Financial Times Releases 2008 Global MBA Rankings » Clear Admit: MBA Admissions Consultants Blog

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Nov. 17: Cornell / Johnson R2
Nov. 26: INSEAD R2
Dec. 5: UNC Kenan-Flagler R2
Dec. 9: Berkeley / Haas R2
Jan. 2: Michigan / Ross R2
Jan. 6: HBS R2
Jan. 6: LBS R2
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Jan. 8: Wharton R2
Jan. 9: UNC Kenan-Flagler R3
Jan. 12: Cornell / Johnson R3
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Jan. 13: MIT Sloan R2

Essay Topic Analysis
Below are links to our comments on some of the top programs' essay topics.
The Career Goals Essay*
Berkeley / Haas*
Chicago GSB*
CMU / Tepper*
Columbia*
Cornell / Johnson*
Dartmouth / Tuck*
Duke / Fuqua*
Harvard*
IESE*
INSEAD*
London Business School*
MIT / Sloan*
Michigan / Ross*
Northwestern / Kellogg*
NYU / Stern*
Oxford / Said*
Penn / Wharton*
Stanford GSB*
UCLA / Anderson*
UNC / Kenan-Flagler*
USC / Marshall*
UT Austin / McCombs*
UVA / Darden*
Yale SOM*
* denotes '08-'09 commentary

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Chicago
Columbia
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Duke / Fuqua
Harvard
Kellogg
Michigan / Ross
MIT / Sloan
Stanford
UNC / Chapel Hill
Virginia / Darden
Wharton
London Business School

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Guide to Grammar and Writing
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The Economist Style Guide
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School Rankings
Rankings are a good way to start your research on various MBA Programs. Keep in mind each uses a different methodology.
Business Week
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Financial Times
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Career Guides
The following resources should be useful to those who want to research the careers open to them after (or before) earning an MBA.
Vault.com
Wetfeet

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MBA Programs: North America
If an MBA Program is not listed, please e-mail and we will be happy to list it.
Berkeley / Haas
Carnegie Mellon / Tepper
Chicago
Columbia
Concordia
Cornell / Johnson
Dartmouth / Tuck
Duke / Fuqua
Emory / Goizueta
Harvard
HEC Montreal
Indiana / Kelley
Michigan
MIT / Sloan
Northwestern / Kellogg
New York / Stern
North Carolina / Kenan Flagler
Notre Dame / Mendoza
Pennsylvania / Wharton
Queens
Stanford
Texas / McCombs
Thunderbird
Toronto
UCLA / Anderson
Virginia / Darden
Western Ontario / Ivey
Yale

MBA Programs: Rest of the World
As there is some variety in the length of international MBA programs, we have denoted the length of the program next to its name (1 = one year; 2 = 2 years). If an MBA Program is not listed, please e-mail and we will be happy to list it.
AGSM (Australia) 2
Cambridge / Judge (UK) 1
CIEBS (China) 2
Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (China) 1
Cranfield School of Mgmt (UK) 1
ESADE (Spain) 1 or 2
HEC (France) 2
IESE (Spain) 2
IMD (Switzerland) 1
INCAE (Costa Rica) 2
INSEAD (France) 1
IPADE (Mexico)
ISB (India) 1
London Business School (UK) 2
Manchester Bus. School (UK) 2
Melbourne (Australia) 2
Oxford / Said (UK) 1
Rotterdam (Netherlands) 1
Tsinghua IMBA (China) 2
University of St. Gallen (Switzerland) 1

Additional Resources
Here we link a host of additional resources available across the web. E-mail info@clearadmit.com to have resources added to this list.
AACSB International
Association of MBAs
Beyond Grey Pinstripes
EFMD
gradschools.com (worldwide)
Infozee
mba.com (GMAT Scores)
MBAInfo
mbaleague.blogspot.com
MBAzone
MBA Jungle
TOEFL
Top MBA

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Blog Archive

Monday, January 28, 2008

Financial Times Releases 2008 Global MBA Rankings

The Financial Times released its 2008 Global MBA rankings today, with the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business claiming the number one spot for the fourth year in a row. Wharton’s company at the top remained relatively unchanged – Columbia, Stanford, Harvard and the London Business School (LBS) again comprised the top five ranked programs. Notably, LBS shot up from fifth to second this year – assuming the highest rank ever for a European business school – due in great part to the growth of London as a world economic center.

“As London has grown as a world financial centre, so has the popularity of British business schools, with students eager to work in the U.K. on graduation,” reported the FT in its analysis of this year’s ranking. Indeed, as we reported last week, LBS students overwhelmingly choose to remain in London upon graduation. Of last year’s graduating class, almost 70 percent took their first job in London last year, even though fewer than 10 percent of the students were British.

The rankings help make clear the ways in which the success of business schools is closely linked to the current business environment, according to the FT analysis. In addition to a rise in popularity of British schools, this year’s rankings also bear out the recent surge of world-class business schools in Asia, particularly China.

“The rise in volume and quality of Asian business schools is also economically linked,” Arnoud De Meyer, director of the Judge Business School at the University of Cambridge, told the FT. “This is for a very simple reason: the demand for business schools is correlated with [the size of] GDP,” he continued.

U.S. schools, meanwhile, are being impacted by the weak dollar – though the impact is felt in different ways by different students. For non-U.S. students, the weak dollar means that jobs in the U.S. no longer carry an expected salary premium. But at the same time, tuition to U.S. programs is now also effectively cheaper.

U.S. schools continue to best their European counterparts where funding is concerned as well, the FT reports. Healthy endowments at U.S. schools help attract both faculty and students. Lisa Giannangeli, director of marketing for MBA admissions at Stanford, told the FT that 72 percent of students in this year’s class received some form of financial aid. “We paid over $7 million in grants and research assistantships,” she said.

Attention to academic research output and alumni satisfaction also differentiates U.S. schools from their European counterparts, according to the FT report. “We haven’t gone nearly as far as many U.S. schools,” says Michael Luger, director of Manchester Business School in the United Kingdom and a former academic at the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler School. European school will continue to increase their focus on alumni, he predicts.

But as European schools seem to be attempting to emulate U.S. schools in these areas, U.S. schools meanwhile are looking to European programs for guidance on curriculum development and teaching methods, the FT continued. Specifically, several top schools – including Yale, Stanford and Columbia – have reshaped their programs to include more teamwork and overseas projects.

Interestingly, the FT analysis points to U.S. schools’ accepting greater numbers of recent undergraduates into MBA programs as another major point differentiating them from their European counterparts. In another post last week, we took a look at this relatively recent trend in the U.S. According to the FT, the ability to enter an MBA program in the U.S. without prior related work experience could prove particularly attractive in the future to European career changers.

For as much as current economic conditions may affect European and U.S. schools differently, there are also ways in which the overall economic climate may impact business schools more universally. More on that in tomorrow’s post…

# posted by Clear Admit @ 3:58 pm in MBA News, Rankings, School: Columbia, School: Harvard, School: London Business School, School: Penn / Wharton, School: Stanford

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