Wednesday November 4, 2009
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The Top Undergraduate Business Programs

Special Report: For Business Students, an Uncertain Future

Slide Show:The Top Undergraduate Business Programs

How the mighty have fallen. For the first time since BusinessWeek launched its ranking of undergraduate business programs in 2006, University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School is not our No. 1 program. It was unseated by the University of Virginia—a program that, incidentally, costs a quarter of the tuition Wharton charges. Virginia, a distant second in 2006 and 2007, made significant gains in 2008. In 2009, Virginia—along with Notre Dame—both scored better on our student survey, which counts for 30% of the final ranking, allowing them to capture Nos. 1 and 2, respectively. Even so, Wharton didn't fall far. The school fared far better on the recruiter survey than Virginia did and had a higher median starting salary for graduates—$61,000 vs. Virginia's $58,000. It also has much higher SAT scores among business majors and a significantly smaller class size in core business classes.

Click column heading once to reorder from highest to lowest. Click twice to reorder from lowest to highest.

2009 Rank	2008 Rank	School Name	School Type	Program Length (years)	Annual Cost($)	Full-time Enrollment	Student Survey Rank	Recruiter Survey Rank	Median Starting Salary	MBA Feeder School Rank	Academic Quality Rank	Index Number	Faculty Student Ratio	Average SAT Score	Average ACT Score	Teaching Quality Grade	Facilities & Service Grade	Job Placement Grade

52	39	Michigan State (Broad) East Lansing	Public	2	10,264	4,619	48	6	48,170	45	91	56.60	55.00	1140	24	B	B	A
53	46	Florida (Warrington) Gainesville	Public	2	3,790	2,367	62	16	47,500	40	61	56.07	22.00	1284	28	B	B	B
54	NA	Virginia Tech (Pamplin) Blacksburg	Public	4	8,198	4,172	41	34	45,000	73	66	54.16	34.00	1165	25	B	B	A
55	48	Minnesota (Carlson) Minneapolis	Public	4	10,806	1,965	66	84	49,000	42	27	54.02	17.54	1295	29	C	A	A
56	50	Rutgers New Brunswick, N.J.	Public	4	12,070	1,010	93	27	55,000	22	50	54.01	45.00	1336	31	C	C	B
57	NA	St. Joseph's (Haub) Philadelphia	Private	4	32,710	2,255	89	18	47,900	96	48	53.00	23.50	1111	23	B	B	B
58	60	Delaware (Lerner) Newark	Public	4	8,648	2,821	53	80	50,000	54	50	52.48	23.00	1211	27	A	A	A
59	64	Bryant Smithfield, R.I.	Private	4	30,721	2,849	59	30	43,000	93	54	52.17	35.17	1148	24	B	B	B
60	NA	John Carroll (Boler) University Heights, Ohio	Private	2	28,000	353	96	86	43,500	62	1	51.88	15.72	1478	24	B	C	C
61	62	Purdue (Krannert) West Lafayette, Ind.	Public	4	8,772	2,794	61	28	49,000	46	74	51.00	41.09	1152	25	C	B	A
62	56	Clemson Clemson, S.C.	Public	4	10,379	2,345	51	44	46,333	82	66	50.84	27.59	1216	27	B	B	B
63	63	Arizona (Eller) Tucson	Public	2	6,344	4,273	46	22	45,516	67	87	50.75	45.00	1140	24	B	A	B
64	53	Marquette Milwaukee	Private	4	27,720	1,565	65	101	48,000	61	27	50.74	23.10	1160	27	A	B	B
65	51	George Washington Washington, D.C.	Private	4	40,392	1,624	63	65	50,000	27	61	50.45	27.70	1232	27	B	B	B
66	61	Connecticut Storrs	Public	4	9,338	1,801	82	85	51,500	75	40	49.19	21.00	1234	27	C	C	B
67	73	Colorado State Ft. Collins	Public	4	6,055	1,858	67	54	44,000	76	54	48.15	26.20	1144	25	B	B	B
68	65	Drexel (LeBow) Philadelphia	Private	4	28,500	2,619	91	33	50,000	84	54	48.06	22.50	1162	25	B	C	A
69	NA	Xavier (Williams) Cincinnati	Private	4	27,360	856	60	90	41,500	37	54	45.05	22.00	1112	25	A	B	A
70	NA	CalPoly (Orfalea) San Luis Obispo	Public	4	5,043	2,348	79	63	51,000	70	66	44.40	38.00	1205	26	B	C	B
71	NA	DePaul Chicago	Private	4	25,490	4,247	54	72	47,500	95	82	43.92	33.70	1109	24	A	B	B
72	70	Arizona State (Carey) Tempe	Public	4	6,164	3,568	88	41	48,000	64	66	43.91	30.00	1205	26	C	C	C
73	81	Northern Illinois DeKalb	Public	2	8,524	3,546	50	48	41,000	98	87	43.70	38.65	1099	22	B	A	A
74	76	Missouri (Trulaske) Columbia	Public	2	8,500	1,353	39	92	46,216	63	87	43.51	22.50	1145	25	C	A+	B
75	80	Massachusetts (Isenberg) Amherst	Public	4	10,232	3,155	80	76	50,000	36	66	42.99	31.87	1201	26	B	B	B
76	84	Iowa (Tippie) Iowa City	Public	2	6,662	2,155	87	50	41,000	68	54	42.83	31.00	1194	25	C	C	C
77	NA	Texas Tech (Rawls) Lubbock	Public	4	6,783	3,318	58	25	46,000	86	100	42.55	47.00	1174	26	C	B	B
78	74	Oregon (Lundquist) Eugene	Public	2	6,531	920	85	29	41,500	74	74	41.54	16.60	1140	26	C	B	C
79	77	Pittsburgh Pittsburgh	Public	4	15,142	1,889	81	69	44,000	78	61	41.47	64.00	1254	26	B	B	C
80	86	Texas Dallas	Public	4	9,850	1,697	57	61	44,401	100	87	41.36	19.83	1161	25	A	A	B
81	NA	Oklahoma (Price) Norman	Public	2	5,245	1,472	71	83	50,000	77	82	40.72	23.90	1145	25	C	B	B
82	NA	Tennessee Chattanooga	Public	4	5,310	1,909	56	81	39,100	90	74	40.19	31.00	1093	23	A	B	B
83	88	Arkansas (Walton) Fayetteville	Public	4	7,020	2,961	43	100	46,627	79	91	39.44	39.00	1145	25	B	A	A
84	89	Belmont Nashville	Private	4	21,110	1,560	74	98	37,500	81	50	39.28	17.03	1161	26	A	C	B
85	85	North Carolina State Raleigh	Public	4	5,286	2,411	69	49	45,700	56	93	39.18	26.00	1168	25	B	C	C
86	95	South Carolina (Moore) Columbia	Public	4	8,870	3,671	76	53	42,600	85	82	39.12	22.74	1192	26	B	B	C
87	82	Houston (Bauer) Houston	Public	4	7,000	1,561	73	91	45,000	89	82	36.81	17.00	1172	25	B	B	A
88	90	Louisiana State (Ourso) Baton Rouge	Public	4	5,086	1,798	95	77	47,000	69	66	36.34	17.00	1224	27	C	C	C
89	83	Colorado (Leeds) Boulder	Public	4	9,466	3,017	83	99	48,672	32	82	35.65	47.45	1200	27	B	B	B
90	NA	Rutgers Newark, N.J.	Public	4	11,457	1,608	84	78	54,000	100	93	35.19	39.00	1064	23	C	B	B
91	NA	Cincinnati Cincinnati	Public	4	9,399	2,197	90	94	43,000	83	74	32.53	43.00	1122	24	C	B	C
92	96	Iowa State Ames	Public	4	6,400	3,473	86	55	42,000	87	93	31.53	46.00	1115	23	C	B	B
93	NA	Akron Akron, Ohio	Public	4	8,237	2,380	98	87	42,000	52	74	31.25	20.00	1123	24	C	C	C
94	NA	Illinois Chicago	Public	4	12,716	2,025	92	89	40,000	66	74	31.24	28.00	1130	24	C	C	C
95	91	Loyola Chicago	Private	4	28,800	1,536	100	95	42,500	88	54	30.86	21.50	1141	26	A	C	C
96	NA	Nebraska Lincoln	Public	4	6,684	2,851	75	73	38,350	57	100	29.98	46.00	1105	25	C	C	C
97	NA	Hofstra (Zarb) New York	Private	4	28,630	1,990	99	75	42,500	94	74	29.87	28.00	1169	25	B	C	C
98	NA	Florida International Miami	Public	2	3,278	2,385	77	97	40,000	92	93	27.90	46.00	969	21	B	C	B
99	94	Temple (Fox) Philadelphia	Public	4	12,330	4,903	101	71	47,500	99	93	25.06	38.38	1106	23	C	C	B
100	NA	Georgia State (Robinson) Atlanta	Public	4	6,056	4,894	94	96	42,857	97	93	24.55	44.00	1050	21	B	C	B
101	NA	South Florida Tampa	Public	4	3,990	2,149	97	82	40,000	91	93	24.52	71.00	1202	26	C	C	C

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Note: Annual program costs include tuition and required fees for in-state students Starting salaries are 2008 medians. Letter grades represent only a part of the total student survey results; highly ranked programs may have low letter grades, while lower-ranked programs may have high letter grades. In each category, the top 20% among all 101 ranked programs earned A+s. The next 25% got As, the next 35% got Bs, and the bottom 20% got Cs. No Ds or Fs were awarded. NR=Not Ranked.

Data: BusinessWeek, Cambria Consulting

Research by: Geoff Gloeckler and Fred Jesepersen, with Brian Burnsed, Alison Damast, Lindsey Gerdes, Louis Lavelle, Dan Macsai, Alysa Teichman, Anne VanderMey

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