Bachelor of Science in Finance
The Bachelor of Science in Finance degree provides students with a depth of knowledge in finance and a solid foundation in business fundamentals and quantitative and analytical skills. Finance courses provide an overview of economic principles for business and managerial decision-making, concepts of microeconomics, macroeconomic principles, asset pricing theory, capital investments and cash flows, shareholder value, pricing and risk management of derivative securities, as well as other topics in finance.
Stuart School of Business is a global leader in bridging technology and business, offering distinctive education that provides students with the knowledge and skillsets to become outstanding professionals in economics, finance, analytics, marketing, business, public administration, operations, and management.
Finance and Economics at Illinois Tech have a prestigious history that dates back to the late 1890s, with some of the nation’s first courses in “Family and Consumer Science” (including “Home Economics” and “Household Management”) being offered by the Lewis Institute, Stuart’s original home, and the Institute’s subsequent formation of the university’s Department of Business and Economics in 1926. Combined with the merger of the Lewis Institute with the Armour Institute, and the earlier pioneering works of Philip D. Armour, a merchant financier, Julia A. Beveridge, a librarian turned public administrator, and Frank W. Gunsaulus, an entrepreneurial preacher in the 1880s, the Department Business and Economics ultimately grew into a separate school at Illinois Institute of Technology – the Stuart School of Business, in 1969, with a gift from Lewis Institute alum and renowned financier Harold Leonard Stuart. Harold L. Stuart himself was a national leader in the field of investment banking in the first half of the 20th century, and his Chicago investment bank played a pivotal role in establishing the city as a global financial hub.
Over a period of more than 125 years, harnessing curricular innovations by Julia A. Beveridge and George N. Carman, and incredible scholarly works by trailblazing Illinois Tech scholars Herb A. Simon (author of Administrative Behavior, later awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics), Karl Menger (developer of the St. Petersburg paradox in economics) and Abe Sklar (developer of the Copula in financial modeling), the Stuart School of Business has refined education in the disciplines of economics, finance, business and public administration, analytics, marketing, and management.
A long-standing leader in curricular innovation, in 1990, building on the foundational works of numerous Illinois Tech scholars, and Harold L. Stuart’s own contributions to finance and the broader business community, the Stuart School of Business established quantitative finance as an academic discipline, with a world’s first postgraduate Master’s program in Financial Markets and Trading – a program that highlighted a new model for embedding into a postgraduate academic program the emphases on career readiness and connectedness with the business community, and transformed business school education.
Today, the Stuart School of Business continues to be a frontier innovator in accredited education, offering academic programs and co-curricular opportunities that place students on the path to self-actualization and career success. Leadership, entrepreneurship, experiential learning, positive societal impact, and connectedness to the business community, combined with a human-centered approach to student development, and an unyielding focus on student success, continue to be core pillars at Stuart. Stuart is accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) – an accreditation achieved by fewer than 6% of business schools worldwide.
The Bachelor of Science in Finance builds on Stuart's prestige in finance and tradition of rigorous undergraduate education. The program requires the successful completion of 126 credit hours.
Required Courses
Code | Title | Credit Hours |
---|---|---|
Core Business Courses | (48) | |
BUS 100 | Introduction to Business and Economics | 3 |
BUS 102 | Introduction to Business Analytics | 3 |
BUS 211 | Financial Accounting | 3 |
BUS 212 | Managerial Accounting | 3 |
BUS 221 | Business Statistics | 3 |
BUS 301 | Organizational Behavior | 3 |
BUS 305 | Operation and Supply Chain Analytics | 3 |
BUS 311 | Strategic Cost Management | 3 |
BUS 321 | Analytics for Optimization | 3 |
BUS 341 | Business Law | 3 |
BUS 351 | Financial Decision Making and Capital Budgeting | 3 |
BUS 371 | Marketing Fundamentals | 3 |
ECON/BUS 382 | Business Economics | 3 |
BUS 480 | Strategic Management and Design Thinking | 3 |
ECON 151 | Microeconomics | 3 |
ECON 152 | Macroeconomics | 3 |
Finance Courses | (15) | |
BUS 452 | International Finance | 3 |
BUS 454 | Investments | 3 |
BUS 455 | Corporate Finance | 3 |
BUS 458 | Financial Derivatives | 3 |
ECON 251 | Introduction to Econometrics | 3 |
Mathematics Course | (5) | |
MATH 151 | Calculus I | 5 |
or MATH 191 | Business Calculus | |
Natural Science and Engineering Requirements | (10) | |
See Illinois Tech Core Curriculum, section D | 10 | |
Humanities and Social Science Requirements | (21) | |
See Illinois Tech Core Curriculum, section B and C | 21 | |
Computer Science Requirement | (2) | |
CS 105 | Introduction to Computer Programming | 2 |
or CS 110 | Computing Principles | |
Interprofessional Projects (IPRO) | (6) | |
See Illinois Tech Core Curriculum, section E | 6 | |
Free Electives | (13) | |
Select 13 credit hours | 13 | |
Total Credit Hours | 120 |
Bachelor of Science in Finance Curriculum
Year 1 | |||
---|---|---|---|
Semester 1 | Credit Hours | Semester 2 | Credit Hours |
BUS 100 | 3 | BUS 102 | 3 |
ECON 151 | 3 | BUS 221 | 3 |
MATH 151 | 5 | ECON 152 | 3 |
CS 105 | 2 | Science Elective | 4 |
Humanities (200 Level Course) | 3 | Social Sciences Elective | 3 |
16 | 16 | ||
Year 2 | |||
Semester 1 | Credit Hours | Semester 2 | Credit Hours |
BUS 211 | 3 | BUS 212 | 3 |
BUS 301 | 3 | BUS 341 | 3 |
BUS 321 | 3 | BUS 351 | 3 |
Science Elective | 3 | Humanities Elective (300+ Level Course) | 3 |
Social Sciences Elective (300+) | 3 | Science Elective | 3 |
15 | 15 | ||
Year 3 | |||
Semester 1 | Credit Hours | Semester 2 | Credit Hours |
BUS 311 | 3 | BUS 305 | 3 |
BUS 371 | 3 | BUS 455 | 3 |
BUS 452 | 3 | BUS 458 | 3 |
ECON 251 | 3 | ECON 382 or BUS 382 | 3 |
IPRO Elective I | 3 | IPRO Elective II | 3 |
15 | 15 | ||
Year 4 | |||
Semester 1 | Credit Hours | Semester 2 | Credit Hours |
BUS 454 | 3 | BUS 480 | 3 |
Social Sciences Elective (300+ Level Course) | 3 | Humanities Elective (300+) | 3 |
Humanities or Social Science Elective | 3 | Free Elective | 3 |
Free Elective | 3 | Free Elective | 4 |
Free Elective | 3 | ||
15 | 13 | ||
Total Credit Hours: 120 |