Tulane's Freeman School: Putting A Rankings Scandal Behind It

THE DEAN IS TRYING TO MOVE BEYOND THE SCANDAL WITH BASIC CHANGES

He has developed a plan to update Freeman’s website and social media campaigns in order to provide more extensive information on the school’s programs. He also plans to offer more financial aid to applicants to entice the best of them to come to Freeman. Solomon has expanded the school’s Career Management Center and created a strategic planning team to guide further moves to rebuild Freeman’s reputation.

The school’s full-time MBA program is small, with only three concentrations in finance, marketing and strategic management and leadership. Last year, Freeman enrolled just 89 students from the 179 accepted out of 216 applicants. The core curriculum is features a global leadership experience, which explores the world economy from the perspectives of Latin America, Europe and Asia. The school also offers a Master of Global Management degree that MBAs can also earn by completing six courses in six different countries as part of a unique international cohort.

Solomon says his vision for the school remains unchanged. “I want to help the school in its quest to become an emerging global leader in the graduate and undergraduate business education space,” he says. “The reality is that Tulane students have very good reputations for being mature and being loyal. They are well balanced in terms of knowledge and skills so they’re able to create value pretty quickly within their organizational settings. And so I think the students themselves are great ambassadors for the programs and why other students should go here. If we’re able to put together differentiated programs that hit market sweet spots while offering these programs in one of the most exciting cities on the planet, that’s a recipe for success.”

DON’T EXPECT AN OVERNIGHT RECOVERY

Solomon’s confidence in this “recipe for success” even leads him to boldly assert that students interested in entrepreneurship or finance should still consider Tulane on a top five list. But he acknowledges that it will take awhile for the school to climb back into the top 50 on the annual U.S. News list.

“It may take a little bit of time,” he says. “I’ve talked with deans of other business schools, and they tell me that there seems to be a natural life cycle with these types of recoveries. But if we’re talking about rankings in particular, they don’t happen over night. And if I didn’t think we could reemerge as a truly outstanding business school, I would be doing something else.”

Even though Solomon shows unwavering confidence in his ability to get Tulane back on track, he admittedly sees this experience as one of his greatest challenges.

“We cannot change the past, we can learn from it and change the future,” he says. “And that’s what we’re doing. If we were to have this conversation a few years down the road, it would have a very different flavor. Because you would be talking about how Tulane has improved its educational offerings and continued to attract truly outstanding faculty. And how it’s quite a story on the positive side of things.”

Who Cooked The Books At Tulane?

UC-Davis Puts Admissions Chief On Leave

U.S. News Tosses Tulane From Ranking

Former B-School Admissions Chief Calls For Audits

Tulane’s Business School Falls 24 Places In U.S. News Ranking

UC-Davis Adcom Chief No Longer Employee