If students are serious about seeking a bachelor’s degree in business in the States, the good news is that they have a lot of options. However, for some, that can also be the bad news. When faced with so many excellent schools, how do you tailor your research to find the right options?
Depending on what you are seeking in a school, one well-regarded university may not suit you as well as another. We have found three research tools that can help you narrow down your options. Here are three factors to consider when you are choosing where you want to earn your business degree.
Funding and state-of-the-art research facilities
If what you want to study requires a bit of technology, the US News and World Report rankings (an independent news magazine) are a great research tool. This ranking list, which has been published every year since the 1980s, has received a fair amount of criticism for some of their research criteria. However, when it comes to identifying schools with the best financial and technological resources, this is the list to look at.
This list is based solely on the assessments of deans and senior faculty from business programs around the US.
Top 10 according to US News and World Report (2017):
- 1. University of Pennsylvania
- 2. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
- 3 (tie). University of California--Berkeley
- 3 (tie). University of Michigan--Ann Arbor
- 5 (tie). New York University
- 5 (tie). University of Texas--Austin
- 7 (tie). Carnegie Mellon University
- 7 (tie). Cornell University
- 7 (tie). University of North Carolina--Chapel Hill
- 7 (tie). University of Virginia
Academic experience
Many students value hobbies, internships, and service outside of the classroom. Poets and Quants, a social media network designed for undergraduate business students, published their first ranking list in December of 2016. Unlike US News, Poets and Quants dedicates all of their research toward business programs. After several business school faculty approached them and expressed their need for a different ranking system, they responded by creating this tool.
There are three criteria by which they judge the schools on their list:
- Admissions standards: this includes exam scores, how selective the program is, and applicants’ class rank.
- Academic experience: Extracurricular activities and the quality of academic advisors.
- Employment outcomes: This criterion includes how quickly new business graduates get jobs, average starting salaries, and the amount of students who had internships during their studies.
Top 10 according to Poets and Quants 2016):
- 1. Washington University in St. Louis
- 2. University of Notre Dame
- 3. University of Pennsylvania
- 4. Georgetown University
- 5. University of California – Berkeley
- 6. Cornell University
- 7. Indiana University
- 8. University of Virginia
- 9. New York University
- 10. University of Michigan
High earnings and student/employer satisfaction
It is no secret that business graduates have excellent earning prospects. However, if you are looking for schools whose graduates command some of the highest salaries, the Bloomberg Businessweek list may be where you want to start your school search. This tool places heavy emphasis on how prepared students are for jobs once they graduate.
The Bloomberg list ranks its schools based on the following four factors:
- Employer survey
- Student survey
- Starting salary
- Internship
Top 10 business schools according to Bloomberg Businessweek (2016):
- 1. Villanova University
- 2. University of Notre Dame
- 3. Boston College
- 4. Indiana University
- 5. University of Virginia
- 6. University Texas at Austin
- 7. University of North Carolina--Chapel Hill
- 8. University of Michigan - Ann Arbor
- 9. New York University
- 10. Bentley University
