Here’s a pretty good ranking of the Top 100 UG B schools. I’d try for at least Top 50 if not Top 25. But some are very good in niche programs.
“Ready for calculus” typically means completion of trigonometry/precalculus – usually the next level after algebra 2. However, a less rigorous “calculus for business majors” course may only require prerequisite math to algebra 2.
If what Canuckguy wrote is true, that in Canada all undergraduate business majors at universities require high school calculus, then the minimum standards are much higher than in the US.
Since my information is a decade old, I decided to look into the current admission requirement and see if things may have changed.
Here is Toronto’s Rotman:
http://www.artsci.utoronto.ca/futurestudents/academics/progs/commerce
They still require calculus but a second math course is dropped from the requirement. The killer is the MAT 133Y1 course required in the first year. (I can assure you it is not your “Math for Business” type of courses). A family member of mine knows all about it.
Here is Schulich at York:
http://futurestudents.yorku.ca/requirements/ontario
The school maintained the two math requirements, with calculus “recommended”. Translation: Don’t even think about not taking it. The 70% requirement puts a smile on my face because nobody applying to Schulich has a 70% in anything. I had a family member went there as well.
Here is Queen’s:
http://www.queensu.ca/admission/apply-high-school/academic-requirements/canadian-high-schools/ontario
If anything, the requirements have gone up. A decade ago there was no mention of 80% minimum requirements in English and Math. Like Schulich, the average student admitted scores over 90%. I also had a family member there.
Finally, a more “pedestrian” university and its business school requirements:
http://laurentian.ca/program-specific-requirements
Here it is possible to avoid calculus, but the student would have to offer both statistic and advance functions. Of the three university prep math courses, advance functions was the most difficult when my youngest was in high school. The parents thought it was “scandalous” because it was the only course that an award was not given. (The teacher did not feel any student in that course was deserving of an award). Even the top students in calculus and statistics were unable to pull off an A. I know little of the university or the program because nobody in the family ever considered it.
Things have changed a bit, but what I said earlier is still basically true.
^to clarify what I said: Most US high school students don’t take calculus; those who are good at math take up to precalculus and are expected to “be ready for calculus”, but many only take up to Algebra 2 (and thus aren’t "calculus-ready, only “precalc-ready”). A significant percentage takes calculus, and these are a majority on college confidential.
So, starting with calculus would not be a sign the student isn’t college-ready; starting at precalc does indicate the students in the business school haven’t taken the most rigorous (nor a “very rigorous”) secondary school curriculum.
This is a randomly picked school, neither good nor bad, with their business majors, one “more theoretical” and one “more applied”.
http://academics.uncc.edu/sites/academics.uncc.edu/files/media/Management-APS-May-2014.pdf
(note that students start with “college algebra and probability”)
http://academics.uncc.edu/sites/academics.uncc.edu/files/media/Economics-Business-APS-May-2014.pdf
Calculus must be passed during the first two years, as well as statistics.
Additionally, keep in mind that Canadian grades tend to be 3-5% below their American counterparts.
In short, the Canadian and American situations don’t really compare when it comes to business degrees’ worth or academic demands.
@shawbridge you need to widen your circle of accounting friends-I think you sell us short.
:))
I have just read this thread and have been rendered speechless! This is not easy to do!
@shawbridge wrote:
only after you wrote this:
My response was to simply point out that Stanford, Chicago and Wharton all have PhD programs in accounting.
This statement makes little sense. If you have no expertise in the area of accounting how can you judge the quality of research of an accounting PhD graduate?
The meaning of this statement is somewhat muddled. Your statement seems to suggest that the accounting firm hired to audit a company are responsible for earning surprises. The following papers from Wharton’s Accounting Department suggest different explanations:
Schrand, Catherine and Sarah Zechman, Executive Overconfidence and the Slippery Slope to Financial Misreporting, Journal of Accounting and Economics, 53 (2012): 311-329.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1919729
Rogers, Jonathan, Cathy Schrand, and Sarah Zechman, Do managers tacitly collude to withhold industry-wide bad news?, Working Paper, 2014.
http://ssrn.com/abstract=2221558
Apparently you are unaware of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act and the new FASB 10-K revenue recognition standards.
And finally
When discussing the accounting profession as a whole, where, when and what you saw is anecdotal evidence and has little value. The following is a partial description of Apples inventory management (i.e. accounting) process:
The op has a very valid question - but this discussion about kids that prefer to get a business degree undergrad not being smart is ridiculous. Who do you think is working their way up the ranks of all the businesses in this country or who are starting small businesses? Art history majors? STEM kids? No - it is the business kids. The STEM kids are inventing and discovering but it is the business kids that are creating the businesses and infrastructure to make those discoveries/inventions commercially viable. And you don’t need an MBA to do it - you do need an MBA if you want to work in a large multinational company in the management ranks. But I find that most kids do not aspire to that. They want to start their own businesses and be in charge of their destiny and most of the innovative business programs offer some type of entrepreneurship programs that teach kids the ins and outs of starting a business. Our generation has very preconceived notions about education and the resulting paths. The world is very different now and there is a reason why many of the undergraduate business schools are thriving…successful alumni are coming back to the universities and are donating huge sums to start innovative programs. Take a closer look and you may be surprised at what you find.
If this was ever accurate, it’s not accurate right now. You don’t have to be a business major to work for someone else’s business and you certainly don’t have to be one to start your own business. I was a little annoyed reading all of the comments running down business majors as shallow thinkers but that doesn’t mean that we should devalue non-business majors either.
DmitriR - you are correct however I am basing this observation on what I see in the business world - given the choice of hiring a business grad or a liberal arts major, the edge usually goes to the kid that has done some type of internship in the business world as part of their schooling. Most undergrad business programs require an internship to graduate…so although you are technically correct, the reality is that the undergrad business kids do have an advantage during the recruitment process.
CC is this wonderful place where we all take the 200 people we know in real life and transpose their experiences onto the greater world.
Guys- it’s not all or nothing. Art History majors do fine in the corporate employment market. STEM kids work their way up the ranks of businesses every single day.
I have a personal bias (I admit it) against the “you have to major in accounting or you’ll be a barista your whole life” mentality which is often on display here, only because in my role running a large recruiting department for a global corporation, I have met so many young kids who are miserable accounting or finance majors, instead of being Kick-%^&* urban planning or political science majors or whatever it was that they wanted to be. And they get to senior year and are interviewing for jobs and they get aggravated. Either because they dislike what they have trained to do, or because they observe that the job they really wanted is going to a kid with a degree in what they really wanted to study.
Most corporate jobs don’t fit into the nice, narrow boxes that CC parents like to imagine exist in the world. If I’m hiring for an entry level analyst rotation which leads to management there are a lot more factors than “does this kid have the words analyst in his resume”. We do business in India and China- what can I do with a candidate who is finishing a degree in “International Business” who cannot put together a coherent sentence to discuss the differences in those two economies? We’re filling spots on our investor relations team- what do you do with a kid with a degree in accounting who doesn’t read the WSJ on a regular basis and can’t discuss (at even a casual, cocktail party level, not a full blown business case) the three big, messy shareholder suits or hostile take-overs going on this month which are all over MSNBC, Bloomberg, and the regular press? You need a junior person for the corporate sustainability effort (being run out of the chairman’s office so it’s a visible role) and you interview a kid majoring in chemical engineering who blew everyone’s socks off last month and he’s writing a senior thesis on the carbon offset exchanges in Europe. Isn’t he a better candidate than a random finance major who has no interest in carbon offsets since he wants to become an investment banker???
You like marketing? Study psychology or econ or English or anthropology. You’ll do better with a rigorous sequence in statistics than a watered down “buyer behavior for marketing majors” class. You are interested in social media? Major in political science and write a senior paper on the role of data mining in the Obama election, don’t take some trendy class on social media where you learn how to use three packaged software programs (which a smart 8th grader can figure out with a Youtube video).
Or- major in finance or accounting. IF that’s what you want to do. Not because someone has promised you a great career with zero downside if you do.
There is probably also a lot of disappointment among seniors looking for jobs finding that jobs specific to their majors are not as easy to get as they like, so that they have to seek jobs in the general “bachelor’s degree credential” job market. Pre-professional majors, particularly more specialized ones like computer game design, sports management, and the like, are not exempt from this type of let-down. General business in theory is widely applicable, but is so popular a major (including among marginal students at marginal business schools that cater to them) that it may be harder to stand out in the flood if one has nothing else to show.
Very true. So, at schools like H and Y, management consulting firms (e.g. Boston, Bain, McKinsey…etc) do heavy recruiting for students in many non-business majors, but with an eye on folks who have a proclivity towards analytic ability. So, unlike many other institutions, their is some latitude shown for specific majors, with a greater emphasis on the specific individual–that it to say, they just want really smart folks–they can train for the rest.
The problem with such statements is that their overgeneralization is belied by the individual experiences. Do you think that an accounting major for Boston University has an edge over a liberal arts major from Harvard? A general business major from USC over a student who graduated from one of the Claremont schools? Or a Santa Clara graduate over a Stanford one based on the sole accomplishment of a required internship?
The reality is that quite different and the ones who emerge are the students who have shown to extract the maximum from the 4-6 years of schooling, including making the correct curriculum choices. Most students have a need to balance real hard classes with easier filler types, most people are correctly assuming that a number of “overview” classes that fall under the umbrella of “business” are among the easiest to pass. In the same vein, high level classes economics and finance are among the hardest one can take and require much work and aptitude.
In the end, there are light classes in both “business” and in parts of the liberal arts curriculum. Comparing one student to another should require a review of how the curriculum were built and what the … end product is. I guess that it is what an experienced recruiter such as Blossom is identifying. It is not only what one studied but what one retained from it and can be put on display in a tangible way in an interview.
Xiggi- the week that Uber announces a valuation larger than Caterpillar or Siemens or Pfizer (or whatever the noise was in the market) is NOT a good week for a finance major to announce in an interview that “I don’t follow internet stocks”. (I figured you’d be amused).
This wasn’t a story about internet valuations and most certainly wasn’t a story about which stocks to follow. This was a story about economic disruption, traditional measurements within the corporate finance discipline and are they based on 1920 economic factors which are no longer valid, how does the financial field (and the accounting experts) make sure that analytical tools are used to give institutions, regulators and consumers data which is accurate and meaningful. And another 50 things one could cite as to reasons why every newspaper in the country had an article on the Uber valuation.
This was an important story which has some far-reaching implications about buyer behavior, a market predicated on open disclosure, etc. And yet- how many finance majors couldn’t engage in some casual chatter before the real interview began which displayed even a cursory interest in a big time finance story?
This gets to why an art history major may beat out the finance major for a job in finance. Show some interest! Read a newspaper! Demonstrate an ability to relate something going on in the real world to an intellectual/analytical problem which actually matters!
Do you know how many accounting majors I met during one particularly gruesome recruiting cycle who couldn’t carry on a two minute conversation about unfunded pension liabilities (it was during an election year when that was all some candidates could talk about. And I’m NOT an accounting professional, but you couldn’t escape the discussion). Why is Chris Christie getting up in town hall meetings filled with fire-fighters and teachers and yelling and screaming about pension liabilities- why is this important, why is this a political issue right now, why does anyone besides a couple of actuaries in Trenton care? And if I’m not interviewing for a job as an actuary, should I even invest five minutes in reading this boring story?
Nope. Not interested, don’t care, it wasn’t on the test. So kids need to be mindful that taking the right classes only gets you so far. If you are going to pretend to be passionate about accounting, well- get some passion.
Because undergraduate education is not geared toward helping you to make a living. Rather it’s training in the liberal arts. Why? Because the basic college curriculum was set up for the rich centuries ago. Grad school was later added to remedy this a bit.
Berkeley and Michigan offer undergrad business but you have to apply to get in after sophomore year.
Should we not ask ourselves why we do not have undergraduate colleges for law and medicine? Other countries start their selection process immediately after high school.
All that said, it is the reason that top tier management consulting firms, would rather hire a Yale graduate say in Political Science, than say, an Oregon State (nothing at all against OSU–just a random example) graduate in finance. With the assumption that smart is smart, and you train for the rest.
Current undergrad studying finance here (gasp!), just finished the recruiting process for Wall Street internships and this is my takeaway.
Liberal arts students from top tier programs are smart, but don’t market themselves very well because their school provides little help in building a resume/professional prep/interviews. I’ve been to multiple firms for multiple interviews and informational programs and this aspect really surprised me. I go to a large state school that has a top 10 undergrad business program (US News says anyways…and CCers like US News) and have had Ivy friends ask me for interview help/resume building suggestions.
I think undergraduate business schools serve students and parents what they want in today’s world - professional preparation for corporate America. Business schools essentially teach students how to market themselves and give them a technical background to succeed in the modern workforce. LACs don’t do this. That’s not to say that there isn’t value in liberal arts, students and parents seek different things.
Now I know some brought up Wall Street jobs in this thread. The big places (JP Morgan, Barclays, Citigroup, Goldman, Morgan Stanley, BAML) will say they don’t care about your major and that’s true. They do care about an interest in business though and usually suggest students take some type of accounting course before graduation. Otherwise, the learning curve is steep. It should be noted that schools like HYP have less of a presence on Wall Street now just because the Street is no longer as attractive as it used to be compared to big tech.
Undergraduate business schools are just a factor of the changing work landscape. Many of you cite unemployed business majors here, but business majors probably have a higher chance of getting a corporate job over someone from the same school who studied liberal arts. Top schools are a different ball game because the recruiting is so great there. That’s why HYP shouldn’t have an undergrad program.
And when people mention MBAs it should be noted that many programs now do grade non-disclosure. From what most people on Wall Street have told me - MBA programs are all about networking. The trend of GND and internship placements for first years in August only supports that. I believe Harvard stopped the practice, but a lot of the most prestigious schools continue it. After all, Dee Leopold herself has stated these programs are all about placement (which is now becoming a reality for all undergraduate colleges no matter major). .
With all due respect, may I ask you … how do YOU know this? Is it possible that you are a bit guilty of over-generalizing what LACs do and overlooking that all of them are not created equal? Do you realize that Harvey Mudd is a LAC and that a liberal arts curriculum might comprise literature, languages, art history, music history, philosophy, history, mathematics, psychology, and science.
Just as all business schools are hardly one and the same in delivering what students need to succeed in the modern workforce?
Further, is it not illusory to conflate every part of the arguments into what happens in terms of recruiting in a narrow industry represented by Wall Street, and perhaps the consulting world?
I’d like to think that someone such as Peter Drucker might have disagreed with you.
Who really cares about the uber select few that CAN get into H,Y,P and then get hired by an uber selective firm in NYC or Boston?–really-it has no application to the other 98% of college grads who do not have that option. So in our real world where the choice is not Yale or OSU but Maybe OSU v Kansas v Purdue you dont really worry much about Bain’s requirements for art history majors from Yale(and there are plenty of such grads who dont get offers from the elite firms) The two dont intersect much, period and that is fine. I have managed never to own my own island or 737 but feel Ok about my life.
Also hardly anyone I know ever majored in Gen Business at any decent B school. At worst(least) you do mgt or marketing. It’s not really a thing until you go way down the quality list…