Asia PR News

BRUSSELS, Feb. 28 /PRNewswire-AsiaNet/ –

EQUIS Has Now Accredited 105 Business Schools.

On Tuesday, 27th February, 8 schools were awarded EQUIS accreditation,
which takes the number of accredited schools to 105 across 30 countries —

— Amsterdam Business School, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands
— CERAM Sophia Antipolis, France
— Faculty of Business, City University of Hong Kong, China
— Faculty of Business, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China
— Faculty of Business, University of Victoria, Canada
— ICN — Business School, France
— Korea University Business School, Korea
— Vienna University of Economics & Business Administration, Austria

Prof. Eric Cornuel, CEO of EFMD said, "From its inception, EQUIS has
targeted top-quality international business schools and we are delighted to
welcome 8 more leading schools into the EQUIS community. EQUIS started as a
European initiative for the benchmarking and accreditation of business schools
but it is now the leading global accreditation system. A distinctive feature
of EQUIS is closely related to its European origin: appreciation for diversity
and in one decade EQUIS has had an enormously positive impact on the quality
of management education worldwide."

EQUIS was created in 1997 by a mandate of EFMD’s member business schools
including Bocconi, HEC Paris, IESE, IMD, INSEAD, ESADE, London Business
School, and Rotterdam School of Management. It was inspired by the need to
develop an INTERNATIONAL accreditation system for those business schools,
wherever they were in the world that were trying to make an impact beyond
their domestic frontiers.

In designing EQUIS, EFMD responded to the needs faced by international
business schools that AACSB, AMBA or any other national accreditation scheme
were not satisfying or likely to satisfy in the foreseeable future. This
remains a key objective of EQUIS: to provide differential value over other
accreditation systems to a highly select number of world business schools that
strive for excellence.

Business schools that are accredited by EQUIS must demonstrate not only
high quality in all dimensions of their activities, but a high degree of
internationalization. EQUIS also believes that business schools should be as
closely connected to the real world of business as schools of medicine are to
working hospitals. There must be a balance between high academic quality and
the professional relevance provided by close interaction with the corporate
world.

Prof. Julio Urgel, the Director of EQUIS said, "Today is a special
milestone for EQUIS reaching over 100 accredited schools. The 100th school to
be accredited was actually the City University of Hong Kong and for the first
time we also welcome a school from Korea (Korea University Business School)
into the EQUIS community. We embrace the diversity all the new schools bring
to the network and believe this is what makes EQUIS the most sophisticated and
innovative improvement and benchmarking tool available for management
education."

More information is available at www.efmd.org/equis

About EFMD:
EFMD advances excellence in management development in Europe and worldwide
by building links between leading business schools and companies, creating and
disseminating knowledge on best practices and changing trends and providing
access to benchmarking tools and accreditations (EQUIS, EPAS, CEL, CLIP). With
more than 600 member organizations from academia, business, public service and
consultancy in 70 countries, EFMD provides a unique forum for information,
research, networking and debate on innovation and best practice in management
development.

SOURCE: EFMD Aisbl

CONTACT:
Matthew Wood,
Communications Director, of EFMD Aisbl,
+32-2-626-95-42, or matthew.wood@efmd.org
Web site: http://www.efmd.org/equis