Another Top-20 B-School Reports An Increase In MBA Applications

Flags at UNC Kenan-Flagler representing the countries where students hail from

It’s a party of three. The Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina is the third top-20 B-school this fall to report an increase in MBA applications in the 2021-2022 cycle — a cycle that saw declines at just about every other U.S. school.

Amid a strong economy in the last part of 2021 and the early months of 2022 that led to flattening in domestic U.S. interest in graduate school, Cornell University’s Johnson Graduate School of Management, USC Marshall School of Business, and UNC Kenan-Flagler all saw MBA apps to the Class of 2024 grow — and not just grow, but balloon to new school records, eclipsing even the previous highs reported during the depths of the coronavirus pandemic when B-schools extended deadlines, waived exams, and otherwise made it easier for candidates to file their paperwork for admission.

Cornell saw a 21% increase in apps in a season when all its peers, and indeed all other top-15 schools, have reported declines. USC Marshall School of Business has also reported an increase in MBA apps from last year. But UNC’s total of 1,975 applications in 2021-2022 is perhaps the most remarkable: a 32% jump over last year’s total, allowing the school to admit 47 more applicants while still driving its acceptance rate down for the third straight year, to a new low of 36%. UNC also cut its class size by more than 50 seats, putting its enrollment closer to the pre-pandemic Class of 2021 that enrolled in fall 2019.

MBA APP DECLINES OCCURRED ACROSS THE TOP 25 U.S. B-SCHOOLS

Go ahead and call it comeback. In the previous cycle of 2020-2021, UNC was one of just six top-25 B-schools in the United States to report a drop in MBA applications, circumstances that led Kenan-Flagler to admit 300 fewer students and reduce its class size by about 50 seats. Even with a wealth of apps, UNC opted to shave its class size once again, back to pre-pandemic levels.

Just about everywhere else in the U.S., MBA applications for full-time MBA programs are on the decline — and in some places, steeply. The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania saw a 14% decline, and Harvard Business School was down 15.4%. Chicago Booth saw a 13.6% decline. Yale SOM's apps were down 16.5%. At Michigan Ross the loss was 9.3%; at NYU Stern, 10%. The largest-reported app decline so far has occurred at UCLA Anderson, which lost 20% of its total year to year.

Declines on the milder side have occurred at Duke Fuqua (6%), Georgetown McDonough (5.4%), and Virginia Darden, where they fell just 3.5%.

NEW HIGHS IN WOMEN & INTERNATIONALS

Though it lost its long-time dean to sudden retirement last month, Kenan-Flagler has reason to be pleased with how its fall has shaped up, beginning with the enrollment of the new MBA class, which set a school record for Graduate Management Admission Test average, at 706, 10 points more than last year's class. The new class also maintains the school's undergraduate grade point average (3.43) and contains the most-ever women, 38% of the class, bringing the school closer to the 40% club that has a growing membership in the top 25.

Most B-schools do not distinguish publicly how many applications they received from U.S. candidates versus abroad, but it has been widely reported by P&Q and other outlets that schools are admitting and enrolling more international students as a way to shore up the flagging domestic numbers. That certainly appears to be the case at UNC, which reports a class that is 35% international — another school record, up from 26% last year, which itself was a massive recovery from the pandemic-hobbled cohort of 2020.

The Kenan-Flagler School also reports that its new class is 23% U.S. minorities, which includes students of Asian descent, and 15% under-represented minorities, which is primarily Black and Latino students. The class is also 9% students with military service in their background.

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