The University of Pretoria’s (UP) Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences (EMS), in collaboration with UP’s Faculty of Law, have launched a first-of-its-kind Master’s degree in insolvency and business rescue.
The degree is aimed at professionals who want to attain an advanced degree while continuing to work at their respective organisations.
Senior Lecturer specialising in Turnaround Management and Business Rescue, Dr Wesley Rosslyn-Smith, said: “The insolvency industry is changing rapidly around the world, with greater emphasis being placed on recovery as opposed to traditional winding down.
“The turnaround process is highly complex, pulling competencies from law, finance and business. As more professionals aim to build careers in business rescue, we saw the opportunity to offer a cross-disciplinary degree to a field that has traditionally been studied from only a legal perspective.”
According to the university, the master’s programme combines modules from business and law, making it the first cross-disciplinary local degree of its kind and one of the few programmes addressing insolvency-related issues in the country.
The university said applications will close on March 31 on the year of first registration.
According to Rosslyn-Smith, studying insolvency law with business rescue together would enable students to gain a detailed understanding of the legal, financial, economic and governance issues underpinning debt finance and recovery.
Students would also gain advanced knowledge of theoretical and practical issues guiding formal and informal debt restructuring procedures.
The admission requirements are:
- An honours degree in an academic discipline related to financial management or business management.
- Or a four-year law degree OR any other qualification in an academic discipline relevant to this MPhil programme.
- If the duration of that qualification is less than four years, substantial proven practical or professional experience in insolvency and/ or business rescue practice will furthermore be required, subject to the discretion of the Dean.
- Alternatively, the student must have scored 65% or more in any other NQF level 8 qualification relevant to this MPhil programme.