About
Why Smeal
Real portfolios. Real clients. Real stakes. Penn State Smeal puts students in charge of live business work before they graduate, backed by research faculty who shape industry practice and a network of alumni who take your call.
What a Penn State Smeal Education is Built On
Smeal students learn business by doing business. They manage live investment portfolios, advise operating companies, model working supply chains, and present recommendations to the executives who act on them. The faculty teaching those courses publish research that shapes their fields and consult for the firms hiring our graduates. That holds at every level here, from a first-year undergraduate to a doctoral candidate to a supply chain executive in a Smeal certificate program.
Business Practiced, Not Simulated
Smeal students take on work with consequences. The puts a multi-million-dollar portfolio in student hands, and students defend every buy and sell decision to industry professionals. solves problems for paying clients, including Fortune 500 companies. builds brands and runs live campaigns. The moves student ideas into the marketplace. Graduates walk into interviews with a portfolio of completed work and the numbers behind it.
Integrity Taught as a Business Skill
96% of recruiters say integrity factors into their hiring decisions. Smeal treats ethical judgment as a skill students practice, in case work, in client engagements, and in the moments when the profitable answer and the right answer split. 95% of Smeal undergraduates say integrity is emphasized here. That alignment follows our graduates into the rooms where reputations get made.
Scale That Works in Your Favor
sit inside a Penn State network of more than 800,000 graduates, one of the largest and most active in the country. Scale shows up in practical ways: more mentors, more hiring managers who already know what a Smeal degree signals, and more people who take the meeting and take your call.
Built with the Companies That Hire Our Graduates
Smeal builds curriculum with the firms recruiting from it. Industry partners bring live problems into classrooms, sit on advisory boards, and tell us what capability gaps they are seeing before those gaps reach the job description. Students learn the work employers are hiring for this year.
What Sets the Smeal Experience Apart
What Smeal Looks Like Each Year
1,300+
Internships and Co-Ops Posted Annually
100+
Global Programs
45+
Student Organizations
Ready to find your program?
Smeal offers undergraduate, master's, doctoral, and executive programs, on campus, online, and in hybrid formats.
Frequently Asked Questions
Penn State Smeal College of Business is accredited by AACSB International, the benchmark for business education worldwide. Its programs earn national recognition across disciplines including supply chain management, accounting, finance, and marketing.
Smeal is known for teaching business through real practice, and for the standard it holds students to while they do it. Undergraduates manage a multi-million-dollar investment portfolio through the Nittany Lion Fund, consult for Fortune 500 clients through Nittany Lion Consulting Group, build brands through Penn State Prime, and launch ventures through the Farrell Center for Corporate Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Students make decisions with consequences and answer for them, which is what separates experiential learning here from a case study. Smeal is equally recognized for its emphasis on integrity: 95% of undergraduates say it is emphasized in their education, and 96% of recruiters say it factors into hiring.
Smeal offers , , , and programs. Undergraduates choose from including accounting, finance, marketing, management, risk management, and supply chain and information systems. Graduate offerings include the , , and master's degrees, and work directly with faculty on research. Executive education provides and .
Yes. Smeal offers and programs taught by the same faculty who teach on campus, built for students who are working while they study. Online programs are delivered fully remotely, and hybrid programs combine online coursework with scheduled time on campus or at a Penn State location.
Smeal has more than 98,000 business alumni worldwide, inside a Penn State network of more than 800,000 graduates, one of the largest and most active in the world. Alumni serve as mentors, connect students to internships and jobs, and take your call throughout your career. The pairs students directly with alumni working in their fields of interest.