Business School Admissions

The application season for Fall 2010 is underway. All indications are that this season will be just as competitive as the previous one. Please check out our school profile, application deadline, and application essay pages for the information you need to get started on your applications.

We continue to conduct and publish interviews with b-school admissions officials every so often, so check back frequently. Here is where you can view our growing list of business school admission interview archives.

September 2009

Forbes Lists “Best Business Schools”

Forbes.com recently released its sixth biennial ranking list of "The Best Business Schools." According to the site, the rankings are compiled by based on the return on investment graduates have achieved after five years. The site also noted that alumni of the top ranked programs typically earn more than $200,000 once they're five years out of school.

Here are the top fifteen schools from the list:

1. Stanford
2. Dartmouth (Tuck)
3. Harvard
4. Chicago (Booth)
5. Pennsylvania (Wharton)
6. Columbia
7. Cornell (Johnson)
8. Northwestern (Kellogg)
9. Virginia (Darden)
10. Yale
11. Texas-Austin (McCombs)
12. UC Berkeley (Haas)
13. Duke (Fuqua)
14. MIT (Sloan)
15. UNC (Kenan-Flagler)

ESADE News

A recent Inside Wire reported on Senior Consultant Cristina Freeman's visit to ESADE, a top European business school, for its monthly Open Day on its Barcelona campus. At Open Day, Jeroen Verhoeven, Assistant Director of Admissions, highlighted the program's flexibility, personalization and methodology. In particular Verhoeven explained that though all students are required to take the same core courses and number of electives, the ESADE MBA experience can adjust to suit the unique needs of each student. The 2009 incoming class will be the first to decide the length of their MBA - 12, 15 or 18 months – after having experienced the program for one semester. Thus they can fine tune their experience depending on their interests and shifting life circumstances. In an uncertain job market, such flexibility and personalization gives students a chance to maximize their MBA experience and prepare for their future.

If you are a client for AdmissionsConsultants and did not receive this edition of Inside Wire, please contact your Client Satisfaction Manager right away.

SDA Bocconi School of Management Admissions Interview

Many European MBA programs are reporting a large influx of American applications. One example is SDA Bocconi School of Management in Milan. SDA Bocconi School of Management has had great success in attracting talented candidates from all around the world to its MBA program.

Here is a recent interview with Tyler Henderson from the Recruiting and Admissions Service, Masters Division at Bocconi. Some of the topics covered in the interview include this year's admissions volume, what SDA Bocconi considers important in the application process, and how the school is adjusting in the light of current financial trends.

Environmental Defense Fund MBA Program Expands

A recent article on enviornmentalleader.com reported that a relatively new MBA program has expanded this year. The program places students into corporate sustainability roles for a 10 week time period and currently has 26 students enrolled and will include 23 companies.

The program is called "Climate Corps". Last years seven program participants reportedly, "helped their host companies identify opportunities to save $35 million in net operational costs over five years while cutting 57,000 tons of carbon pollution annually."

Students in the program were selected from top schools including Cornell University, the University of Pennsylvania, Stanford University and Yale University. Some of the companies involved include Cisco Systems, EBay Inc., salesforce.com, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Accenture.

Stanford Graduate School of Business Announces New Dean

In May, Professor Garth Saloner was named the new dean at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Saloner is an economist and a scholar of entrepreneurship and business strategy. He will succeed Robert Joss who is stepping down after 10 years. Saloner officially started the new position on September 1, 2009.

President John Hennessy is quoted on Stanford GSB's website saying, with "over nearly two decades at Stanford, Garth Saloner has demonstrated that he is not only a top-notch scholar, but also a respected leader among his peers and distinguished teacher highly praised by his students. His scholarship in the areas of entrepreneurship and electronic commerce is particularly pertinent to our times and global economy."

Provost John Etchemedy was also quoted on the website stating, "Garth Saloner helped to lead the development path and transition to a new curriculum that is truly reinventing the path to an MBA."

May 2009

Financial Times Releases Executive Education Rankings

The Financial Times has released its 2009 rankings for open enrollment and custom-designed executive education programs.

Here is the top ten list for open enrollment programs:

1. Harvard Business School
2. University of Virginia: Darden
3. IMD
4. IE Business School
5. Iese Business School
6. London Business School
7. Center for Creative Leadership
8. Stanford University GSB
9. University of Western Ontario: Ivey
10. MIT Sloan School of Management

New Fellowship for Stanford MBAs

Commitment to social entrepreneurship by a growing number of Stanford Graduate School of Business students has inspired the School to create a new fellowship award - the Social Innovation Fellowship - which will provide substantial financial and strategic support to graduates starting social ventures.

Recipients will be selected by June 2009. The fellowships are part of a three-year pilot program developed by the Business Schools' Center for Social Innovation. The program's directive is cultivating leaders to solve the world's toughest social and environmental problems.

The fellowship program is designed to help mission-driven MBAs create nonprofits that benefit society. The one-year fellowships carry a stipend of $80,000 per student, or $120,000 per two-member team that must be led by a graduating Stanford MBA. Fellowship winners must be committed to building a successful nonprofit venture or innovation that addresses a particular social or environmental challenge, and must work full-time for their ventures during the fellowship year.

Fellowship winners receive strategic assistance and entrepreneurship expertise deemed necessary by a team of senior staffers from the Business School's Center for Social Innovation. Faculty advisors for the program include Jim Phills, the Claude N. Rosenberg Jr. Director of the Center for Social Innovation, and James Patell, Herbert Hoover Professor of Public and Private Management.

The Social Innovation Fellows program builds on Stanford's popular Public Management Program, which is part of the Center for Social Innovation. One in every four Business School students receiving an MBA also elects to earn a Public Management Program Certificate, indicating their preparation to apply their management skills to a government agency, nonprofit enterprise, or socially responsible businesses.

November 2008

Business Week Releases 2008 Rankings

Business Week has announced its 2008 b-school rankings.

Here are the top ten:

1. Chicago (Booth)
2. Harvard
3. Kellogg (Northwestern)
4. Penn (Wharton)
5. Michigan (Ross)
6. Stanford
7. Columbia
8. Duke (Fuqua)
9. MIT (Sloan)
10. UC Berkeley (Haas)

In addition, here are BW's top ten ranked international schools:

1. Queens
2. IE Business School
3. INSEAD
4. Western Ontario
5. London Business School
6. ESADE
7. IMD
8. Toronto (Rotman)
9. IESE
10. Oxford (Said)

Introducing the University of Chicago Booth School of Business

The University of Chicago received a $300 million gift from 1971 alum Jim Booth of Dimensional Fund Advisors. The school will now be rebranded to the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

New European, Asian Partnerships for MIT

The MIT Sloan School of Management is teaming up with four international business schools to offer a one-year Masters in Management Studies degree that will start in 2009.

The four schools are HEC Paris, Tsinghua in Beijing, Fudan in Shanghai, and the SKK Graduate School of Business at Korea’s Sungkyunkwan University. MIT Sloan already has partnerships with the three Asian schools.

The new post-experience degree will enable students studying for a MBA at any of the four to also acquire the MIT degree. MIT officials have said that American students and faculty will also benefit from the partnership.

Fifteen students are expected to attend Sloan for the first year, with up to 50 students enrolling in the future.

October 2008

Round 2 Looking at Sharp Increase

While there are no official tallies for the first round of admissions (many b-school deadlines are still a week or two away), several programs have reported a big increase in interest in their MBA programs.

NYU's Stern School of Business reported a 30% increase in attendance at their off-site info sessions; Chicago GSB has also indicated the same, though with no solid percentage. Michigan's Ross School of Business says campus visits has more than doubled and Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management has indicated they've seen a 22% increase in applications so far.

Registration for the GMAT is also seeing a sharp rise over last year. The GMAC has indicated that registration volume so far for 2008 is at 129,902, up 5.1 percent.

The reported increases in school visits, initial applications and test registration all point to a coming flood of applications in the next few months. While Round 1 deadlines have passed for many schools - and the majority remaining have late October / early November deadlines - Round 2 will most likely see a sharp increase across the b-school application landscape.

Chicago GSB Alters Curriculum for More Flexibility

The faculty at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business today approved changes in the school's curriculum that will add flexibility to an M.B.A. program already known for allowing students wide latitude in course selection. The changes go into effect for students beginning in the summer of 2009.

The faculty also voted to add a new academic concentration in analytical management and require all students in the evening M.B.A. program and weekend M.B.A. program to take a leadership development course similar to one required of full-time students.

The addition of the leadership development course requirement for students in the evening MBA program and weekend MBA program means those students will take 21 courses, the same as full-time students. The new course requirement for part-time students was enacted because the faculty felt it is essential that all graduates be exposed to a well-executed leadership program that includes a self-assessment component coupled with opportunities to enhance interpersonal skills.

Some of the new courses in the required portion of the curriculum are more rigorous as a result of the higher quality of students entering the program.

School officials explained that "although we are giving students more flexibility, this is not a radical departure from our curriculum." In discussions with recent alumni, current students, and corporate recruiters, the existing curriculum consistently received high marks. More than 92 percent of Chicago's recent graduates said they were satisfied with the business education they received.

September 2008

Further Scandal Fallout

The Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) has announced the completion of its investigation of GMAT test takers who paid to receive active test questions on the Web site Scoretop.com, which is in direct violation of GMAC testing policies and procedures.

As a result, GMAC canceled the scores of 84 test-takers. Twelve posted live GMAT questions on the Scoretop Web site and will not be eligible to take the test again for a minimum of three years. The remaining 72 wrote messages on Scoretop confirming that they saw items from the site on their GMAT exam. The scores of these individuals were also canceled; however, they are allowed to re-test. Schools where scores were sent have also received notification of this action.

While GMAC is not actively expanding the scope of the investigation, it retains the right to investigate any additional information it receives about a test-taker's activities on Scoretop and will take appropriate action.

According to the Wall Street Journal, eleven of the 84 students were applicants at Stanford; they were denied admission. Another student had already graduated with a MBA from the school and officials have indicated they will be discussing the situation with the student.

Two of the 84 are currently enrolled at Chicago GSB; school officials there are still considering a course of action and have not made a decision. Representatives at the business schools of Columbia, Dartmouth, Harvard, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Yale said they had no students enroll with the tainted test scores.

One indication of how much the Scoretop problem has shaken students and officials alike is at Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business. The b-school plans to hold an "ethics fireside chat" this month on campus to discuss the scandal, including officials from the business-school council.

Wharton Launches Joint JD/MBA Program

Two of the nation's top law and business schools - the Wharton School and the Law School at the University of Pennsylvania - are launching an accelerated three-year program leading to both the JD and MBA degrees. Penn's three-year JD/MBA is the country's first fully integrated three-year program offered by elite law and business schools. The new program will target potential applicants who will typically have around two years of work experience, whether in law, finance, as entrepreneurs or in investment banking, private equity and related fields.

Students in the new program will spend the first year in Law School and the following summer in four Law and Wharton courses designed specifically for the three-year JD/MBA. The second and third years will include a combination of Law and Wharton courses, including capstone courses in the third year and work experience in law, business, finance, or the public sector in the summer between the second and third years.

Applicants must be admitted by both schools in order to enroll in the three-year program. Students in the joint program will be required to meet the Law School's mandate to perform 70 hours of supervised legal work in a pro-bono setting in order to graduate. The three-year JD/MBA program is expected to enroll about 20 students each year, beginning in September 2009.

Penn Law already offers 10 other three-year joint degree programs that combine a law degree with master's degrees in bioethics, international studies, education and other disciplines. In total, Penn Law offers more than 30 joint- and dual-degree and certificate programs; one-half of its students take classes outside the Law School; and 70 percent of its faculty hold advanced degrees in fields other than law, including nearly one-half of the standing faculty holding a Ph.D.

August 2008

Many B-Schools Report Increase Last Year

Application levels for the upcoming school year were especially strong in full-time programs. Among full-time MBA programs participating in the 2008 GMAC Application Trends Survey, 77 percent - the highest level in five years - said they saw application levels increase. This compares with 64 percent in 2007 and reflects the second-largest year-over-year surge in applications to full-time MBA programs since the survey was first conducted by GMAC in 2000.

Part-time and executive MBA programs also reported rising application levels, although not at the same pace as their full-time counterparts. Sixty-one percent of part-time programs said applications were up in 2008, compared with 69 percent in 2007 and 62 percent in 2006. For executive programs - typically aimed at people with more career experience than applicants to other types of MBA programs - the figure for 2008 was 60 percent, down from 63 percent a year ago.

Application levels to MBA programs are showing strength amid a record-setting period for the GMAT, which is used as part of the admissions process at thousands of MBA programs around the world. The GMAT was administered 246,957 times during the testing year that concluded June 30, 2008, representing the busiest testing year ever for the exam.

In addition, GMAC researchers have found that people with MBAs are having substantial success in the job market. Three months prior to graduation, 57 percent of the MBA students who participated in the 2008 GMAC Global MBA Graduate Survey said they had received an offer of employment-the highest percentage since 2001.

Columbia Begins New Class with New Curriculum

Columbia Business School will unveil its redesigned core curriculum this fall with the entering class of 2010, introducing a streamlined set of foundational courses, newly built-in flexibility and a corporate governance module during orientation for first year students.

Consolidated to allow for an additional full-term elective course in the second semester of the first year, the revised core curriculum is organized into "required" and "flexible" components. The new structure retains Columbia's commitment to an academically rigorous core as the nucleus of the MBA. The required core of 6.5 courses covers material that is deemed essential to an MBA: accounting, corporate finance, leadership, marketing, operations, statistics and strategy. The flexible core, designed to expand the scope of the required core and complement its content, is composed of 1.5 courses.

A new feature of Columbia's core curriculum - a non-credit corporate governance module - brings a unique focus to a topic often overlooked as a core competency in management education. The module is designed to enhance students' understanding of their duties and responsibilities as managers and directors of firms, as well as their appreciation of the role of corporate governance in their careers, the business entity, the economy and society at large.

The revised core curriculum was developed by the Foundations Curriculum Committee (FCC), a group of tenured faculty representing the School's five academic divisions convened by Dean Hubbard in 2006.

July 2008

New Hi-Tech Security for the GMAT Rolling Out

As early as next year, you may be required to 'scan your hand' when you show up to take the GMAT.

This high-tech ID check comes courtesy of the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC). It's called "palm-vein scanning" and will be tested next month at GMAT test centers in Korea and India. It's expected to show up in U.S. centers as early as late fall of this year, with a world-wide rollout slated for May of 2009.

The new ID technology is being used to target proxy test taking, a fraud where applicants hire high-scoring imposters to take the exam in their place. U.S. authorities broke up a fraud ring back in 2003, which caused the current digital fingerprinting security check in place since 2006. The GMAC says the new vein-scanning is highly superior and more acceptable to consumers.

A palm scan takes a few seconds, where the vein patterns in the student's palm is imaged and archived along with their test. The scans are extremely accurate and much harder to fake, unlike many fingerprinting devices.

The good news? Despite adding the new technology, the GMAC will not be increasing the current exam fee of $250.

While it seems this new security measure is in partial response to the recent Scoretop scandal, it's not. ID fraud is different than question-sharing, and the GMAC has had various security methods in place for a number of years, including videotaping and photographing test takers in their centers. However, unlike the Law School Admission Council - which disposes of their paper fingerprints of LSAT test takers after five years - the GMAC has indicated it expects to make the palm-vein scans part of a student's permanent record. However, there should be no worries because law enforcement cannot use the scans in their investigations.

New Survey Shows Corporate Responsibility Important

A recent survey and study conducted by the Stanford Graduate School of Business shows that future business leaders rank corporate social responsibility high on their list of values, and that they are willing to sacrifice a significant part of their salaries to find an employer whose thinking mirrors their own.

The study examined the tradeoffs students are willing to make when selecting a potential employer. Researchers found that intellectual challenge ranked number one in desirable job attributes, while money and location were essentially tied for second, each roughly 80 percent as important as the most important factor.

A reputation for ethical conduct and caring policies towards employees ranked high as well—75 percent as high as intellectual challenge and 95 percent as important as the financial package. Other attributes of corporate social responsibility, including environmental sustainability and care for the community and other stakeholders, was weighted with over half the importance of the top job criterion, intellectual challenge.

The researchers found that the students expected to earn an average of $103,650 a year at their first job. Nearly all (97.3 percent) said they would be willing to make a financial sacrifice to work for a company that exhibited all four characteristics of social responsibility. They said they would sacrifice an average of $14,902 a year, or 14.4 percent of their expected salary.

Salary Offers Still High

According to a recent 2008 undergraduate study, it seems recent hires can expect to maintain competitive starting salaries despite the weak state of the economy. The latest quarterly report of salary offers to grads, released by the National Association of Colleges & Employers (NACE) on July 2, shows an overall increase of 7.1% in starting salaries in all majors, compared to a year ago. Increases for business students lagged the overall market, however, posting only a 4% increase.

For business grads, the average salary offers varied by specialty. Business administration and management grads fared especially well, posting a 5.1% increase over the previous year. Marketing grads saw an equally strong increase—4.7% over last year. Economics majors saw a 4.2% increase, according to the survey, and finance grads saw a 2.8% increase. While accounting grads reported a modest 2.9% increase in their average offer, it's a gain compared with NACE's spring report, which found no year-over-year salary increase for accounting majors.

June 2008

Scoretop Scandal Widens

The GMAT cheating scandal that broke open on June 23 just got bigger. The Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) said the number of prospective MBA students facing questions about their entrance exams now totals more than 6,000—six times the original estimate.

GMAC, at the time, tried to reassure involved students that only those who knowingly used the site to cheat on the GMAT would have their scores cancelled, but panic still remains among current applicants, enrolled students and even MBA graduates. GMAC is currently analyzing the seized hard drive and is using the data to determine who used the site to cheat on the test. Those who did will find their scores cancelled, with the exact punishment left up to each school. Schools could reject current applications, expel current students, and possible unspecified sanctions for graduates.

A list of advice and frequently asked questions will be posted to GMAC's website sometime this week.

The Scoretop site, unlike legitimate GMAT preparation companies such as Kaplan or Princeton Review, offered a VIP service for $30 for 30 days that GMAC says gave visitors access to the "live" test questions. Legitimate test-prep companies use retired questions that have been legally purchased from GMAC.

It's unclear exactly how Scoretop obtained the live questions, although at least some of them were posted by the site's users after having taken the GMAT. It's also unclear whether everyone who used the site knew the questions were live. The site described the questions as being "fully owned by Scoretop [and] written by our own…tutors."

While the hard drive contains payment information on VIP members, GMAC says it's unlikely all VIP members will have their scores canceled.

IESE's new Young Talent Program

International b-school IESE at the University of Navarra has unveiled its Young Talent Program, something similar to Harvard's 2+2 program.

The YTP combines professional experience with pre-admission to the full-time MBA program at IESE. The program is designed for juniors and seniors at the university level who demonstrate academic and personal excellence. Students who are accepted are able to develop a long-term career path with a top firm, obtain possible corporate sponsorship for their MBA, and gain skills necessary to be an international manager.

For more information, visit IESE's YTP website.

May 2008

New Columbia J Term and HBS Applications Released

Columbia and HBS were amongst the first schools to release their deadlines and essays for next year. As we have traditionally done, we will update all of these on our site so you have access to all the latest information in one convenient spot.

Darden and PLE Cement Partnership

The University of Virginia's Darden/Curry Partnership for Leaders in Education (PLE) has joined with Portugal's Universidade Autonoma de Lisboa (UAL) to create a program that will eventually lead to a post-graduate leadership degree for teachers in Portugal. Beginning in the fall of 2008 in Lisbon, Darden/ Curry faculty via the PLE will work with the UAL to develop a two-semester post-graduate leadership program on educational management and administration.

The mission of the PLE is to strategically combine the most advanced thinking in business and education to meet the unique demands of managing and governing schools and school systems, proving that by engaging leadership at all levels and aligning those efforts, all students can learn at high levels.

April 2008

Kellogg Sees Over 500 Participants in Leadership Trips

In March, about 35 students from the Kellogg School's Full-Time MBA Program met with Lee Myung-bak, president of South Korea, as part of the school's Global Initiatives in Management (GIM) program. GIM is a global business leadership course designed by Kellogg students, in conjunction with faculty advisers, as a way to provide first-hand knowledge of the culture, economics and governance of foreign countries.

All told, more than 500 Kellogg School students traveled to locales such as Argentina, Botswana, Brazil, Dubai, the European Union, India, Japan, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, Tanzania, Thailand, Turkey, Uruguay, Vietnam, and Zambia. During the trips, the students met with business leaders, government officials and Kellogg graduates for an intimate look at the global landscape. They also conducted the primary research essential for completing their final reports and presentations required for the GIM course.

The Kellogg School's Global Initiatives in Management program has grown tremendously over the last 10 years. It consists of 10 weeks of classroom instruction followed by two weeks of international field study and research analysis. Approximately two-thirds of students within the full-time, part-time and executive MBA programs at the Kellogg School participate annually in GIM. The GIM course and trip abroad give students valuable leadership skills while enhancing their awareness of the global business environment.

Tepper School Team Ties Princeton for Second

A team from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School won the 2008 Financial Engineering Case Competition hosted by the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University. The host team from the Tepper School and Princeton University tied for second-place at the 11th annual contest. This year's event, held April 4 at Lehman Brothers New York headquarters, was sponsored by the Tepper School, Lehman Brothers, PRIMIA Institute and Appaloosa Management Partners.

The competition requires teams to solve a complex financial engineering problem in just six hours. The case this year focused on the energy derivatives market. Competitors were asked to design and price exotic electricity- and natural gas-linked structured products based on underlying cash flows from an electrical power plant. Teams presented their solutions before a panel of judges made up of faculty from the competing schools and Lehman Brothers executives.

Seven teams joined this year's competition, including the University of Chicago, Columbia University, the University of California at Berkeley, New York University, Wharton, Princeton and Carnegie Mellon.

The Financial Engineering Case competition is the premier competition to showcase the business and analytical skills of top graduate business students in the areas of derivative security valuation and financial engineering, also known as computational finance. Carnegie Mellon offers one of the most highly regarded programs in computational finance at the bachelor's, master's and doctoral levels, as well as a joint degree with the MBA program.

March 2008

2009 Rankings Released

US News & World Report released their 2009 "Best Business Schools" rankings list.

Harvard Business School, the Stanford GSB, and Wharton took the top 3 slots in this year's US News & World Report business school rankings, showing little movement from the previous year.

The top 10 schools in this year's rankings are:

1. Harvard Business School
1. Stanford GSB
3. University of Pennsylvania - Wharton
4. MIT – Sloan
4. Northwestern University – Kellogg
4. University of Chicago GSB
7. Dartmouth – Tuck
7. UC Berkeley - Haas
9. Columbia Business School
10. New York University - Stern

International B-Schools Open to GRE

For nearly 60 years, the GRE test has been the common test of most graduate study programs and a common admissions requirement - except for MBA programs. Most b-schools worldwide use the GMAT as their benchmark test, but that seems to be changing.

This past February, the Instituto de Empresa (IE) Business School in Madrid quietly announced that it would begin accepting GRE test scores for admissions to all of its management degree programs, including the MBA. According to the school, the GRE increases and diversifies the business program applicant pool, and supports IE's effort to attract high-quality participants from diverse backgrounds, including grad student hopefuls who many not have considered a MBA.

Since IE's announcement, other European business schools have followed suit. The Helsinki School of Economics, Barcelona School of Economics, ESADE Business School in Barcelona and the European School of Economics in London are but a few who have also quietly opened their admissions doors to GRE test-takers.

One common thought is that the GRE will help boost the pool of women candidates, since GRE test takers are more likely to be women and more likely to be recent graduates, whereas the GMAT is more popular with those who have been out of school for a few years. By accepting results from both tests, the hope is to widen the applicant pool and create a more diverse mix of students in the MBA programs.

Because the GRE and GMAT are both taken by individuals from diverse academic backgrounds, neither test have advanced content knowledge in any specific area, including buisness. They both measure knowledge and skills that admissions officials evaluate in applicants for MBA programs.

February 2008

Financial Times Releases Rankings for 2008

The Financial Times released their new MBA program rankings for 2008 this week. Retaining the top spot is Wharton for the third year in a row. Surprisingly, in second is the London Business School, previously fifth on the list the last two years.

The top twenty programs are:

1. Wharton (University of Pennsylvania)

2. London Business School

3. Columbia Business School

4. Stanford University GSB

5. Harvard Business School

6. INSEAD

7. Sloan (M.I.T.)

8. IE Business School

9. Chicago GSB

10. Judge School of Business (Cambridge)

11. Ceibs

12. IESE Business School

13. Stern (NYU)

14. IMD

15. Tuck (Dartmouth)

16. Yale

17. Hong Kong UST

18. HEC Paris

19. Saïd (Oxford)

20. Indian School of Business

The complete rankings can be found at www.ft.com.

January 2008

Columbia Changes Up the Case Study

Responding to executive rumblings a few years ago regarding the quality of MBA graduates, Columbia Business School has created a new approach to the classic MBA teaching method of the 'case study.' The case study method was invented by Harvard business school nearly a century ago and is used by most b-schools. Columbia hasn't abandoned the method, but given it a new twist.

Concerned that today's MBA graduates were intelligent but ill-prepared to handle an important managerial responsibility - solving problems quickly with minimal information - Columbia's dean came up with the "decision brief" method. This offers less information than a standard case study and more importantly, doesn't provide a solution until after students have wrestled with all the issues on their own.

These days, the skill to frame a problem, finding the data and effectively analyzing it - often without all the information - is an important one. The method is blended with the more traditional method of case study and reflects contemporary issues while doing away with the traditional Harvard formula.

The standard case study formula presents a narrative arc, containing a protagonist and story line. Students are provided with a wealth of information ranging from the company's history, market share and other factors. The students are then guided along the decision-making process as the protagonist 'solves' the problem.

The Columbia decision brief breaks that mold. Students are given basic information and the protagonist's challenge, along with a few documents that enhance the background of the situation. Students then discuss possible solutions; afterwards, the group then sees how the protagonist handled the issue and their thought process. The students then debate whether or not it was the correct decision.

Columbia's new technique is still in its infancy, having been taught this year. It's first "field test" will be during the summer, when most MBAs head out to their various internships. It is hoped that these corporate recruiters encounter students who are more independantly-minded thinkers and decision-makers, more able to handle the complexities of today's growing markets.

Georgetown and ESADE Global EMBA Partnership

Georgetown University and ESADE Business School in Barcelona, Spain, have partnered to create a new executive management program. Known as the Georgetown-ESADE Global Executive MBA, the program will be offered by Georgetown's McDonough School of Business and Walsh School of Foreign Service with ESADE Business School. It will be delivered in six 11-day modules on four continents, and is designed to meet the needs of accomplished executives whose scope of work is global.

The Global EMBA has been developed using the expertise of the McDonough School in inter-disciplinary teaching and international residencies, ESADE's know-how in executive leadership, social innovation and international business as well as the Walsh School's recognized leadership in the area of international relations and global policy. The result is an intellectual challenge and an academic experience that goes beyond classrooms, cases and textbooks. The program is believed to be the first of its kind to include a strong global policy dimension within an executive business degree.

"This program will give accomplished executives a chance to both crystallize their professional experience and better understand the complexities of global business in a world-class program that is adapted to their schedule," said McDonough School of Business Dean George Daly. "I am excited about this new Global MBA program, the result of our collaboration with ESADE Business School."

The Georgetown-ESADE EMBA program will begin in Washington, D.C. in June 2008, with subsequent modules in Barcelona, Buenos Aires/Sao Paolo, Bangalore, Barcelona/Moscow, and Washington/New York over a 16-month period.

Applications are now being accepted for the inaugural class. The three application deadlines are February 28, April 1, and May 15, 2008. Participants will be notified of acceptance within two weeks of their admissions interview.

GRE a MBA Admissions Option?

The Educational Testing Service (ETS), producers of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), is going after a new market - the business school applicant. Though nearly all b-schools require students to take the GMAT (owned and produced by the Graduate Management Admissions Council), the ETS is attempting to persuade some schools to consider the GRE as an alternative.

In 2006, both Stanford University's Graduate School of Business and M.I.T.'s Sloan School of Management quietly announced they would accept the GRE in lieu of the GMAT. However, according to some officials at both schools, the GMAC is pressuring them to keep such acceptance quiet, due to the contracts between the GMAC and the b-school.

Some schools do accept the GRE in place of the GMAT, but only on a case-by-case basis. Chicago GSB is one such b-school, where the GRE has been accepted if the applicant is located nowhere near a GMAT testing facility. All of these exceptions involve international applicants.

ETS has begun placing advertisements claiming that "MBA" can also mean "more business-school applicants," with the selling point being that a larger number of students are available in the GRE pool who are weighing grad school options. Many of these students would apply to business school if a separate test isn't required.

For the time being, ETS officials are working with schools such as Stanford to track the performances and successes of GRE-admitted students, in order to gauge the test's effectiveness in identifying promising applicants.

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