Horizontal integration of courses through SAP: implementation in a business school

The teaching of ERP concepts and demonstration of transactions among business functional areas through ERP software such as SAP R/3 could open up wide choices in business curricula design and offerings. While vertical orientation of traditional business curricula has served its purpose, today's business education demands more horizontal integration among courses. The focus to horizontal integration in designing/redesigning business programmes may serve the following objectives: offering more value added courses to students; making the course offerings relevant to industry needs; logical integration of various courses within degree programs; improving job prospects for students. This paper illustrates how courses of a business programme have been redesigned to focus on horizontal integration. A regionally accredited business school took advantage of the SAP-University Alliances Program and changed various courses to incorporate SAP materials. The lessons learned from this exercise could be valuable to business schools elsewhere