Develop the Leader You're Meant to Be
Leadership is something you learn by doing.
At the McDonough Center for Leadership and Business, you’ll explore what it means to lead, discover your own leadership strengths and put what you learn into practice. Through coursework, hands-on experiences, community engagement and connections with other leaders, you’ll develop the skills, confidence and perspective to make a meaningful difference on campus, in your profession and in your community.
Leadership is not a title you earn. It's a capability you develop.
At the McDonough Center for Leadership and Business, you'll learn how to lead teams, solve complex challenges, create positive change, and make meaningful contributions in your profession and community. Whether you aspire to lead a healthcare organization, an engineering team, a school district, a nonprofit, a business, or a community initiative, the McDonough Center provides the knowledge, experiences, and mentorship to help you reach your potential.
As part of one of the nation’s most comprehensive liberal arts-based leadership development centers, you’ll learn alongside students from every academic discipline while developing the skills to become a thoughtful, ethical and effective leader.
Through innovative coursework, hands-on learning experiences, community engagement, professional networking, research opportunities, and global experiences, you’ll put leadership into practice long before graduation. You’ll leave Marietta prepared to bring people with the leadership capabilities employers and communities need most.
Undergraduate Academic Opportunities
The nationally recognized McDonough Leadership Program gives undergraduate students from every major the opportunity to develop their leadership potential and turn their passion for positive change into action.
If selected through the competitive application process, you’ll become a McDonough Scholar and join a community of high-achieving students who challenge themselves and one another to grow as leaders.
As a McDonough Scholar, you can choose the academic pathway that best complements your interests and career goals:
- Teacher Leadership Specialization
- Engineering Leadership Specialization
- Leadership Studies Specialization
- Minor in Leadership Studies
Through an interdisciplinary curriculum, you’ll explore leadership from multiple perspectives while building practical skills in communication, ethical decision-making, teamwork, systems thinking, problem-solving and organizational leadership. Just as important, you’ll have opportunities to put those skills into practice, preparing you to lead with confidence and purpose at Marietta and beyond.
Ready to explore your path as a McDonough Scholar? Contact your admissions counselor to learn more about the program and application process.
Leadership Development That Extends Beyond the Classroom
At the McDonough Center, you won’t just study leadership. You’ll put it into practice. Through real-world experiences, you’ll apply what you learn, deepen your understanding of leadership and build connections that expand your professional network.
Community Leadership
Leadership begins with service.
Through the Office of Community Engagement, you’ll work alongside community partners to address real challenges and contribute to a stronger region. Along the way, you’ll build skills in collaboration, communication and problem-solving while developing the cultural awareness and civic responsibility to lead effectively in diverse communities.
These experiences will help you discover that meaningful leadership goes beyond achieving goals. It’s about working with others to create positive, lasting change.
Business Leadership
Today’s business leaders must be ready to navigate change, uncertainty and complexity.
Through programs such as the Fitzgerald Executive-in-Residence Program and Visiting Executive Program, you’ll connect with accomplished executives, entrepreneurs and industry professionals who bring contemporary leadership challenges to life. You’ll gain new perspectives on how organizations work while strengthening your ability to think strategically, communicate effectively, make sound decisions and lead through change.
Whether your path takes you into business, consulting, public service or entrepreneurship, you’ll develop the skills and perspective to adapt, solve problems and lead with confidence in a changing world.
Healthcare Leadership
Better healthcare requires leaders who can bring people together, navigate complexity and keep human well-being at the center of every decision.
Through leadership coursework and applied learning experiences, you’ll develop skills in ethical decision-making, systems thinking, communication, teamwork and leading change. You’ll learn to see healthcare from multiple perspectives--healthcare administration, public health, medicine, nursing, and related professions--and understand how effective leadership can strengthen teams, organizations and the communities they serve.
Whether your future is in healthcare administration, public health, medicine, nursing or another health profession, you’ll be prepared to lead with purpose in environments where both people and performance matter.
Educational Sector Leadership
Great educators lead wherever they serve.
Whether you aspire to teach, work in administration or student affairs, shape educational policy or serve your community, you’ll develop the skills to inspire learning, bring people together, advocate for others, and create meaningful change.
Through leadership studies, you’ll strengthen your ability to communicate effectively, make ethical decisions, engage communities and help organizations continually improve. You’ll be prepared to lead both inside and beyond the classroom, creating environments where others can learn, grow and succeed.
Engineering Leadership
Technical expertise can solve problems. Leadership helps turn solutions into progress.
As an engineering student, you’ll learn to pair analytical and technical expertise with the ability to communicate, collaborate and lead. Through the engineering leadership specialization, you’ll strengthen your skills in managing complex projects, leading technical teams, navigating change and approaching organizational and societal challenges with an ethical perspective.
Whether your future is in engineering, technology, manufacturing or another technical field, you’ll be prepared to bring people and ideas together to solve complex problems and drive innovation.
Nonprofit Leadership
Turn your passion for making a difference into the skills to make it happen.
Through the Nonprofits LEAD Office and other leadership experiences, you’ll explore how mission-driven organizations build partnerships, mobilize resources, engage stakeholders and create lasting impact.
And you won’t just study how nonprofits work. You’ll have the opportunity to serve for a full year on a nonprofit board of directors, regardless of your major or career goals. You’ll also learn grant writing by working with real organizations and real needs, with the opportunity to see those proposals earn funding.
Whether your future is in the nonprofit sector, philanthropy, advocacy, public service or another profession, you’ll develop the skills to turn purpose into action and help organizations and communities thrive.
Political and Global Leadership
Today’s challenges cross borders, cultures and perspectives. Effective leadership must do the same.
Through study abroad and international engagement opportunities, you’ll experience different cultures and explore how people around the world approach leadership, followership and problem-solving. Those experiences will challenge you to consider new perspectives, question assumptions and deepen your understanding of what it means to lead in an interconnected world.
Along the way, you’ll strengthen your adaptability, cultural awareness and ability to communicate and lead effectively across differences.
Leadership Research and Innovation
Great leaders never stop learning, questioning and exploring new ideas.
At the McDonough Center, you’ll have opportunities to explore leadership more deeply through research with students and faculty. You may collaborate on research projects, present your work at academic and professional conferences, and contribute to conversations about how leadership and organizations are evolving.
Along the way, you’ll sharpen your critical thinking, gain new insight into the challenges facing leaders today and build connections with others who are asking important questions in fields that matter to you.
Ethics, Purpose and Impact
A thread that runs through everything we do.
Leadership isn’t defined only by what you accomplish. It’s also defined by how you accomplish it and whom your leadership serves.
Whatever path you pursue, you’ll encounter complex challenges that require more than professional or technical expertise. You’ll need to navigate uncertainty, consider different perspectives, balance competing interests and make difficult decisions with integrity.
Throughout your McDonough experience, you’ll explore the ethical responsibilities that come with leadership and consider what it means to lead for the common good. Through coursework, community engagement, hands-on leadership experiences and reflection, you’ll develop the self-awareness to understand your values and the confidence to put them into action.
Whether you pursue a future in healthcare, education, engineering, business, nonprofit organizations, public service or another profession, you’ll leave Marietta prepared to lead with courage, integrity and purpose and to make a meaningful difference wherever your path takes you.
Because the goal isn’t simply to become a leader. It’s to become the kind of leader people trust, organizations need and communities value.
McDonough Leadership Academic Paths
Choose your leadership path:
-Leadership Studies minor or specialization
-Engineering leadership specialization
-Teacher leader specialization
Learn more about the academic options leadership offers.
Office of Community Engagement
Get Involved – Be Part of the Solution: The habits of thoughtful and engaged leaders are best developed in college through involvement in the community. At McDonough, students become involved through service, which enhances the overall leadership experience by providing students with experiential learning – a bridge between academic learning and the real world.
Discover community engagement.
Fitzgerald Executive-In-Residence Program
The Executive-in-Residence (EIR) program is designed to bring experienced business leaders into the Marietta College community in ways that are personal, engaging, and meaningful. Rather than a single lecture, the EIR spends time building relationships with students and faculty—sharing real-world leadership experiences while learning alongside the campus community.
Learn More about the program.
Nonprofits LEAD
The vision of Nonprofits LEAD is for every nonprofit to have the tools, resources, knowledge, and support they need to meet the needs of their community. The mission of Nonprofits LEAD is to build a strong, sustainable nonprofit community in the Mid-Ohio Valley in which every organization is able to effectively and efficiently achieve its mission.
Learn about Nonprofits LEAD.
ROTC
You may feel called to lead, serve, and make a difference beyond yourself. Air Force and Space Force ROTC (AF / SFROTC) at Marietta College offers you a pathway to grow as a leader while earning your degree—supported by a close‑knit campus community and a shared commitment to service.
Explore ROTC.
Veterans Services
We understand that veterans bring leadership, discipline, and real‑world experience to the classroom, and we are committed to providing an education that respects your service and supports your next mission.
At Marietta College, veterans benefit from a highly personal learning environment where faculty know you by name, value your experience, and are invested in your success.
Explore our Collegiate Purple Star Award support.
Who was Bernard P. McDonough?
The Center is named in honor of Bernard P. McDonough (1903-1985), a self-made industrialist and entrepreneur who ran wide-ranging global business interests from his Marmac Corporation headquarters in Parkersburg, West Virginia. From humble beginnings, he built an industrial empire after World War II with diverse holdings, including concrete plants, construction companies, shoe factories, marine barges, lawn and garden tool factories, and sand and gravel operations.
In 1986, through a generous $5.5 million gift from McDonough's wife, Alma McDonough, and the McDonough Foundation, Marietta College established the Bernard P. McDonough Center for Leadership and Business. Drawing from a liberal arts curriculum, the Center began offering one of the first comprehensive undergraduate leadership programs in the United States. The Center welcomed its first cohort of undergraduate leadership students in the fall of 1987. In 1988, the McDonough building was dedicated on campus — offering state-of-the-art facilities.
As a reflection of Mr. McDonough’s entrepreneurial spirit, the Center has maintained its focus on cutting-edge leadership studies initiatives, including the Teacher Leadership Certificate, and the Engineering Leadership Certificate. Aside from these innovative tracks, the Center also offers a Minor and a Certificate in Leadership Studies, which can be combined with any major at Marietta College.
Contact Us
There are several ways to contact us, and we'd love to hear from you!
Email: lead@marietta.edu
Phone: 740.376.4624
The McDonough Center for Leadership and Business
Marietta College
215 Fifth Street
Marietta, OH 45750
U.S.A.