The Management of Co-operatives: Developing a Postsecondary Course

Abstract

This research project aims to design a course outline, syllabus, and reading package for a “Management of Cooperatives” course that will be offered at the University of Winnipeg (Faculty of Business and Economics) in the fall of 2010. Current undergraduate and graduate level courses at different universities across Canada that examine cooperatives will be researched in the development of this project.

Cooperatives aim to meet the social and economic goals of their membership while their equal distribution of profits and their democratic decision making process differentiate them notably from other types of businesses, especially private firms. For this reason, those involved with cooperatives require a different management and governance education than the mainstream education that is primarily geared toward the private enterprise model. However, undergraduate classes on the management of cooperatives are not part of the curricula in most Canadian universities.

Cooperative management education has been identified as a priority need by the cooperative community in Manitoba, and this research will address this by designing a complete university level class curriculum that will be the first of its kind in Manitoba at the post-secondary level, and the first of its kind at an undergraduate level in Canada.