<p>who do you trust? i have seen schools in one report ranked second and then 14th in another report. I am interested in business. Should i trust the US news and report's rankings or businessweek or neither</p>
<p>I've only looked at rankings because I find them interesting. They don't sway me in my college choices, because the US News, or whatever organization's, criteria are certainly not the same as mine. I instead look for schools that best fit me holistically, and narrow it down that way. It takes more research, but I have found several colleges that I would love to go to, not because of a specific major, or the ranking of a department, or any other single criterion, but because they are overall the best fits for what I would ideally want in a college. There's so much to finding a college- far more than quantitative rankings can reveal.</p>
<p>If you are going to use U.S. News, which is probably one of the better ranking systems outside of personal visitations, then look at the specific business programs that you are interested in. The top business schools in the nation (Penn, Michigan) aren't necessarily the top in lets say, finance or supply chain management.</p>
<p>i think Wharton is top in both of those. But colleges all seem the same. I dont really mind big city or in the middle of no where. I just want to know which problems is nationally or internationally acclaimed to be the best or one of the best.</p>
<p>Many of the top firms actually prefer econ majors from the Ivies over business majors from most of the business schools. Business is a little complex, you have to look a little deeper. If you want to go into finance or consulting in fact the Ivies, Duke, Stanford, etc do better at getting people jobs than any of the business schools except perhaps Wharton. </p>
<p>What are you looking to do?</p>
<p>Slipper, Business students at Wharton, Sloan and Ross all do better than most Ivy League Econ majors when it comes to placement into IBs and MCs, with an outrageously high placement rate into such firms for students who care to apply. From Wharton,about 180 out of 500 or so graduates joined major IBs and MCs. From Ross, roughly 100 out of 350 joined major IBs and MCs. From Sloan, roughly 25 out of 70 graduates joined major IBs and MCs. I do not have stats for Stern, but I am pretty certain they also place many of their students into top IBs. McIntire, McDonough also place a significant portion of their students into top IBs and MCs. In short, although I personally do not recommend Business studies at the undergraduate level, one must concede that B-schools have far more aggressive career offices and more appropriate resources to attract top recruiters.</p>
<p>"i think Wharton is top in both of those. But colleges all seem the same. I dont really mind big city or in the middle of no where. I just want to know which problems is nationally or internationally acclaimed to be the best or one of the best."</p>
<p>Actually, Michigan State is the top in supply chain management...Wharton is top of finance.</p>
<p>Alexandre, its impossible to compare placement because the Ivies don't seperate students pursuing corporate jobs from those that don't. But the Ivies are all actively recruited at a great majority of the top consulting/ IB firms far ahead of any business school outside the top 3-4 and on par with of the top b-schools if you look at the quality of recruiters coming onto campus.</p>
<p>Slipper, the same can be said of several non-Ivy League schools, like Chicago, Duke, Georgetown, Michigan, MIT, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Stanford, UVa and several LACs, where top MCs and IBs activelly and aggressively recruit dozens of Arts and Science majors on a regular basis. Those schools, along with the Ivies, do a great job placing their qualified and interested students into those exclusive firms.</p>
<p>As can be expected, at universities with high-profile undergraduate business programs (Georgetown, Michigan, MIT, Notre Dame, Penn and UVA), most students interested in pursuing Consulting or IBanking career will naturaly be drawn to their BBA programs. Still, a significant number of non-B-school undergrads at those universities are recruited by the likes of UBS, Goldman Sachs, Bain and McKinsey etc...</p>
<p>Although I am certain the Ivies place their students into the top MCs and IBs very effectively, with the exception of Harvard, Yale and Princeton, I doubt their placement rates match those at Wharton, Ross and Sloan. Those three Business programs place a third of their students into top IBs and MCs, and one must keep in mind that only half of the students in those programs actually wish to work in those industries. The other half would prefer working in the Bio (J&J, Pfizer, BMS, EL, Medtronic, Amgen, Baxter etc...), Technology (Microsoft, Google, IBM, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrup Grumman etc...), consumer (the Big 3, P&G, GE, Kraft, Kellogg etc...) or auditing (the Big 4) industries or go straight to graduate school. So basically, for every 10 students who wish to join top MCs or top IBs, 7 or so students in those three elite B programs will actually get offers.</p>
<p>Alexandre, when I say Ivies I mean the Ivies + Stanford, Duke, Amherst, Williams and a couple others. </p>
<p>But I don't think all the schools you listed fit into this category. If you look at the core banks or consulting firms recruiting at UVA or Georgetown, they aren't the most elite firms, but rather places like Deloitte, Bear Sterns, and Ernst and Young- good firms but not the top. If you think UVA, Notre Dame, or Georgetown places as well as Dartmouth or Columbia econ you are absolutely wrong.</p>
<p>In the case of Georgetown, Notre Dame and UVa, I was referring to their B-Schools. I agree that their Arts and Sciences programs don't have placement rates as impressive as Columbia or Dartmouth. But their B-Schools have excellent placement rates.</p>
<p>UVA's McIntire's placement information for 2006:</p>
<p>As you can see, Bain, BCG, Booz Allen, Mercer, McKinsey, Blackstone, Lehman, Goldman Sachs, Lazard, J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley and Citigroup all hired at least 2 McIntire students in 2006...out of a class of 300. </p>
<p>Top recruiters at Georgetown's McDonough in 2005:</p>
<p>JP Morgan Chase 14
Goldman Sachs & Co 9
Deutche Bank 6
Merrill Lynch 6
KPMG 4
Banc of America Securities 3
BearingPoint 3
Corporate Executive Board 3
Lehman Brothers 3
Navigant Consulting 3 </p>
<p>Top recruiters at Notre Dame's Mendoza in 2005:</p>
<p>Deloitte 23
PricewaterhouseCoopers 14
Ernst & Young; Target Corporation 11
Accenture 10
General Electric; Protiviti 9
KPMG; Huron Consulting; Morgan Stanley 7
Citigroup 6
Nestle USA 5
Ford Motor Company; Johnson & Johnson; JP Morgan Chase; Procter & Gamble 4
Bain Capital; CGI-AMS; Credit Suisse; General Mills; Goldman Sachs; Lehman Brothers; and others 3</p>