CUNA Management School Overview

What’s it all about?
You've heard the saying "nothing worthwhile in life comes easy." Well, nothing could be more true, especially when it comes to effective leadership. This takes time, skill, understanding and the ability to constantly move forward.

In cooperation with the University of Wisconsin Graduate School of Business, this intensive management program helps you learn and implement principles that make you a more dynamic and effective manager and leader.

Students attend classes for three, two-week terms over consecutive summers. In addition to on-site sessions, students complete two substantial written projects during the three-year period. CUNA Management School is the next step toward professional growth and positions of executive leadership. Many of our graduates have gone on to hold high-level positions at state and national levels with credit unions and credit union professional organizations.

A graduation diploma is issued in conjunction with the University of Wisconsin Graduate School of Business and is recognized throughout the credit union movement as an honor and mark of accomplishment.

The American Council on Education's College Recommendation Service (ACE Credit) has evaluated and recommended college credit for all CUNA Management School courses. For more information, visit ACE Credit's Web site.

Experiential Learning Opportunities
While attending CUNA Management School students spend many hours in the classroom, but there is a great deal of learning that takes place outside of the classroom as well. An experiential learning event is scheduled for each class every year. The experiences will be challenging; focus and emphasis is placed on creating an experience where a group can work together to learn trust, leadership, and teamwork.

Students will find that experiential learning provides a number of metaphorical experiences that are applicable to work and life. Further, students find themselves immersed in a nonjudgmental and supportive environment. Experienced facilitators guide all activities illuminating and anchoring how the experiential activity relates to the credit union’s mission and goals. Students discover that experiential learning is not just an event, but a solution.

First Year Event: Team Building Challenge

• Experience and build individual and team effectiveness with this adventure in teamwork, communication, and leadership skills

Second Year Event: Community of Shared Practices

• Learn the advantage of combining competition and cooperation, new means of forming strategic alliances, through experiential activities

Third Year Event: Ultimate Team Adventure

• The focus of this adventure will be servant leadership

CUNA Management School Projects

First Year
No preparation projects.

Second Year
In preparation for their second year, students are required to complete a research project and background analysis of their credit union. This involves research in areas such as credit union history, current membership, potential growth, sponsorship, current member services, credit union performance, and credit union relationships.

Third Year
The third-year project uses data, insights, and perspectives generated in the second-year project as the foundation for developing a strategic plan that charts the course for the credit union in the short- and long-term future. In preparing this project, students establish short-term goals and long-range objectives for the credit union, and determine methods and action plans which may be implemented and achieved.