<p>There have been numerous threads regarding acceptance at the top law schools. Does anyone have specific stats for the top business schools?</p>
<p>Business school is much easier to get into than law school, for students at Ivies and top private schools at least. The list is very similar to that of law school: (1-4) HYPS; (5-8) Dartmouth, Columbia, Penn, Duke; (8 on) Northwestern, Brown, UChicago, UCB, UMich, WashU, etc.</p>
<p>Top business schools don’t care where you go as an undergraduate. They are much more interested in what you have accomplished in the business or professional world prior to your arrival. </p>
<p>Top business schools generally expect you to have worked at least 2 and, on average, 5 years before matriculating. Some undergrad institutions have better recruiting ties to Wall Street, which generates a lot of future MBAs - but top schools don’t want to fill their classes with analysts either. Typically, you won’t even know where most of your classmates went as undergrads unless you ask, but you will become aware of their professional backgrounds and what experience they brought to the table as a result of class discussions.</p>
<p>My suggestion to anyone interested in a top business school is the same as my advice to someone who wants to go to an HYPMS: grades and test scores won’t differentiate you (and neither does the school name). You have to have accomplished something that makes you stand out, and makes you a desirable addition to the class. You need the kind of recommendation letters that make people want to meet you. If you are an analyst on Wall Street and 500 of your fellow analysts are all applying to HBS, you are going to have a very, very hard time making a case for your uniqueness.</p>
<p>Top business school don’t care about where you went for undergrad, but where you went for undergrad makes a huge difference (at least much bigger than that for law school) because it affects what kind of jobs you get. Most analysts at BB get into top business school. The entering class at HBS is huge, and yes, they take hundreds of analysts from Wall Street. Yes, you can make it from any school, but it’s much easier if you go to a certain few.</p>
<p>Yes, Wall Street sends a lot of people to top business schools (and even more to mid-level business schools), and yes, Wall Street recruits at the brand name undergraduate schools (and schools like HBS attract applicants who like brand names)-but remember, if you go that route, you are competing against hundreds of sharp-elbowed peers with nearly identical credentials. It’s very, very hard to stand out. You will be ranked against the other 50 analysts at your firm when those letters of recommendation go out. </p>
<p>The easier route into a top business school (if you can’t arrange to be the heir to an industrial empire or to start a string of companies yourself) is to do something you love and get into a leadership position outside of the financial analyst and consulting world. It’s a lot easier to differentiate yourself if you aren’t one of several thousand analysts applying for a top slot. And for many of those jobs, you don’t need a brand name school.</p>
<p>I think we are off track here. I do believe students who has two years of front office experience at PE (Bain Cap, Blackstone, etc.), hedge funds (Citadel, Bridgewater, etc.), investment banks (Goldman, Morgan Stanley, JPM, etc.), and consulting firms (McKinsey, BCG, etc.) have the surest shot from what I’ve observed of students who went to Ivies and other top schools. I’m sure students (given that they are smart) who do something impressive on their own can make it as well.</p>
<p>Although this is dated, here’s the representation at Stanford GSB in the 1990s:
[Timeline:</a> History: News: Stanford GSB](<a href=“http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/history/timeline/mba93.html]Timeline:”>http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/history/timeline/mba93.html)</p>
<p>The strength of Princeton, Dartmouth, and MIT are especially impressive given that they have very small student bodies compared to some of those other schools listed and not listed.</p>
<p>IvyPBear, it’s like you’re unaware of any life path in business other than hedge funds, investment banking, and consulting. Any top business school will be hiring plenty of people who have business interests OTHER than those things (you know, the people who actually make the products and services without which there is nothing to invest in or consult about). M’s Mom is right. Top business schools care very little about undergrad. And though you may not know it, there are actually people who are successful doing things other than hedge funds, IB and consulting and who are therefore great candidates for top b-schools.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl - Can you not read or can you not reason? No wonder kids nowadays are failing reading. I said I believe from my experience and from what I’ve seen (limited to students at elite schools) have the surest shot, which is a statement that leaves room for other cases. Does that make me ignorant of everything else? No. Because I even added “I’m sure students (given that they are smart) who do something impressive on their own can make it as well.” If you are engineering major from UIUC who has worked for Google for two years, is your chance at a top business good? No doubt. For all engineering majors, are their chances as good as a traditional candidate? Probably not. If you have ever attended a top business school, you would know that the vast majority come from a finance, consulting, and engineering background. You have obviously never been in investment banking, hedge fund, or consulting, or else you would know that people who work at these places knows a great deal about everything. If you have worked in a pizzeria your whole life, they probably know more about your pizzeria and about how to run pizza business than you do.
Top business schools do care very little about undergrad. I never disputed that. However, your undergrad can have a significant impact on your work experience prior to business school. How else would you explain why so Stanford GSB’s incoming class is dominated by elite (and many of which are very small) schools? Where is Ohio State? Where is University of Iowa?
I seriously believe people like you don’t understand a simple fact: a typical student from large mediocre public schools are no where near as smart and capable as a typical one from an Ivy, but the smartest few at that mediocre public is probably as smart and capable as the top ones at an Ivy.</p>
<p>“Pizzagirl - Can you not read or can you not reason? No wonder kids nowadays are failing reading… I seriously believe people like you don’t understand a simple fact: a typical student from large mediocre public schools are no where near as smart and capable as a typical one from an Ivy, but the smartest few at that mediocre public is probably as smart and capable as the top ones at an Ivy.”</p>
<p>I guess that pretty much sums up Ivy for you. Need I say more?</p>
<p>I know that at my top MBA program about 80% were from about 25 undergrad programs - pretty much looked similar to USNEWS. Lots of the usual suspects - HYPS, Dartmouth, Duke, Columbia, Penn, etc.</p>
<p>So far the only thing I have learned from this thread is that someone here believes that Ohio State and Iowa are large mediocre public schools…</p>