York University's first dual business-school degree began with a "gentlemen's handshake," in the words of Su-Lan Tenn.

Ian Lee, assistant professor at Carleton University's Sprott School of Business. Photo: Blair Gable for The Globe and Mail

Ian Lee, assistant professor at Carleton University's Sprott School of Business. Photo: Blair Gable for The Globe and Mail

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Officials from the Schulich School of Business and the Kellogg School of Management, which is based at Northwestern University in Illinois, kept running into each other at the same recruiting events.

As the deans from both schools chatted, they discovered they had similar goals: to establish a foothold in the other's country, said Ms. Tenn, who is program director at Schulich.

"On our side, Dean (Dezso) Horvath … wanted to leap over the [Canadian] competition with the first cross-border executive MBA program," she said.

Such was the beginning of the Kellogg-Schulich Executive MBA program.

The program began in 2002 and has graduated dozens of students since.

These days, as business schools jockey for prospective students, such dual degrees, as well as joint degrees — between two schools within the same university — are fast becoming marketing tools.

At least 10 universities coast-to-coast offer joint MBA and law degrees, while other business schools are branching out into fine arts or agriculture partnerships.

A small subset of students may also head to universities in Europe or Asia that have established dual degrees with Canadian business schools.

Still, students should bear in mind that little research has been done on the usefulness of such degrees in the job hunt, said Ian Lee, an assistant professor at Carleton University's Sprott School of Business who specializes in MBA studies.

"All we can do is look at the fact that they are growing over time," he said.

"But I haven't seen any cost-benefit analysis studies on this, so the only real data out there is they are proliferating because there is increased demand."

Demand for joint degrees is rising due to the increasing cross-disciplinary nature of the work force, said Wendy Ma, assistant dean at the University of British Columbia's Sauder School of Business.

Employers want their workers to have more than one field of expertise, she said — a law firm, for example, might ask its lawyers to delve into patent law — and joint degrees give academic proof that a person can work in more than one field.

"There are a lot of lawyers that deal with the business sector, like mergers and acquisitions," Dr. Ma said. "So the business degree and the law degree go very well together because there are so many lawyers involved in business transactions."

The University of Alberta's business school wanted to draw upon its environment — agriculture — to give farmers and forestry officials the management skills they need.

"We're finding it's a good draw for individuals considering our program," said Joan White, associate dean of the school's MBA program. Numbers have stayed consistent this year despite the recession, which she said is an indication of the degrees' continuing relevance to students.

As for international partnerships, Canadian MBA schools such as Schulich are selecting universities to partner with based on how fast a country's economy is growing.

The program began in 1996 with the Guanghua School of Management at Peking University in Beijing. Now, York is sending representatives to universities in India, Russia and possibly Brazil in search of partnerships.

The idea is to give the university a toehold in other countries, increasing its international street cred and forming partnerships that will increase investment in each other, said Schulich's Charmaine Courtis.

"As a strategy we will continue to evolve dual-degree programs with other partners," said Ms. Courtis, the school's executive director of student services and international relations.

"I manage about 50 different exchange agreements. We're connected to a huge network of schools, and (Peking) is but one of them."

In a similar vein, UBC has offered its MBA degree at China's Shanghai Jiao Tong University since the mid-1990s.

The school plans to evolve its exchange program into more prominent dual degree programs, said Dr. Ma.

"We're looking to start a dual degree relationship with Copenhagen's business school, but usually those things take some time to sort out," she added.

"When you're working with a Canadian or international universities, we all have our jurisdictions and our guidelines, and in order to work with international institutions we need to work with other guidelines."

Headaches can be the result, but Dr. Lee said the drive to offer joint and dual degrees is a good move for Canadian universities.

"What's developed is a technique, a strategy of differentiating to attract good students," he said. "Over time that will influence the reputation Canadian universities develop."

Special to The Globe and Mail