Pressing pause on your career to enroll in a full-time M.B.A. program is by no means a simple, or cheap, task. The majority of M.B.A. students desire to use their degree as a springboard that will propel them through the corporate ranks in their desired profession. Yet, no matter how lofty one's long-term goals may be, the ability to generate an immediate return on such a significant investment of time and money by quickly landing a job is equally important.
[See which b-schools made the biggest jumps in the rankings this year.]
M.B.A. graduates have typically had a high level of success finding work, and U.S. News's own data indicates that the hiring market for business graduates is improving after enduring a lull throughout the recent recession. Examining a business program's job placement rates within three months of graduation is an effective means of discerning whether your diligent work will pay off in the near term.
For context, an average of 73 percent of 2010 business school graduates found jobs within three months of graduation among the 141 business programs that provided the figure to U.S. News.
[Learn more about the M.B.A. hiring market.]
In all, 16 schools reported that at least 90 percent of their graduates found employment within three months. Conversely, 15 schools reported that less than half of their students were able to find a job three months after graduating.
Among the top 10 schools on the job placement list, six business programs placed in the top 50 of U.S. News's rankings of Best Business Schools, including the seventh-ranked Dartmouth College Tuck School of Business, the 25th-ranked Ohio State University Fisher College of Business, and the 28th-ranked University of California—Davis Graduate School of Management. Abilene Christian University reported the highest three-month job placement figure—97.1 percent—yet the school is ranked 107th.
The following table highlights the 10 business schools with the highest three month job placement rates among their full-time 2010 M.B.A. graduates:
| Business School | Students Employed Three Months After Graduation | U.S. News B-School School Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Abilene Christian University | 97.1% | 107 |
| Oklahoma State University Spears School of Business | 96.8% | 97 |
| Iowa State University College of Business | 96.3% | 69 |
| Georgia Institute of Technology College of Management | 95.2% | 28 |
| University of Iowa Tippie School of Management | 94.7% | 40 |
| Ohio State University Fisher College of Business | 94.6% | 25 |
| University of New Mexico Anderson School of Management | 93.6% | Rank Not Published |
| Dartmouth College Tuck School of Business | 93.3% | 7 |
| Tulane University Freeman School of Business | 93.3% | 40 |
| University of California—Davis Graduate School of Management | 93.0% | 28 |
Don't see your school in the top 10? Access the U.S. News Business School Compass to find business school salary data, debt data, complete rankings, and much more.
U.S. News surveyed more than 400 schools for our 2010 survey of business programs. Schools self-reported a myriad of data regarding their academic programs and the makeup of their student body, among other areas, making U.S. News's data the most accurate and detailed collection of college facts and figures of its kind. While U.S. News uses much of this survey data to rank schools for our annual Best Business Schools rankings, the data can also be useful when examined on a smaller scale. U.S. News will now produce lists of data, separate from the overall rankings, meant to provide students and parents a means to find which schools excel, or have room to grow, in specific areas that are important to them. While the data comes from the schools themselves, these lists are not related to, and have no influence over, U.S. News's rankings of Best Colleges or Best Graduate Schools.
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Old Wise Guy of TX 11:40AM July 29, 2011
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