KU Leuven faculty awarded prestigious EQUIS label
KU Leuven’s Faculty of Economics and Business can continue to use the EQUIS label for another five years. The faculty is accredited for the third time in a row. “This international recognition makes us a unique faculty in Flanders,” says dean Wilfried Lemahieu.
The EQUIS label is awarded by the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD), a non-profit organization of business schools and companies that aims to promote, improve and internationalize management education. With the EQUIS label, the EFMD bridges the gap between education and the business world. The organization awards the EQUIS label to a select group of business schools and faculties worldwide that meet its high quality standards.
How is the EQUIS label awarded?
The EQUIS accreditation is awarded on the basis of a long and intensive evaluation process in which all facets of a faculty or business school are examined: the quality of the programs and of the students, the level and relevance of the research, the quality of strategy and governance, the degree of internationalization, financial health and risk management, orientation towards the national and international business world, and attention to ethics and sustainability.
Unique in Flanders
The Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB) of KU Leuven currently has more than 9700 students, including some 2100 international students. It has campuses in Antwerp, Brussels, Kortrijk and Leuven. After a thorough review, the EFMD decided to grant the faculty another five-year accreditation for its four campuses. In 2014, the faculty already won a three-year accreditation, and in 2017 it was even awarded the EQUIS label for five years .
“This international recognition makes us unique in Flanders,” says a proud Wilfried Lemahieu, dean of FEB. “After all, we are still the only Flemish faculty with an EQUIS label. And in addition, only the Vlerick Business School also has a five-year accreditation.”
“We are very pleased with the high appreciation that the assessment panel had for the international reputation of the faculty and the quality of our research,” continues Lemahieu. “Our interdisciplinarity in education and research was also seen as a great asset, bridging the gap between (business) economics and other disciplines such as engineering sciences, law and even biomedical sciences. In addition, the panel assessed the quality of our professors, the ties with the world of practice and our alumni activities as exceptionally strong, even by EQUIS standards.”
With this five-year accreditation, the faculty once again joins a small circle of top schools such as the Guanghua School of Management (Peking University), Saïd Business School (University of Oxford) and the business schools of Imperial College London and the University of Melbourne. For KU Leuven, the EQUIS label is an important asset to further strengthen the international reputation of the Faculty of Economics and Business.