The Most Exclusive MBA Programs

When you look at admissions from an application-to-seat perspective, several surprises emerge. In the Midwest, Booth, Kellogg, and Ross entice more applications because they are international brands. They also fall well short of Washington University’s Olin Business School. The prototype of a small, close-knit program, Olin netted 1,579 applications for its 128 open seats. That’s a 12.3-to-1 ratio, one that reflects an increase of one applicant per seat. Alas, this number has some roots in the school paring down by 13 students. Despite this, Olin has traditionally ranked among the highest ratios. Similarly, the University of Texas-Dallas’ Jindal School of Management rules the southwest with a 10.3-to-1 student-to-seat ratio. You’ll find a similar dynamic at the aforementioned Penn State (10.7-to-1) and University of Rochester (9.5-to-1). Even more, larger programs outside the Top 10, such as New York University and the University of Texas, bested higher-ranked schools like Columbia, Duke, and Virginia.

The reason? For one, says Shinewald, this dynamic stems from applicants not always realizing just how competitive some programs are. For another, prestige isn’t necessarily restricted to the national level. “People shouldn’t be deceived that it is only Harvard and Stanford,” Shinewald emphasizes. “There are programs that are competitive all the way down for different reasons. Some are local or regional programs that are widely-respected. Or, they may be the only show in town, like Rice, where they are going to be very, very competitive with more local applicants.”

ARIZONA STATE: A HUNGRY GREAT WHITE OR A FRAGILE PAPER TIGER?

An applicant-to-seat ratio can also tip MBA candidates off to trends at the school — or serve as a red flag to look behind the numbers. That is the case with Arizona State’s W. P. Carey College of Business. In just one year, Carey’s applications per seat rose from 5.2 to 9.7, thanks to a 262% increase in applications and a 38% increase in seats. Impressed? Don’t be, as Carey became the first full-time program to offer a free MBA with the 2018 Class. It’s a risky move that will soon vault the school into the Top 20 discussion.

The real question, however, is where Carey goes from there. “It is a long way up,” Shinewald admits. “I’m sure they’ll continue to rise in the rankings because of what the rankings measure: selectivity, applications, yield. Having a free program favors a school like that.  It is one thing to get into the conversation. It is another to get consistently into the Top 10 in rankings. That’s a very tough world to penetrate. For some people, the value of prestige is always going to be greater than the savings on tuition, right or wrong.”

There are other factors at play too. At first glance, Ohio State, Temple, and SMU each boosted their performance over the previous year. However, each did it by cutting their number of seats, which hiked their application-to-seat ratios. However, other schools showed real progress. Cornell’s ratio, for instance, rose 0.8 on the heels of 243 more applications. At Boston College, which had an 86-member first year class, 93 more applications tipped the ratio from 6.8 to 8.0. While New York University’s ratio slipped from 10.9 to 9.7, that number is based on the school beefing up its 2018 Class by 50 students. This included 77 more applications, with average GMATs and GPAs holding steady from the previous year.

LOW ODDS MEET HIGH TALENT

Of course, the data also reveals some uncomfortable truths for certain business schools. Look no further than Purdue University’s Krannert School of Management. How rough was 2015-2016? Their applications plunged from 643 to 453 — nearly 30%! Despite opening up seven new seats, the school’s applications-to-seats ratio took a dive from 9.2 to 5.9. That same situation repeated itself at solid programs like the University of Maryland, USC Marshall, and the University of North Carolina, where a dip in applications coupled with an increase in class sizes, produced a drop in the ratio.

Georgia Tech and the University of Minnesota also appear to be in a downturn thanks to losing a seat or more in their apps-to-seats ratio. Like NYU, each mustered more applications than the year before. The difference is, they added more students — and that increase far exceeded the scope of their application growth. Scheller, for example, added 20 students while only luring 11 more applicants.

In the end, do these numbers really matter? They’re another informative piece of the puzzle, one that brings a different vantage point to a school’s positioning and momentum. Despite the long odds they represent, MBA candidates shouldn’t get too caught up in them. Instead, as Shinewald argues, they must focus on what makes them such a special fit at the schools that appeal to them.

“You can look at these numbers and tell yourself, ‘I’m never going to get in,’” he concedes. “You start to worry about the many, many invisible foes that you have out there that seem like, by sheer volume, must be better. But you can’t control the applicant pool. All you can control is your own application. Once you commit to applying to a school, you have to just ignore the stats because they don’t help you. All you can do is create your best application. That’s what’s going to make you the most competitive applicant. For all the GMAT averages, yields, and applicants per seat, it doesn’t affect who you are as a human being or what your potential is as a manager. So you just have to let go of those things.”

For school comparisons by number of applications, acceptances, enrollment, and application-to-seat ratios, go to the next pages.

Editor’s Note: The story focuses on 2015-2016 data since Class of 2019 data won’t be publicly available until late fall of 2017.

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