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Career Ready

Preparing innovative leaders for engagement, impact, and service

At the Barney School, we cultivate the curiosity and drive of each of our students into career success. Aligned with industry business models, the Barney School curriculum, expert faculty, and our Career Ready program prepare students to graduate with an agile skill set to lead the next generation of innovative thinkers and business professionals. 

Barney students graduate ready to hit the ground running!

From Classroom to Boardroom

students presenting

The Barney School classes not only challenge the students with academic rigor, but they also contain a career-ready component with curriculums and programs that reflect the real world.

At the core, the distinguished faculty is comprised of both scholars and practitioners in the focused areas of Accounting, Business Analytics and Managerial Economics, Entrepreneurial Studies, Finance, Management, Marketing, Risk Management and Insurance, and Sports Management. The Barney School faculty are committed to providing business terminology, concepts, and application in a challenging and dynamic environment. They bring strong academic disciplines and high qualifications to a learning environment that both challenges and motivates learning and preparation. 

Surrounding this core is an intense focus on career activation skills, expanding and enhancing the student for an effective and efficient transition into the workplace, once they complete their Barney School program. Ready for engagement, impactful results, as a seasoned individual and future organizational leader. 

The Fixture of our Curriculum: Career Readiness

Student asking about internship

Embedded in everything we do is our Career Ready curriculum. All of our classes offer rigorous academic programming focused on developing your personal and professional skills, so when you graduate, you are prepared for your future success and experience with employers. You will be career-ready! 

The career-ready curriculum consists of Project, Research, Internship, Mentorship Program, and Extra-curricular Activities. All these components provide the tools you need to be successful at the Barney School.
When a student completes their Barney program, they will assume professional positions in public, private, or non-profit organizations.  These entities typically thrive with a collaborative, team-based model where the collective wisdom of the team will bring about the optimal solutions or approaches to operational and strategic opportunities or challenges.  The ability to function and thrive in a cross-functional team environment is essential for career impact and success.  Hence teamwork is a key pillar of our career-ready curriculums and programs. 
Scholarly research is a hallmark of higher education. Whether it is operational, scientific, technological or financial in orientation, research is the foundation for developing innovative solutions for an organization and its customers. The Barney programs facilitate research initiatives in an effective way such that current assessments and observations are carefully evaluated; insights are developed. Both are then applied to create a set of alternative states or conditions which can be evaluated. From this, optimal solutions are identified and recommended for implementation. This evolving focus begins with research.
The Barney degree programs all require at least one internship.  Additional internships opportunities may be pursued if the opportunity presents itself and many students do participate. Regardless, these experiences provide the individual student to individually focus there academic and activation skills in a real-life environment with a partner organization, who may become a future employer.
Mentorship is a time-tested methodology for individuals to benefit from a professional, long term relationship with a trusted advisor.  The mentor provides a safe environment for building self-awareness, confidence, resiliency, understanding and encouragement for the student as they begin and move along their career trajectory. The mentor/mentee relationship is intended to be long term, through which the student receives support and confidence.  It is built upon trust, where the mentor believes in their capabilities.  This unique relationship provides a profound impact, enhances successful performance and achievement and is one “that can last a lifetime”.
Getting involved in extracurricular programs is a place to further a student’s knowledge and relationships, these programs are a platform for students to cultivate their leadership and communication skills.  There are many organizations waiting for new students to join.  Whether program-specific fraternal organizations, leadership clubs or social awareness in focus these organizations provide personal development opportunities and strengthen the students' academic and personal credentials.

Barney School Faculty

faculty-student-in-analytics-lab

Our Barney School faculty support and facilitate more than academic terminology and concepts. You will learn through case studies, completing classroom projects with our business partners and internships. Our faculty bring academic materials to life. A Barney School graduate is prepared to solve real-world problems while being aware of the need to behave ethically and responsibly. Barney School prepares students to be leaders.

Career Activation

student discussion

Along with your academics, you will develop the necessary skills to succeed through career planning and exploration activities. Our undergraduate degree programs offer important career-prep courses, like resume preparation, interview techniques, job-search techniques, business etiquette, and professionalism. Constantly updated to reflect the evolving business and hiring environments, our students receive the latest expert training to be competitive when applying for internships and jobs. 

Augmenting the classroom development of career activation, there are programs for acquiring professional certificates in areas such as skill development, communications, change management, and project management. The Barney School of Business launched the Barney Passport Program for its undergraduate, graduate, and faculty in 2020. The purpose of this program is to provide a series of credentialed programs and certificates indicating skills acquisition and mastery in a subject or skill area.

Barney Passport Program includes:

  • Excel: basic data management and analytics
  • Tableau: data visualization
  • Bloomberg Market Concepts: business intelligence
  • Project Management 
  • Udemy Learning Platform: Programming languages such as Python, R, and SQL.

Industry Partners

Panel discussion at Barney Liftoff

The Barney School has developed a network of industry relationships with diverse organizations, ranging from Fortune 500 companies to start-ups that will provide learning and career strengthening experiences and ultimately a potential place of employment once they complete their program. 

The Barney School Board of Visitors is a great example of industry partners, many of whom are University of Hartford alumni who are committed to the direction and advancement of the Barney School.  The industry partnerships are cultivated and managed in a way where the Barney Students, faculty and administration along with the industry partner all gain value through the relationship.  Many industry partners look to the Barney School as a “must go to” source for their talent recruitment initiatives.  In fact, many New England and national companies are led by Barney alumni.  They, in turn, are engaged in the education and development activities at the school.
The Barney School of Business proudly houses several academic centers that have been established to expand knowledge and understanding of business and business practices. For example, at the Risk and Disruptive Technology Institute, students and faculty across colleges will work together on customized projects, for data-driven and technical solutions of risk assessment and mitigation with member companies. R.C. Knox Center gives awards to outstanding Insurance/Finance graduates and serves as a conduit for employment and internship inquiries from the industry. Each year, students intern at major insurance and risk management companies such as Aetna, Chubb, Cigna, The Hartford, Travelers, and UnitedHealth Group. These internships frequently lead to full-time positions after graduation. Other centers are available for students to get hands-on experience with the real-world business: Entrepreneurial & Women's Business Center, and Upper Albany Main Street.
To start your career, you need hands-on experience in addition to classroom knowledge. That’s where an internship comes in. Work with one of our local corporate partners or a non-profit. Many students secure permanent positions after their internships are over.

Success Stories

Alec Capasso '23, 3+1 Program

Finance Leadership and Development Program at Travelers

“​​Barney supported me through providing real life experiences. Running through simulations in classes, constantly having outside corporations come to the school, and the Barney Passport program equips students for the real world. The entrepreneurial skills learned all help me think outside of the box on my work and take various approaches to solving problems. I feel I can approach a problem by looking at more perspectives learned in my classes.”

Learn more about Alec's story

Sarah Gada ‘23

Personal Lines Product Management Intern at The Hartford

"My four years at UHart definitely helped me to achieve this job opportunity. Being a Barney student, I completed many courses that taught me what it took to work in business."

Learn more about Sarah's story

Danni Keating ’23, 3+1 Program

Product Management Development Program at Travelers

“UHart's professors are hard to beat,'' Danni says. She credits Professor Ken Goldstein for sparking her interest in this career path. “He was a terrific professor at Cyber Insurance. I took it online with him, and although it was only seven weeks, since it was an MBA-level course, I was able to learn so, so much.”

Learn more about Danni's story

We designed all of our classes, internships, and professional development experiences to help you land your dream job.

Start your UHart journey today. Take the next step.