North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School

North Carolina's Kenan-Flagler School is ranked 18th among the best business schools in the U.S. by Poets&Quants.

18. University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

Kenan-Flagler Business School

CB 3490, McColl Building

Chapel Hill, NC 27599

Admissions: 919-962-5327

Email: mba_info@unc.edu

Website: http://www.kenan-flagler.unc.edu/Programs/mba/index.cfm

Apply Online: http://www.kenan-flagler.unc.edu/Programs/MBA/Apply/applynow.cfm

Admission Deadlines for Class of 2014:

Early Action: 10/21/11

Round One: 12/2/11

Round Two: 1/6/12

Round Three: 3/16/12

Think leadership when you consider UNC’s Kenan-Flagler’s MBA degree program. The school puts a heavy  emphasis on the case-study method and group activities, putting extraordinary leadership at the core of almost everything. Students must complete all required core classes in the first year. They may also begin taking elective courses to better prepare for summer internships.

Year one also consists of a required integrative exercise. This exercise requires students to put together the methods they’ve learned in the core classes to solve complex problems. The format for the exercise is a study group based case competition.

Kenan-Flagler offers eight career and enrichment concentrations; students can choose one or combine two concentrations specific to their needs. Or they can design their own course of general management study by choosing from a variety of electives.

Latest Up-to-Date MBA Rankings:

Poets&Quants (2011): 18

BusinessWeek (2010): 16

Forbes (2011): 16

U.S. News & World Report (2011): 19

Financial Times (2011): 62 (Global), 30 (U.S.)

The Economist (2011):  47 (Global), & 29 (U.S.)

Rankings Analysis:

As far as rankings go, the Kenan-Flagler Business School seemed as steady as could be in 2011. The school ranked 18th for the second consecutive year in Poets&Quants’ list of the top 100 MBA programs in the U.S. Underneath our composite ranking, however, there was some formidable churn. The Financial Times, always something of a wild card in the rankings game due to the extreme volatility of the FT list, gave the school a global rank of 62nd, which represented a decline of 16 places from its 2010 rank of 46th. The Economist, meantime, didn’t help the school’s cause. The magazine ranked Kenan-Flagler 47th on its global list, down seven spots from a rank of 40 in 2010. Those declines were at least partially offset by the more authoritative U.S. News ranking, which lifted UNC by two places to 19th from 21st a year earlier. The school also saw a one-place slip in the biennial Forbes ranking which measures return-on-investment. Its Forbes rank was 16 in 2010, down from 15 in 2009.

Besides Forbes, the best rank the school currently has comes from BusinessWeek, which largely ranks MBA programs on the basis of graduate and corporate recruiter satisfaction. Kenan-Flagler is one of the few schools that achieved fairly good balance among these two very different stakeholders. BW gave the school a rank of 17th in its 2010 graduate opinion survey and a rank of 19th in its recruiter poll. One graduate summed up the Kenan-Flagler experience well, writing that “the school’s unparalleled collegiality differentiates it from most of its peers in that students form lasting, collaborative relationships from the outset. Rather than setting a competitive tone, the faculty and staff establish a community centered on team-based, collaborative initiatives centered around the school’s five core values of excellence, leadership, integrity, community, and teamwork.”

The school’s unparalleled collegiality differentiates it from most of its peers in that students form lasting, collaborative relationships from the outset. Rather than setting a competitive tone, the faculty and staff establish a community centered on team-based, collaborative initiatives centered around the school’s five core values of excellence, leadership, integrity, community, and teamwork.

MBA Program Consideration Set:

Stretch Schools:  MichiganYale, Cornell

Match Schools:  Carnegie Mellon, UCLATexas at Austin, Emory

Safe SchoolsIndianaUSCGeorgetown, Minnesota

Tuition & Fees: $48,928 (resident)

Tuition & Fees: $93,176 (non-resident)

Median GMAT: 700

GMAT Range: 620-750

Average GPA: 3.30

Acceptance Rate: 36%

Full-Time Enrollment: 581

International: 25%

Female: 27%

Minority

African American: 5%

Asian American: 11%

Hispanic or Latino American: 4%

Mean Age: 28

Median Base Salary: $95,000

Median Signing Bonus: $25,000

Percentage of MBAs with Job Offers at Graduation: 67%

Percentage of MBAs with Job Offers Three Months Later: 84%

Estimate of Total Pay over a 20-Year Career*: $2,607,451 (only 16 other U.S. business schools had higher career pay numbers)

Notes: MBA Program Consideration Set: If you believe you’re a close match to this school–based on your GMAT and GPA scores,  your age and work experience, you should look at these other competitive full-time MBA programs as well. We list them by stretch, match and safety. These options are presented on the basis of brand image and ranking status.

* Payscale 2010 estimate for Bloomberg BusinessWeek.

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