Cryptocurrency courses have become a big deal in a short amount of time—much like cryptocurrencies themselves. As recently as three years ago, it still seemed disreputable for business schools to teach about Bitcoin or other electronic currencies that are secured through online databases.
Business schools that added the subject as early as possible, before the boom of 2017, may be benefiting from being ahead of the curve, just as it paid off to be an early investor in Bitcoin. Vergne definitely thinks that’s true at Ivey, which began teaching about Bitcoin in 2013 and integrating it across programs in 2014; they were listed in aarticle on the relatively small number of important “bitcoin, blockchain and cryptocurrencies” courses.
The content of programs doesn’t only respond to the market; it also changes to fit research. “I would say that in most cases, faculty expertise is behind the introduction of new courses,” Malinova says. Don Cyr, professor of finance at Brock University’s Goodman School of Business, says that around 2015 or 2016, there was an “explosion” in the number of research studies being done on cryptocurrencies.
Business schools are also learning to focus not on individual currencies like Bitcoin—which themselves may well turn out to be fads—but the principles and technologies they’re attached to, which are impossible to put back into the bottle.