Fall is always a busy time on campus, and this year, we have much to be thankful for: strong alumni support, winning case study teams, notable faculty impact, employment success, and annual rankings. Of particular note, the fall employer recruiting season is off to a fast start. Thus far, we surpassed last year’s historic employment highs, with over two-thirds of our second year’s students having job offers to discuss at Thanksgiving! And in the volatile MBA ranking world, this fall delivered gains in some key publications and slips in others – below is a rundown:
In a five-year look at alumni careers, Forbes moved Vanderbilt MBA up 19 spaces to #30 in its ROI metric. This ranking showed the relative progress our graduates have made as the economy strengthened.
In one of the most volatile rankings, Bloomberg BusinessWeek pushed Vanderbilt MBA from #34 for #21 last year, only to slide back to #30 this fall. That ranking considered US schools and is broken down into four indexes, Compensation, Networking, Learning, and Entrepreneurship.
The Vanderbilt MBA scored #22 among US schools (#29 globally) in the Economist’s annual “Which MBA?” rankings. This is a small decline from last year, when we ranked 20th in the US. The Economist looks at 21 individual dimensions that they roll up into 4 broader categories. Owen received high marks for opening new career opportunities, where we ranked #15 among US Schools (#20 globally).
Latin American outlet América Economía Global MBA ranking placed Vanderbilt MBA #15 in the US (#30 globally).
In another global publication, Vanderbilt’s Executive MBA programs rose to #13 among U.S.-only programs (#73 globally) in Financial Times. Owen’s strong positions in salary increase, female students, and FT’s career progress ranking (relative to the US and globally) led to the year-over-year improvement.
This week in Princeton Review, Owen collected six top-10 ratings, including general areas like #2 for Best Administered, #4 for Best Professors, #6 Best Campus Environment, #4 for Most Family-Friendly, along with two-shout outs for concentration: #2 for best MBA in Human Resources and #8 for Operations.
Each rankings provide data and another viewpoint of our school. We will study and learn from these results. Beyond the movement in any individual ranking, I am most excited about our progress in the fundamentals — like helping our students open exciting, well-paying, careers. Our growing faculty is more diverse than ever and continues to receive national recognition for their impact in the classroom and practice. I am proud of our progress to deliver world-class business education on a personal-scale.
—Dean M. Eric Johnson