<p>Best</a> Business School Rankings | MBA Program Rankings | US News</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter. it’s the number 1 in most people’s list. it still has the most number of applicants and highest yield rate.</p>
<p>Stanford is #1 in my mind.</p>
<p>[Stanford</a> Tops Harvard in 2012 Best Business Schools Rankings - US News and World Report](<a href=“http://www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/top-business-schools/articles/2011/03/15/stanford-tops-harvard-in-2012-best-business-schools-rankings?s_cid=related-links:TOP]Stanford”>http://www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/top-business-schools/articles/2011/03/15/stanford-tops-harvard-in-2012-best-business-schools-rankings?s_cid=related-links:TOP)</p>
<p>Stanford Tops Harvard in 2012 Best Business Schools Rankings </p>
<p>By Brian Burnsed </p>
<p>Posted: March 15, 2011</p>
<p>The Stanford University Graduate School of Business surpassed Harvard Business School for the top spot in U.S. News’s 2012 rankings of Best Business Schools. Stanford had tied with Harvard for the lead spot for the past three years, but was able to claim sole possession this year as Harvard’s overall score slipped to 98 from the 100 that had become commonplace for the Cambridge, Mass. institution. </p>
<p>The change at the top of the rankings is far from the only shift taking place in the business school realm. M.B.A. programs nationwide are being forced to drastically alter their approach to M.B.A. instruction given the increasingly global nature of the business world. Esteemed programs like the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, which has the third-ranked international program this year and is tied for third in the overall rankings, and the Yale University School of Management, tied for 10th overall, have made sweeping changes to their curricula to better prepare students to approach their careers with an international mindset. The Thunderbird School of Global Management is this year’s top-ranked international M.B.A. program, followed by the University of South Carolina Moore School of Business. </p>
<p>[Read more about the changes in b-school curricula.] </p>
<p>Though Stanford’s ascent carries significance, other business programs made bigger jumps in the rankings from last year to this year. The University of CaliforniaDavis Graduate School of Management leapt 14 spots from a tie at 42nd to a tie at 28th; the Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management jumped from a tie at 36th to a tie at 28th; and the Rice University Jones Graduate School of Business climbed from a tie at 39th last year to a tie at 34th in the 2012 rankings. </p>
<p>[See 10 b-schools on the rise.] </p>
<p>M.B.A. hiring has begun a gradual turnaround, but was stagnant during the recession. Executive M.B.A.s, on the other hand, fared much better during the economic tumult and are continuing to flourish as the market improves, though E.M.B.A.s typically cost a great deal more than a traditional, full-time M.B.A., forcing many to rely on an employer to subsidize the education. The Wharton School once again topped the executive M.B.A. list, and the remainder of the top five stayed the same, though the University of Chicago Booth School of Business captured the second spot from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, which placed third. </p>
<p>[Read more about executive M.B.A.s] </p>
<p>A growing number of ranked business schools are tapping into their on-campus resources in the hopes of creating online M.B.A. programs that are on par with their well-regarded traditional offerings. This fall, the 19th ranked University of North CarolinaChapel Hill Kenan-Flagler Business School will launch a comprehensive online degree program that is instructed by the very professors that teach on campus. Similar programs have long been in place at Indiana University Kelley School of Business, which is tied for 23rd this year, and Pennsylvania State University, which is tied for 40th.</p>
<p>U.S. News also ranked part-time programs, which, like online and E.M.B.A. programs, are convenient for those who don’t want or can’t afford to take time off from work as they further their graduate business education. Northwestern, Chicago, and the University of CaliforniaBerkeley Haas School of Business once again garnered the top three spots in the part-time M.B.A. rankings. </p>
<p>Searching for a business school? Get our complete rankings of Best Business Schools.</p>
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<p>RML, I am sorry, but since when does a school having the most number of applicants indicate that it is the best school?</p>
<p>USNWR Graduate School of Business Rankings</p>
<h1>1 - Stanford</h1>
<h1>2 - Harvard</h1>
<p>Acceptance Rates
6.8% – Stanford
11.2% - Harvard</p>
<p>Enrollment Yields
80% - Stanford
84% - Harvard</p>
<p>Total Average Starting Overall Compensation
$179,629 - Stanford
$166,685 - Harvard</p>
<p>At the level of HBS and Stanford GSB and their yield/cross-admit levels, it’d absurd to quibble about relative strength. If one was good – and lucky – enough to get into both, the choice would be about big vs. small and East vs. West.</p>
<p>Other kick-ass schools, IMO:</p>
<p>Booth/Chicago
Haas/Berkeley
Kellogg/Northwestern
Wharton/Penn</p>
<p>Again, quibbling about relative quality at this level is a bit absurd.</p>
<p>Let’s keep in mind that this is only one ranking. Though USNEWS has a popular ranking for college, B-Schools should really be compared using multiple sources such as FT and Bloomberg. </p>
<p>Also, as Bedhead points out, anything in the top 10 is really the elite level B-school. There will be changes from year to year, but these institutions are all the best of the best. If you are lucky enough to attend Wharton, you wouldn’t dare complain that it only placed #3 in one of the rankings. </p>
<p>That being said, it is impressive that Stanford’s GSB has made the move to #1. They were always good, but have been revamping their program for some time now. It has obviously paid off.</p>
<p>“If you are lucky enough to attend Wharton, you wouldn’t dare complain that it only placed #3 in one of the rankings.”</p>
<p>There are big differences among business schools in the top 10 in terms of quality of education and quality of the people you meet. I have heard a lot of people complaining about attending Wharton instead of HBS or Stanford, though people who attended Wharton for finance tend to be proud. There’s always the elite of the elite in every field.</p>
<p>College: HYP
Medical school: Harvard and Johns Hopkins
Law school: YHS
Business school: HBS and Stanford GSB
Engineering school: MIT and Stanford</p>
<p>For b-school, GSB and HBS are considered to be the best and are equal in prestige in my mind.</p>
<p>Wharton is an arguable 3rd, since Sloan, Booth, and Kellogg will all give Wharton a run for its money. And have you ever visited Wharton and considered living in south philly?</p>
<p>Beyond, GSB and HBS, you have to look at schools for its relative strength.</p>
<p>Marketing - Fuqua and Kellogg
Finance - Booth, CBS, and Wharton
Operation - Sloan</p>
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<p>Gee, focused on brand name much?</p>
<p>In the past couple of years, cross-admit battles have gone pretty much like this:</p>
<p>Harvard is the toughest
Stanford close</p>
<p>Haas and Chicago have come on strong. Wharton is solid.</p>
<p>MIT and Kellogg not far behind.</p>
<p>The rest of the top.</p>
<p>In terms of percentage admits, Stanford is the “king” with the lowest admit percentage (as indicated above) and Harvard and Haas duke it out for second place.</p>
<p>I can accept that Harvard and Stanford are a fairly elite duo. However, to suggest that a school of Wharton’s quality has a bunch of people who are nothing but disappointed because they aren’t at Harvard or Stanford and that this is an indicator of inherent quality is frankly laughable. It’s idiotic. The professors at a place like Wharton come from Harvard/Stanford/MIT/Chicago/Berkeley/Yale/Princeton for one thing. They are all elite. And Wharton folks do really, really well.</p>
<p>In terms of law school, I’d throw in some others: arguably Columbia is in the top tier for sure, just as hard to get into as another in the trio.
Med school: UCSF and Penn should be there, maybe Duke.
Engineering: Berkeley.</p>
<p>“In terms of law school, I’d throw in some others: arguably Columbia is in the top tier for sure, just as hard to get into as another in the trio.
Med school: UCSF and Penn should be there, maybe Duke.
Engineering: Berkeley.”</p>
<p>I never said Wharton isn’t good. It’s just not at the HBS/Stanford level. And like I said, I have met people disappointed about attending Wharton instead of HBS/Stanford, just as I have met people disappointed about attending Booth instead of Wharton.</p>
<p>CLS is good, but it’s no HYS. Columbia is a lot easier to get into than HYS. Though it has a higher LSAT range than SLS, SLS is known to emphasize the GPA and non-numerical factors.
UCSF, Penn, and WashU, though all highly ranked, don’t yet have the prestige to match Harvard and Johns Hopkins.
Berkeley is good, but it’s no MIT/Stanford.</p>
<p>IvyBear, I don’t think you know enough about engineering to say that Berkeley is not as the level of MIT/Stanford. It’s ridiculous.</p>
<p>“IvyBear, I don’t think you know enough about engineering to say that Berkeley is not as the level of MIT/Stanford. It’s ridiculous.”</p>
<p>Berkeley engineering is good, but it’s not MIT/Stanford. Berkeley is a solid #3, though it’s a closer to UIUC/Georgia Tech than to MIT/Stanford, just as how Wharton is closer to Booth than to Harvard/Stanford. The fact that you like Berkeley doesn’t make it the very best of the very best.</p>
<p>Wharton is a great school, but most people would chose HBS/Stanford over it.</p>
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<p>I wish you knew how ridiculous you sound, but you are oblivious.</p>
<p>IvyPBear is right. At my college (a top 10), the smartest law school aspirants want to go to HYS. The best pre-meds want to go to Harvard and Johns Hopkins (some CA residents have UCSF as their top choice). The brightest engineering majors (ones who don’t plan to go into trading or consulting) wanted to go to MIT/Stanford. There’s always two or three schools in each field. Not to say other schools (Georgia Tech, UIUC, etc.) aren’t good, but they don’t have the hype.</p>
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<p>And it’s probably also a regional bias… Without even caring to look, I’d bet IvyBear is from the Northeast.</p>
<p>Anyway, I wouldn’t quibble about the law school “hype” or even the business school “hype” entirely. Hype indeed – that’s what it is. I was reacting to the absurdity of saying that people were upset to go to Wharton, firstly, and that that was an indicator of the school’s inherent quality. </p>
<p>I’d just point out the regional bias. Yes, yes, Stanford is in Cali, I realize, but its always the honorary Harvard of the West.</p>
<p>UCSF is the top West Coast med school and is the first choice of many.</p>
<p>As far as engineering goes, look at the numbers. Apart from US NEWS which switches back and forth Stanford and Berkeley in the 2 and 3 spots behind MIT, the comprehensive NRC rankings would indicate that Stanford is no Berkeley or MIT:</p>
<p>Out of the eight fields of engineering listed, among the top 3, MIT has an average ranking of 1.6, Berkeley 3.7, and Stanford 5. I didn’t demerit for departments that don’t exist. In 5 of the fields, Berkeley outranks Stanford whereas Stanford does in 2 cases against Berkeley.</p>
<p>[NRC</a> Rankings in Each of 41 Areas](<a href=“NRC Rankings in Each of 41 Areas”>NRC Rankings in Each of 41 Areas)</p>
<p>But I’ll account that hype may trump substance…</p>
<p>“But I’ll account that hype may trump substance…”</p>
<p>Possibly due to the fact that Berkeley doesn’t rank first in any of the engineering fields while Stanford is #1 for EE. I bet IvyPBear went to a very elite school. At my school (a top 10), although people realize that the t14 law schools and the top 10 business schools are good, people make distinctions between HYS/CCN/MVP for law and HBS, Stanford/the rest for business school. People even make a distinction between Wharton and Booth for finance (even though both are great); you always hear people say they want to attend Wharton for finance, you hardly hear anyone say that they want to attend Booth.</p>
<p>IvyBear looked too deeply into USNEWS rankings. I don’t know about much about other fields but for engineering, Berkeley is at least on par with Stanford. In Civil engineering, Berkeley is above MIT, Stanford, it is regarded as the school for civil. In CS, Berkeley=MIT=Stanford=CMU. In EE, MIT slightly > Berkeley=Stanford . In Chemical Engineering, MIT > Berkeley >… Stanford. In environmental engineering, Berkeley = Stanford > MIT. In biomedical, MIT > Stanford~Berkeley. This is from the individual subfield rankings. The overall ranking is biased towards larger schools ( Berkeley is smaller than Stanford, MIT that is also why Caltech is behind Georgia Tech and likewise). I remember in 2004, Berkeley is ranked the no 1 engineering school in the world by the Times above MIT ( it falls to No 2 the next year but still above Stanford). That’s why I thought it is ridiculous that Berkeley is not at the level of MIT/Stanford but of course who cares. Prestige-whores will continue to say that despite all the evidence.</p>
<p>Well, according to ARWU, Berkeley is #3 ([ARWU</a> FIELD 2010 Engineering/Technology and Computer Sciences](<a href=“http://www.arwu.org/FieldENG2010.jsp]ARWU”>http://www.arwu.org/FieldENG2010.jsp)). However, in terms of quality of education, career prospects, etc., Berkeley, Georgia Tech, Caltech, etc. are on par with MIT/Stanford. I think IvyPBear is heavily influenced by which ever elite college he went to.</p>