Business Education
Business Education, instruction to prepare students for jobs in the business world. There are basically two levels of business education.
Business training that is offered at the high school level, in junior colleges, and in some private business schools mainly prepares the student for office work. Typical courses include word processing, shorthand, bookkeeping, accounting, use of office machines, business English, and commercial arithmetic. Some schools also cover merchandising, selling, and retail purchasing. This field of study is sometimes called distributive education because it deals with the distribution of products. Many schools offering such courses have evening and Saturday classes to permit students to combine work and study.
Business education at the college level prepares the student for managerial and executive work. Course work includes accounting, banking, finance, business law, economics, industrial management, production, marketing, real estate, and statistics. A person planning an executive career often finds it advantageous to major in a science or in engineering as an undergraduate, and do graduate work leading to a master's degree in business administration (M.B.A.).
In former times young people received business training only through on-the-job experience. The first private business schools appeared in the United States about 1840. Gradually business education was extended into high schools and colleges and universities. The Wharton School of Finance and Commerce, established in 1881 at the University of Pennsylvania, is generally considered the oldest college-level school of business in the United States.