The North Dakota Trade Office and North Dakota State University have formed a partnership that will expand the state’s international business resources and education.
The Trade Office will partner with NDSU’s Center for Global Initiatives and Leadership, a program that will build on the working relationship between university faculty and students and North Dakota’s leaders in international business.
The Center for Global Initiatives and Leadership, part of NDSU’s College of Business, will be located in Richard H. Barry Hall. The downtown building will also house the North Dakota Trade Office and the university’s Department of Agribusiness and Applied Economics.
Barry Hall, named for the late R.H. Barry, a renowned financial consultant, is under construction at the site of the former Pioneer Mutual Life building in downtown Fargo. The $15 million project encompasses 135,000 square feet, including a three-story classroom wing and a 250-seat auditorium.
Barry Hall will provide a “learning environment for students that will be among the best in the world” and will offer opportunities for NDSU to partner with the community and the state,” NDSU President Joseph A. Chapman said during the project’s fall groundbreaking ceremony.
“Through the North Dakota Trade Office and Center for Global Initiatives and Leadership, it will provide for global business connections,” Chapman said. “This is a wonderful win-win for everybody.”
The Center is charged with serving as a catalyst for multidisciplinary work on issues important to international business and trade. Once operational, the center is expected to involve faculty from disciplines from across campus, including agribusiness and applied economics, foreign languages, history and political science.
The Center also will help build on the Trade Office’s export assistant program – international business internships at the Trade Office and at North Dakota businesses that are involved in the global marketplace, Trade Office Executive Director Susan Geib said.
“We have been successful at providing talented graduate students with valuable international business internships,” Geib said. “Nearly all of them have gone on to jobs in international business management here in North Dakota.
“It’s a good program because it provides North Dakota businesses with the international expertise they need to capitalize on international opportunities and allows our highly-trained graduates to remain in state instead of having to find work elsewhere.”
“We are very grateful for NDSU’s generosity in including us as tenants in Barry Hall and even more so for the vision that President Chapman has set in motion – a vision that will better prepare students for the global marketplace and at the same time serve the state’s business community,” Geib said