Ruth Barratt, Ph.D., has been named chair of the MSOE Rader School of Business, effective July 1, 2018, following a national search. She is the first woman to hold this position.  

MSOE has offered business and management degrees for more than 60 years, and in 2000 the business program was renamed the Rader School of Business. Current offerings include an industry-driven and technology-focused Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree, an MBA and specialized MBA programs in education leadership and STEM leadership, and Master of Science degrees in engineering management, marketing and export management, and new product management.  

Barratt is an associate professor in the Rader School of Business and came to MSOE in 2015 to lead the MBA in Education Leadership program. Under her leadership, enrollment in that program increased from 14 to 70 students. Originally a national initiative funded by the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the program combines business and education course work to better prepare up-and-coming school leaders for the challenges of leading an academic system. Character formation and education leadership are the tenants that guide the program. The MBA in Education Leadership has since evolved from a fellowship- to tuition-based program run solely by the Rader School of Business. It is the first of its kind in the United States.  

“We are at a point where we are ready to take the next step in furthering the business school at MSOE,” said Barratt.  

The addition of an artificial intelligence focused computer science program at MSOE and the $34 million Dwight and Dian Diercks Computational Science Hall, Barratt said, will provide many new opportunities to integrate new technology into the business school.  

“I’m really excited to see where the AI program is going to take us and ways we can tie the work we are doing into the competitive advantage we have in the engineering space,” she said. In the immediate future, Barratt will focus on creating a better experience for business students, with a longer-term goal of earning business school accreditation. She also plans to emphasize a culture of character, ethics education and corporate responsibility in all aspects of the business curriculum.  

Barratt will remain executive director of the MBA in Education Leadership program.  

“The MSOE community is excited to welcome Dr. Barratt to this important academic leadership role at the university,” said Dr. Eric Baumgartner, vice president of academics at MSOE. “She has done an outstanding job developing the successful MBA in Educational Leadership program and will build on this momentum as well as her past experiences to advance all of the programs within the Rader School of Business.”  

Before coming to MSOE, Barratt was an assistant professor at Marquette University for two years, and Arizona State University for seven. She holds a bachelor’s degree in finance from University of Greenwich, London, UK, and a bachelor’s degree in business, from De Montfort University, Milton Keynes, UK. She earned her M.S. in research and Ph.D. in organizational behavior from the Cranfield School of Management, Cranfield University, UK.  She also completed postdoctoral work at Thunderbird International Management School.