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Notice to Prospective School of Business Degree Program Students
Please note that this program is available only to CMA certified members of the Institute of Certified Management Accountants (ICMA).
If you are not a CMA-certified member of the ICMA, you need to become a CMA member of the ICMA first before applying for the MBA or DBA programs. You will need to go to the ICMA website to apply for membership. You cannot apply for membership via this Calwest University website.
Note that no program at Calwest is designed to lead to positions in a profession, occupation, trade, or career field requiring licensure in the State of California; and students are advised not to rely on a Calwest degree to obtain such qualifications or credentials.
Post Graduate program: Business Research (Leading to the Doctor of Business Administration degree)
Program Admission Requirements:
Prospective candidates who already have an MBA degree from a recognized university, and wish to be evaluated for admission to the DBA Program must: (1) in addition to their CMA and MBA, hold a Bachelor’s degree (or equivalent) in any discipline from an accredited university (or from a government approved institution, if outside the United States); (2) submit a carefully written 3-4 page Essay titled, “My objectives in undertaking Doctoral Research” (in such an essay, you may discuss some or all of the following: why you have been inspired to engage in a doctoral program; how such a credential will impact your professional career or standing; how your former preparation has led you to undertake future and more advance studies, etc. - you are not limited to these ideas; they are merely suggestions) and (3) submit a comprehensive resume or Curriculum Vitae, detailing both academic and professional experience. The Doctor of Business Administration program consists of 60 credit hours, for which holders of MBA degrees will receive 33 credit hours for their Recognized Prior Learning (RPL). Such students will need to successfully complete the 27 credit hour research component to be awarded the DBA.
English Proficiency Requirements: Applicants without appropriate previous academic experience in an English language environment must obtain the following minimum scores: the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) - 530; the TOEFL-Internet Based Test (IBT) - 71; the International English Language Testing System (IELTS)- 6.5; the Pearson Test of English (PTE) - 50; Exams of the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) - B2; and ACT Compass - Level 3.
Program Objective: The main purpose of Calwest University is to provide affordable, high-quality American degrees to students living in all parts of the world who deserve a quality education, but were, until recently, unable to obtain such due to both costs and the tyranny of distance. The program objective of the Doctor of Business Administration degree program is to provide business professionals with an opportunity for career related research at the doctoral level. Action research is undertaken to provide an industry-responsive program for senior managers. Students research a specific area of study and write a research thesis.
Program Description: Students must complete the research courses listed below via Tubeclasses which includes a comprehensive Research Project to complete their DBA degree. For the Research Project, an individual supervisor will be appointed to each student by Calwest University. The course consists of 60 credit hours.
Program Start Date (DBA): There is no deadline date for starting the DBA degree program. You work at your own pace. The method of assessment is via online exams or via an assignment at the end of each course. There will be a research supervisor assigned at the Research Proposal stage.
Minimum and Maximum Time Requirements (DBA): A DBA degree will be awarded by Calwest University upon the successful completion of 60 Credit points. This is expected to take 3 years (full time) and 6 years (part time) after start date. Accelerated learning and early completion is possible with permission. In all cases, it is expected that students should finish their graduate program in 5 years and doctoral program in 7 years. Explanations will be sought if these degree programs take more than 5 years or 7 years to complete.
Final Assessment on Completion of All Courses (DBA): The final assessment is the successful completion and defence of a Research Thesis. You submit the Research Thesis to your supervisor, for submission to two examiners for grading.
In summary, MBA Degree holders with a CMA need to successfully complete only the Research courses to obtain their DBA.
Degree Awarded: Doctor of Business Administration [DBA]
Program Courses:
Click on course title for more information
| Recognized Prior Learning Granted for MBA Degree Holders |
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| Course Code | Course Title | Credit Hours | Grade |
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| DBA802 | Management This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. This course brings the methodology and critical apparatus of the humanities into the field of management to fulfill two basic objectives. The first objective is to place in broad critical perspective how we think about the function and culture of management and to expand the boundaries of how managers understand their role within a firm, how they take decisions, set priorities and benchmark success and failure. The second objective is to help students learn how to build robust analytical frameworks informed by different perspectives in order to evaluate concepts and solve problems. The course draws upon diverse material, ranging from history to economics, to encourage students to think about management beyond its traditional confines. Topics include the function of the firm, the role of incentive, the ways in which narrative forces shape decision making, and how market relationships define the managerial culture in ways that can lead to sub-optimal outcomes. | 3 | |
| DBA803 | Marketing This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. This course aims to provide students with the foundation for differentiating marketing from other organizational functions by fostering an understanding of markets, marketing concepts, key marketing issues and the relationship of these to society as a whole. This framework enables students to link their knowledge with the practicalities of marketing. The aim is to provide students with an understanding of the key concepts of marketing and to provide an insight into the role of marketing in an organization, and to provide an understanding of the main essentials of marketing. The subject is presented within a marketing planning framework in which marketing theories and concepts focus on the practical need of developing and implementing effective marketing strategies. It covers, in broad detail, the concepts and applications of marketing for consumer, business-to-business (including industrial) and service organizations. | 3 | |
| DBA804 | Accounting This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. Accounting is the language of business. Companies communicate their performance to outsiders and evaluate the performance of their employees using information generated by the accounting system. Learning the language of accounting is essential for anyone that must make decisions based on financial information. The course is designed to provide an understanding of financial accounting fundamentals for prospective users of corporate financial information, such as investors, creditors, employees, and other stakeholders (e.g., suppliers, customers). The course focuses on understanding how economic events such as operating activities, corporate investments, and financing transactions are recorded in the three main financial statements (i.e., the income statement, balance sheet, and statement of cash flows). Students will develop the technical skills needed to analyze financial statements and disclosures for use in financial analysis. Students will also learn how accounting standards and managerial incentives affect the financial reporting process. | 3 | |
| DBA805 | Finance This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. This course will introduce students to frameworks and tools to measure value; both for corporate and personal assets. It will also help students in decision-making, again at both the corporate and personal levels. This course is primarily devoted to the fundamental principles of valuation. Students will learn and apply the concepts of time value of money and risk to understand the major determinants of value creation. The course uses both theory and real world examples to demonstrate how to value any asset. | 3 | |
| DBA806 | Economics This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. This course aims to provide students with the foundation for differentiating marketing from other organizational functions by fostering an understanding of markets, marketing concepts, key marketing issues and the relationship of these to society as a whole. This framework enables students to link their knowledge with the practicalities of marketing. The aim is to provide students with an understanding of the key concepts of marketing and to provide an insight into the role of marketing in an organization, and to provide an understanding of the main essentials of marketing. The subject is presented within a marketing planning framework in which marketing theories and concepts focus on the practical need of developing and implementing effective marketing strategies. It covers, in broad detail, the concepts and applications of marketing for consumer, business-to-business (including industrial) and service organizations. | 3 | |
| DBA807 | Business Statistics This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. Business Statistics is an introductory course in which the focus is on statistical inference: how to make valid conclusions based on data from random samples. At the heart of the main problem addressed by the course will be a population- connected with which there is a numerical quantity of interest. If students could talk to each member of the population, they could calculate that number exactly. But what if the population is so large that a student’s resources will not stretch to interviewing every member? What if a student can only reach a subset of the population? This course will discuss good ways to select the subset; how to estimate the numerical quantity of interest, based on what is seen in the sample; and ways to test hypotheses about numerical or probabilistic aspects of the problem. The methods that will be covered are among the most commonly used of all statistical techniques; although there will be no mindless memorization of formulas and methods. Throughout the course, the emphasis will be on understanding the reasoning behind the calculations, the assumptions under which they are valid, and the correct interpretation of results. | 3 | |
| DBA808 | Strategic Management This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. In this course, the underlying theory and frameworks that provide the foundations of a successful business strategy are explored. It will develop the student’s ability to think strategically by providing him/her with the tools for conducting a strategic analysis. Strategic analysis is critical for analyzing the competitive context in which an organization operates and for making reasoned and reasonable recommendations for how that organization should position itself and what actions it should take to maximize value creation. Aspiring managers, entrepreneurs, social entrepreneurs, analysts, and consultants all may find value in mastering these fundamentals. | 3 | |
| DBA809 | International Business This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. International and not-for-profit organizations present an increasingly complex environment to work in and therefore require for their successful management an unprecedented level of managerial skills on top of a deep understanding of the socioeconomic and political context they operate in. This course is designed to provide students with (1) basic notions of the practice of international relations (2) a general overview of the management challenges international and not-for-profit organizations are faced with as well as key theoretical frameworks and practical tools for managers to excel in this environment. Key areas of management will be reviewed, from strategy setting to implementation through marketing and fund raising, and assessment. (3) Given the growing interaction between public and private sectors, this course also touches upon the management of public/private partnerships. | 3 | |
| DBA810 | Corporate Finance This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. This course will provide a market-oriented framework for analyzing the major types of financial decisions made by corporations. The course will provide an introduction to present value techniques, capital budgeting principles, asset valuation, the operation and efficiency of financial markets, the financial decisions of firms, and derivatives. The primary objective of this course is to provide a framework, concepts, and tools for analyzing financial decisions based on fundamental principles of modern financial theory. | 3 | |
| DBA811 | Competitive Analysis This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. In this course students will learn how firms behave in situations in which strategic decisions are interdependent, i.e. where their actions affect competitors' profits and vice versa. Using the basic tools of game theory, students will analyze how firms choose strategies to attain competitive advantage. This course is about the behavior of companies in competitive markets. Facing competition forces firms to look ahead and anticipate developments: If rivals are likely to react to a price cut, a firm will have to take the expected reaction into account. Students focus on such instances of “strategic interdependencies” in real business situations. Students will first study the basic concepts of game theory as a toolbox and then analyze strategic “games” in real-life settings. Rather than a set of checklists of “how-to-behave” in a number of pre-specified situations, this course will teach students to think about business strategy in a systematic and exciting - and ultimately more successful way. | 3 | |
| DBA812 | Operations Management This course is designed for students who are thinking of doing a research project in business administration. This course will teach students how to analyze and improve business processes, be it in services or in manufacturing. Students will learn how to improve productivity, how to provide more choice to customers, how to reduce response times, and how to improve quality. Specifically, students will learn how to improve productivity, increase responsiveness, provide more choice to the customer, and deliver higher quality standards. In short, students will learn how to analyze business processes and how to improve them. Along the way, students will learn about topics such as Lean Operations, Six Sigma, and the Toyota production system, and hear about bottlenecks, flows rates, and inventory levels. | 3 | |
| Total Credit Hours (Completed 0) | 33 |
| Core Research to be Undertaken |
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| Course Code | Course Title | Credit Hours | Grade |
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| DBA801 | Research Methods (2 Courses Equivalent) This course studies the nature, scope, and significance of business research and research methodologies. Additionally, the course studies primary and secondary research methods with applications to specific problems, using qualitative and quantitative methods for individual investigation and reporting on current problems within a student's area of interest. Social research is a craft, and like any other craft, it takes practice to do it well. By the end of the course, you should be able to: (1) understand how to design a research project; (2) collect your own data using a variety of methods; (3) analyze both qualitative and quantitative data; and (4) critically evaluate your own research and that of other social scientists. | 6 | |
| DBA813 | Research Proposal Prior to doing this course, students must first complete the Research Methods course; which provides a general introduction to social research methods and covers broad topic areas such as research ethics, research design, data collection, and data analysis. This will provide the foundation for formulating good research questions and designing an appropriate research agenda. In this course, students are required to develop a 2,000-3,500 word research proposal and present the proposal for evaluation by the supervisor appointed to them. | 3 | |
| DBA814 | Research Thesis (6 Courses Equivalent) This is equivalent to 6 courses; and consists of writing a final thesis of a length of between 25,000 and 50,000 words (including references and appendices). Once the supervisor and student are happy with the thesis, it will be officially submitted for grading by two external examiners. | 18 | |
| Total Credit Hours (Completed 0) | 27 |
*Courses that meet minimum standards to be counted as general education credit
Credit Hours Completed: 0
Credit Hours Remaining: 60
This program consists of a total of 60 Credit Hours
