According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the job market for health and medical service managers is projected to grow 32% in the next eight years, and Utah Valley University wants its students to be ready.

On Thursday, the UVU Woodbury School of Business announced a new Master of Business Administration program with an emphasis in health care management, which should prepare students to enter the workforce in a field that, according to the BLS, is growing faster than the average for all occupations.

“The MBA curriculum focuses on key business skills with a unique focus on the fastest-growing job area: healthcare,” Don Capener, associate dean over graduate programs for the Woodbury School of Business, said in a press release. “In the curriculum, faculty with healthcare expertise will address key issues impacting costs, healthcare access, informatics, legal issues, and other healthcare complexities.”

This new MBA track will prepare students to direct, plan and coordinate the business-related aspects of health care providers in public, private and nonprofit health settings, such as hospitals, group medical practices, nursing homes or companies that produce health care-related products.

Students will have the option to complete this program on a full-time one-year accelerated track available only at the UVU Orem campus or on a part-time two-year track, available both at the Orem campus as well as the new UVU Thanksgiving Point campus in Lehi that was acquired in 2020.

“UVU’s MBA in healthcare administration is based on engaged learning, where students receive real-world experience in planning, directing, consulting, and coordinating the business management activities of healthcare organizations,” states a press release distributed by UVU.

The Woodbury School of Business has been rapidly growing and changing within recent years. It has become the largest business school in the state of Utah with close to 5,188 students and celebrated the opening of the Scott C. Keller Business Building on Jan. 12., which consists of 205 offices, 30 classrooms, and several labs and resource centers.

“We really do have first-rate students at UVU, and now we have a facility that matches them and their dreams, and the things that they need to accomplish while they’re at UVU,” said Norm Wright, the former dean of the Woodbury School of Business. “A lot of what you see in this building kind of feels like that halfway point between higher-ed and industry. We’ve had a number of people from the industry come and say ‘this looks a little more like a business than it does like an institution of higher education.'”

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