Thursday, April 18, 2002

Ford and General Motors Establish Distance-Education Programs for Employees By MICHAEL ARNONE Eager to offer more-competitive benefits, Ford Motor Company and General Motors are sponsoring programs that will let employees earn degrees through distance education. Starting this September, Northwood University expects to offer employees at Ford and Lincoln Mercury dealerships nationwide the chance to earn a mostly online bachelor's degree of business administration in automotive marketing and management. Cardean University will offer its all-online master's-degree program in business administration to employees of General Motors beginning in May. Cardean is a division of UNext, a major provider of online management education. Education and professional development are strong incentives for dealership employees to stay and build careers at their current locations, says Nancy E. Nagle, director of retailer education and training for Ford. Employees at auto dealerships are a nomadic lot and will often work at multiple dealerships over the course of their careers. The turnover can be as high as 35 percent at some locations, says Dennis J. Zawalich, owner of Burlington Lincoln Mercury Suzuki in Burlington, N.J. "We will have a competitive edge on our non-Ford competition in attracting and retaining good people," he says. Employees at auto dealerships find it hard to fit traditional education into their busy schedules, which often include working nights and weekends, says Terry Kidd, dealer principal of Chatsworth Ford in Chatsworth, Ga. He is a member of the Lincoln Mercury Dealer Council and serves on Ford's Training Advisory Board, which conceived the program. His office manager, Gail Amos, will be one of the students in the pilot phase with Northwood. The Northwood program will teach management and entrepreneurial skills for owning and operating car dealerships, says David E. Fry, the university's president. The Northwood bachelor's program will be 90 percent online, but students will have to come for at least one three-day session on the university's Michigan campus. University officials expect that the average dealership employee in the program will already have two years of college credit, and Northwood will grant up to one year of academic credit for work experience and Ford training, he says. The program is open to the roughly 50,000 employees in management positions at dealerships that sell Ford products, Mr. Fry says. The pilot program that starts this fall will have 30 to 50 students from around the country. He expects to eventually have hundreds of participants. Although the company helped create the program, Ford isn't paying students' tuition; dealers and their employees will have to decide how much each will contribute, Mr. Fry says. Ford's arrangement with Northwood may mark the first time that an automaker has offered higher education to its dealership employees. Mr. Fry, Ms. Nagle, and the auto dealers say that automakers routinely pay for education for their own employees but not for those of dealerships, which are run as franchises by their owners. Northwood offers degrees specialized for the auto industry and has thousands of dealership owners among its alumni. Cardean's program will focus on employees of General Motors, not the company's dealerships. Geoffrey M. Cox, Cardean's president, says 86,000 management, technical, and professional employees worldwide are eligible. About 100 students have expressed interest in the program so far, he says, and he expects several hundred more in the near future. General Motors is paying its employees' expenses. This is the only online M.B.A. program for which General Motors will pay employees' tuition, Mr. Cox says. It is also the first online degree the company is sponsoring, says Christine D'Angela, communications director for General Motors University, the automaker's in-house training division. The arrangement marks the second phase of a relationship the automaker established with Cardean in 2001. Cardean offered training to about 3,000 of General Motors' human-resources employees last year, she says. Mr. Fry and Mr. Cox say they expect their universities to make money off their respective partnerships because both universities are using existing programs, rather than undertaking the expense of creating new ones. Students in the programs will take the same courses as other university students and be mixed in classes with them, the presidents say. Easy-to-print version E-mail this article

New satellite regulations still pose problems for scientists Emeritus professor resigns as Winthrop U. trustee, saying board neglects faculty needs Reports of bribe-taking at Russian universities have increased, authorities say Spring commencement speakers are announced by 15 colleges Higher-education organizations plan a coordinated approach to network security Engineering institute will drop form pledging adherence to copyright act To lease or to buy Microsoft software? Some colleges find that big systems upgrades are going more smoothly Ford and General Motors establish distance-education programs for employees