located in Sherman, Texas.Sherman, Texas Sherman is a city in and the county seat of Grayson County, Texas, United States. The city's population in 2020 was 43,645. It is one of the two principal cities in the Sherman–Denison metropolitan area, Sherman–Denison metropolitan statist ...

are eligible to enroll in graduate–level courses towards the completion of the

Master of Science in Accounting The Master of Accountancy (MAcc, MAcy, or MAccy), alternatively Master of Science in Accounting (MSA or MSAcy) or Master of Professional Accountancy (MPAcy, MPAcc, MPA or MPAc), is a graduate professional degree designed to prepare students for pu ...

(MSA) degree from the School of Accounting through an integrated program.

Health Organization Management

The Health Organization Management (HOM) program is part of the Texas Tech University Rawls College of Business. The program teaches students about the business side of health care. It awards a degree in

Master of Business Administration A Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a professional degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration; elective courses may allow further study in a particular ...

in Health Organization Management, or MBA(HOM). The program conducts and reports research relevant to health care in the United States and recently Canada and provides services related to healthcare organizations. The Texas Tech MBA(HOM) program is credentialed under the

Association of University Programs in Health Administration The Association of University Programs in Health Administration (AUPHA) is a non-profit organization of university-based educational programs, faculty, practitioners, and health care provider organizations. It works to improve the delivery of he ...

(AUPHA) and

Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Management Education The Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Management Education (CAHME) is the accrediting body for graduate programs in healthcare management in the United States and Canada. It is based in Spring House, Pennsylvania, and is a 501(c)(3) non ...

(CAHME) accreditation programs.

Rankings

In 2014, ''Business Week'' ranked the Rawls Business undergraduate program 83rd among United States business schools. In the 2017 '' U.S. News & World Report'' Best Undergraduate Business Programs, Rawls Business was ranked 94th, and the 2015 rankings the MBA program was ranked 87th.

Facility

Rawls Business is located on the Lubbock campus of

, which is situated in the rural,

South Plains The South Plains is a region in northwest Texas, United States, consisting of 24 counties. Counties The South Plains region includes 24 counties: The northernmost four (Parmer, Castro, Swisher, and Briscoe) also form part of the Texas Panhand ...

region of

West Texas West Texas is a loosely defined region in the U.S. state of Texas, generally encompassing the desert climate, arid and semiarid climate, semiarid lands west of a line drawn between the cities of Wichita Falls, Texas, Wichita Falls, Abilene, Texa ...

. The campus of Rawls Business sits on the northwest gateway of the Texas Tech campus, near the 9th Street bridge over the Marsha Sharp Freeway and across from the

Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous state in the South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the west, and has an international border wi ...

campus and University Medical Center. Prior to the current building, Rawls Business occupied the now College of Media & Communication, and the former English-Philosophy building. Rawls Business began occupying their current building in 2012, and completed an addition in 2016. The new building includes classrooms, breakout rooms, student lounges, study areas, food service, and a career management center. The building is a

LEED Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is a Green building certification systems, green building certification program used worldwide. Developed by the non-profit U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), it includes a set of rating ...

-certified facility, incorporating the latest green technology into all offices and classrooms. The $70 million capital campaign for the project was co-chaired by Alan White, chairman and CEO of Plains Capital Corporation, and Jack Hightower, chairman and CEO of Celero Energy. The new building is located on the north end of campus at the previous site of Thompson and Gaston Halls. The building was originally planned to be constructed south of the Merket Alumni Center, but was relocated after complaints from the Texas Tech Alumni Association. Other sites considered included the southwest corner of University and Broadway, where Weeks Hall is located. The building is constructed in Spanish Renaissance theme and creates a north campus gateway. The process of clearing the site began with a ceremony on September 20, 2008. Ground-breaking for the new building took place in September 2009, and the building opened for class in the Spring of 2012. The Rawls Business Building grounds feature three

sculptures Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

, including two from the

percent for art The term percent for art refers to a program, often a city ordinance, where a fee, usually some percentage of the project cost, is placed on large scale development projects in order to fund and install public art. The details of such programs va ...

program used to fund

public art Public art is art in any Media (arts), media whose form, function and meaning are created for the general public through a public process. It is a specific art genre with its own professional and critical discourse. Public art is visually and phy ...

on campuses of

Texas Tech University System The Texas Tech University System is a Public university, public State university system, university system in Texas with five member universities. Headquartered in Lubbock, Texas, the Texas Tech University System is a $3 billion enterprise focus ...

member universities. The

installation art Installation art is an artistic genre of three-dimensional works that are often site-specific art, site-specific and designed to transform the perception of a space. Generally, the term is applied to interior spaces, whereas exterior intervent ...

located in the eastern courtyard, ''We are in the Business of Changing the World'' by Joe Barrington and Tara Conley, was commissioned to coincide with the opening of the building; the sculpture features a

bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals (such as phosphorus) or metalloid ...

bear Bears are carnivoran mammals of the family (biology), family Ursidae (). They are classified as caniforms, or doglike carnivorans. Although only eight species of bears are extant, they are widespread, appearing in a wide variety of habitats ...

and

stainless steel Stainless steel, also known as inox, corrosion-resistant steel (CRES), or rustless steel, is an iron-based alloy that contains chromium, making it resistant to rust and corrosion. Stainless steel's resistance to corrosion comes from its chromi ...

bull A bull is an intact (i.e., not Castration, castrated) adult male of the species ''Bos taurus'' (cattle). More muscular and aggressive than the females of the same species (i.e. cows proper), bulls have long been an important symbol cattle in r ...

on either side of an illuminated archway of two sets of stainless steel pipes with identical bases that

tendril In botany, a tendril is a specialized Plant stem, stem, leaf or Petiole (botany), petiole with a thread-like shape used by climbing plants for support and attachment, as well as cellular invasion by parasitic plants such as ''Cuscuta''. There ar ...

either upwards or downwards at their ends relating to their adjacent

market trend A market trend is a perceived tendency of the financial markets to move in a particular direction over time. Analysts classify these trends as ''secular'' for long time-frames, ''primary'' for medium time-frames, and ''secondary'' for short time ...

-inspired

statue A statue is a free-standing sculpture in which the realistic, full-length figures of persons or animals are carved or Casting (metalworking), cast in a durable material such as wood, metal or stone. Typical statues are life-sized or close to ...

s. A second installation was commissioned as part of the 2016 building addition; ''Illuminated Arboreal Data Codes'' by Koryn Rolstad, is a group of 13 tree-like forms depicting graphic elements of

telecommunication circuit A telecommunication circuit is a path in a telecommunications network used to transmit information. Circuits have evolved from generally being built on physical connections between individual hardware cables, as in an analog phone switch, to v ...

s with four concrete bands extending from the watershed base, each engraved with a different text language:

cuneiform Cuneiform is a Logogram, logo-Syllabary, syllabic writing system that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. Cuneiform script ...

morse code Morse code is a telecommunications method which Character encoding, encodes Written language, text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code i ...

braille Braille ( , ) is a Tactile alphabet, tactile writing system used by blindness, blind or visually impaired people. It can be read either on embossed paper or by using refreshable braille displays that connect to computers and smartphone device ...

, and

binary Binary may refer to: Science and technology Mathematics * Binary number, a representation of numbers using only two values (0 and 1) for each digit * Binary function, a function that takes two arguments * Binary operation, a mathematical op ...

. Located inside the western courtyard, ''CEO'' by Glenna Goodacre is a 6-foot, 4-inch bronze statue of a young businesswoman that her daughter Jill Goodacre Connick modeled for in 1985; after a previous attempt to purchase the statue when the building initially opened, it was gifted by Goodacre to the college prior to her retirement in 2016. Construction on the previous Rawls Business building broke ground in 1966 and opened in 1968. It has , 176 offices, and 36 classrooms spread across 13 floors, including a basement. The building is the third-tallest in Lubbock, and the tallest on the Texas Tech University campus.

Student life

Notable organizations

* Accounting Leadership Council ALC (Accounting Association) *

Alpha Kappa Psi Alpha Kappa Psi (, often stylized as AKPsi) is the oldest and largest business Professional fraternities and sororities, fraternity. The fraternity was founded in 1904 at New York University. It is headquartered in Noblesville, Indiana. Histor ...

(Coed Professional Business Fraternity) *

Beta Gamma Sigma Beta Gamma Sigma () is an international business honor society. Founded in 1913 at the University of Wisconsin, University of Illinois and the University of California, it has over 980,000 members, selected from more than 600 collegiate chapters i ...

(International Business Honor Society) *

Delta Sigma Pi Delta Sigma Pi () (officially the International Fraternity of Delta Sigma Pi, Inc.) is a coeducational professional business fraternity and one of the largest in the United States. Delta Sigma Pi was founded on November 7, 1907, at the Schoo ...

(Coed Business Fraternity) * Rawls Graduate Association * Energy Commerce Association * Tech Marketing Association * Association of Information Technology Professionals * Health Organization Management Student Association * Finance Association * Real Estate Organization * Women In Business

Notable people

Alumni

Since its founding in 1942, Rawls College of Business community has 45,553 alumni.

Deans

* John Orval Ellsworth (1942–1946) * Trent Campbell Root (1945–1959) * Haskell Grant Taylor (acting, 1948–1966) * George Gail Heather (1950–1968) * Reginald Rushing (interim 1968–1970) * Jack Donald Steele (1970–1975) * Carl H. Stem (1975–1998) * Roy D. Howell (interim 1998, 1999–2001) * R. Stephen Sears (interim 2001–2002) * Allen T. McInnes (2002–2012) * Lance Nail (2012–2015) * Paul Goebel (interim 2015–2017) * Margaret L. Williams (2017–present)

Faculty

After many years of planning under longtime Dean Carl Herbert Stem, Allen T. McInnes became Dean of Rawls Business in September 2001. McInnes, the former president and CEO of TETRA Technologies, earned a bachelor's degree, MBA, and doctorate at the

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...

and a master's degree at

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

References

External links

* {{authority control Business schools in Texas Universities and colleges established in 1942

Business Business is the practice of making one's living or making money by producing or Trade, buying and selling Product (business), products (such as goods and Service (economics), services). It is also "any activity or enterprise entered into for ...

1942 establishments in Texas