Meet Yale SOM’s MBA Class Of 2025 by: Jeff Schmitt on December 05, 2023 | 14,048 Views December 5, 2023 Copy Link Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Email Share on LinkedIn Share on WhatsApp Share on Reddit Yale School of Management A CLASS PROFILE As a whole, the Class of 2025 is slightly smaller than previous incarnations. The class consists of 339 full-time MBAs, down eight students from the previous year. Collectively, they average a 723 GMAT, equal to the previous year, and an undergraduate GPA of 3.63, tying it for the lowest score of the past five years. Another 37% of the class took the GRE, posting 164 (Verbal) and 165 (Quant) averages. Demographic-wise, women account for 40% of the class, down three points from the Class of 2024. International students make up 50% of the class, a 10% improvement over the past three years. That said, the percentage of underrepresented minorities declined from 24% to 18%. Together, the class hails from 46 countries. In terms of academic backgrounds, STEM majors hold 35% of the class seats. Humanities and Social Sciences graduates account for 25% of the class, up six points from the previous year. Business and Economics majors round out the class at 22% and 18% respectively. In terms of professional experience, Financial Services tops all comes at 24%, beating out other double-digit representations by Consulting (18%), Technology (12%) and Government (11%) – with Non-Profit coming in at 9%. The rest of the class features students versed in Consumer Products, Energy, Healthcare, Manufacturing, Media and Entertainment, Real Estate, and Retail. Yale SOM First-Year Orientation in August A TOP TEN MBA PROGRAM This year, Yale SOM reached the point where it is a consistent Top 10 MBA program. After ranking 8th in P&Q’s 2022-2023 MBA Ranking, the school finished 10th (Financial Times), 8th (U.S. News), 10th (CEOWorld), 8th (LinkedIn) and 4th (Fortune). That doesn’t count boasting a Top 10 Executive MBA program that shares resources with the full-time program too. In a US News survey of business school deans and MBA directors, the school ranked 1st and 7th for its Non-Profit and Management curriculum respectively. In the Princeton Review’s 2023 survey of MBA students and recent alumni, Yale SOM notched the top scores for its Consulting programming, while ranking 3rd for Best Professors and Family Friendliness (and bosting Top 10 scores for its Marketing and Management programming). The school also ranked 11th in business research output and quality according to The Financial Times…and is home to P&Q’s reigning Professor of the Year, Jeffrey Sonnenfeld. In other words, MBAs enjoy an across-the-board excellence that goes beyond its reputation as a “social impact school.” “Sure, Yale SOM does have incredible resources for people going into “non-traditional” MBA paths,” says ’23 grad Caitlin Piccirillo-Stosser. “They are a community full of students, faculty, administration, and staff who want to leave an impact on the world. After all, they maintain a mission statement of “educating leaders for business and society.” I think that we are responsible for doing as much as we can to better society. But all of this doesn’t mean that SOM only prepares students for working at nonprofits or in social impact roles. Actually, our community is incredible at everything! I have classmates who are going to be working in every role you can think about, and professors, who specialize in so many cool topics. SOM goes above and beyond to help students achieve their career goals, whatever those might be.” One area where Yale SOM is underrated is Entrepreneurship, finishing 18th in P&Q’s 2023 MBA Entrepreneurship Ranking. Looking below the surface, 31% of Yale SOM MBAs took entrepreneurship electives in 2022-2023, with 28% of faculty teaching courses devoted to entrepreneurship innovation according to P&Q data. Even more, SOM ranked among the top 10 schools in the world for entrepreneurs-in-residence, startup award money per student, mentorship hours, and the percentage of MBA graduates entering private equity or venture capital. Employers have certainly taken notice. This year, graduates earned over $200K to start, with median base pay alone climbing nearly $15K to $175,000. This year, the school also announced it would be launching a new one-year Master’s in Technology Management program, while adding a General Management track to its Executive MBA program. Thanks to a $20 million dollar gift in April, the school is busy launching a new Asset Management Institute. Yale SOM Club Fair AN INTERVIEW WITH YALE SOM ADMINISTRATION And there’s a lot more to come. In October, P&Q reached out to Yale SOM to learn about what’s coming up at Yale SOM – and why it matters. From leadership to AI to sustainability, this is what you can expect from Yale SOM in the coming year. Editor’s Note: The name and title of the administrator addressing the question is found below the answer. P&Q: What have been the two most important developments in your MBA program over the past year? What type of impact will they have on current and future MBAs? Yale SOM: “First, the faculty’s scholarship, and especially the arrival of new faculty, has augmented our curricular offerings in exciting ways. A small sampler of new courses: Customer Discovery and Rapid Prototyping in Tech Entrepreneurship: Stakeholders, Management, and Capitalism; Housing markets; Understanding and Reducing Bias in Organizations; and Large Language Models: Technology and Applications. The second important development is that the creation of several new master-degree programs in the last several years (in advanced management, global business and society, systemic risk, and asset management) has led to the creation of a large number of specialized courses in the respective disciplines that are open to MBA students (with prerequisites in some cases). Moreover, the School puts no limits on where MBA students may take their elective courses within Yale, which gives students an almost unbounded set of curricular choices.” Anjani Jain – Deputy Dean for Academic Programs & Professor in the Practice of Management Yale SOM Interior P&Q: Give us your one-minute pitch for your business school. What makes you unique? Yale SOM: “The Yale School of Management is a place for people who want to have a positive impact on their organizations, their community, and the world more generally. Our founding mission to educate leaders for business and society continues to animate everything we do at the school, from our integrated core curriculum to our distinctive global offerings to our deep programmatic connections to Yale University. We attract students who have the broad-mindedness and intellectual curiosity to leverage the many interconnected and interdisciplinary opportunities available to them at Yale SOM; the humility to lead teams effectivity in a diverse, global context; and the optimism to believe that they can make a difference in the world and that this is a worthy goal to which to aspire.” Bruce DelMonico – Assistant Dean for Admissions, Yale SOM P&Q: Sustainability has emerged as a major attraction to prospective MBA students. How does your full-time MBA program integrate sustainability across its curriculum? Yale SOM: “Sustainability has long been a strength of The Yale School of Management. As a founding partner of Yale’s Center for Business and the Environment, SOM is a hub for sustainability teaching and research. Beyond a robust set of electives dealing with topics at the intersection of business and the environment—such as Energy Systems Analysis; Metrics, Tools and Indicators in Corporate Responsibility; and Financing Green Technologies—sustainability topics are integrated into SOM’s core MBA curriculum. For example, core courses offer modules on ESG frameworks and sustainability reporting, and leverage cases focused on sustainably themed companies such as Beyond Meat.” Gabriel Rossi – Assistant Dean Faculty & Curriculum, Yale SOM In a colloquium led by Dean Kerwin K. Charles at Yale SOM on April 12, the founder and chief executive officer of Citadel offered perspectives on career development, the future of finance and technology, and philanthropy. P&Q: What are some key elements in your teaching of leadership? Yale SOM: “My teaching is practicum based, so people learn through experience. In interpersonal & group dynamics, people learn through an interactive facilitated laboratory designed to promote learning from what emerges in group discussion and exercises. In the Everyday leadership course, people build capacity to lead every day in way that is more aligned with their values. A designed group process promotes learning for everyone from the way participants reflect together on leadership experiences outside the classroom.” Professor Heidi Brooks – Senior Lecturer in Organizational Behavior P&Q: What types of options does your school offer that deepens student experience with leadership and makes them more competitive in the marketplace? Yale SOM: “I’m committed to learning through experience in part because it helps prepare our graduates for a demanding world where they will need to continue to grow their capacity to manage complexity. On top of a core curriculum that has our students stretch to think from the perspective of executives, my classroom goes beyond life by syllabus to prepare graduate for a life of learning to adjust to dynamic, volatile, ambiguous conditions. In a world where too many people are lonely and ambivalent about work, leaders need to be able to cultivate a lived experience of work that is meaningful, and where humans thrive. I deeply believe that work can be a better experience – we get talented people, who care deeply about the world and come to Yale SOM to amplify the impact of their career. They deserve more than a world of work that is eternally depleting, individualistic to a fault and inhumane. I believe our graduates can make a meaningful impact on organizational norms and the world of work by the way that they lead and interact every day. I hope experience in my classrooms raises up a yearning for a better world of work and that our graduates pursue just that in every corner they touch.” Professor Heidi Brooks – Senior Lecturer in Organizational Behavior Next Page: Profiles of Yale SOM First-Years Previous Page Continue ReadingPage 2 of 3 1 2 3