The 40 Best B-Schools For A Better World

A year ago, for the first time in a decade and a half Corporate Knights made alumni outcomes a formal part of its Better World MBA ranking for the first time. This year it doubled down, and the top of the list moved.

Maastricht University’s School of Business and Economics is No. 1 in the 2026 Better World MBA ranking, up from third last year. Australia’s Griffith Business School ended a six-year run at the top, finishing in a tie for third with the top-ranked U.S. business school, the University of Vermont’s Grossman School of Business.

The reshuffling in the top 10 was sparked by a methodology change. Corporate Knights – which evaluated more than 170 business schools for this year’s ranking, its 17th – now gives alumni impact 20% of the weight, up from 10% in 2025, while the curriculum component falls from 90% to 80%. The change rewards schools whose grads go on to work at organizations focused on environmental and social progress.

A NEW NO. 1

Maastricht posted the highest curriculum score in the ranking at 94% and a final weighted score of 95.2%. The school is marking its 50th anniversary. It offers a part-time, two-year, in-person MBA in English for professionals with at least five years of experience. The average student has about 15.

“We take a holistic approach to sustainability,” Mariëlle Heijltjes, dean of Maastricht’s School of Business and Economics, told Corporate Knights, adding that sustainability runs through the entire program rather than sitting in a single course.

The University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business made the biggest move in the top three, climbing from seventh to second on the strength of a 62% alumni impact score. Griffith still posted the second-highest curriculum score at 88%. Its 28% alumni impact score, however, couldn’t keep pace once that measure doubled in weight.

CORPORATE KNIGHTS 2026 BETTER WORLD MBA TOP 40

2026 Ranking	University	2025 Ranking	Country	Curriculum	Alumni Impact	Final Weighted Score
1	Maastricht University School of Business and Economics	3	Netherlands	94%	37%	95.2%
2	University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business	7	South Africa	83%	62%	89.1%
3 (tie)	University of Vermont Grossman School of Business	2	U.S.	84%	50%	85.8%
3 (tie)	Griffith Business School	1	Australia	88%	28%	84.0%
5	American University Kogod School of Business	5	U.S.	78%	62%	83.6%
6	University of Victoria Gustavson School of Business	9	Canada	76%	62%	82.6%
7	Centrum PUCP Business School	8	Peru	72%	1%	78.1%
8	Bard College	4	U.S.	65%	62%	69.9%
9	University of Exeter Business School	10	UK	55%	23%	64.9%
10	Duquesne University Palumbo-Donahue School of Business	6	U.S.	52%	70%	60.5%
11	EADA Business School Barcelona	22	Spain	59%	14%	59.8%
12	ESMT Berlin	21	Germany	57%	27%	57.6%
13	Henley Business School	17	UK	55%	22%	54.8%
14	Loughborough Business School	39	UK	52%	19%	52.0%
15	Glasgow Caledonian University	19	UK	50%	18%	51.5%
16	Manchester Metropolitan University	New	UK	52%	9%	50.6%
17	York University Schulich School of Business	12	Canada	52%	11%	50.2%
18	Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University	25	Netherlands	47%	39%	49.6%
19	Toronto Metropolitan University	18	Canada	43%	29%	44.3%
20	HEC Montréal	41	Canada	33%	6%	41.7%
21	Colorado State University College of Business	24	U.S.	38%	29%	41.3%
22	University of Winchester Business School	20	UK	44%	–	41.1%
23	UBC Sauder School of Business	14	Canada	41%	16%	40.5%
24	La Trobe Business School	15	Australia	36%	49%	40.4%
25	University of Guelph Lang School of Business and Economics	Opted out	Canada	37%	37%	39.5%
26	Warwick Business School	11	UK	40%	11%	39.1%
27	Gordon Institute of Business Science	23	South Africa	34%	6%	38.6%
28	UC Berkeley Haas School of Business	13	U.S.	39%	15%	38.6%
29	Nottingham University Business School	16	UK	39%	8%	37.7%
30	Newcastle University Business School	59	UK	40%	3%	37.6%
31	Frankfurt School of Finance and Management	31	Germany	32%	44%	36.4%
32	TIAS School for Business and Society	29	Netherlands	35%	24%	36.3%
33	University of Bath School of Management	42	UK	38%	7%	36.2%
34	McGill University Desautels Faculty of Management	27	Canada	36%	11%	35.7%
35	Keele Business School	36	UK	36%	–	35.5%
36	Solvay Brussels School of Economics & Management	30	Belgium	35%	18%	35.4%
37	Durham University Business School	28	UK	32%	14%	32.6%
38	University of Lincoln	New	UK	33%	5%	32.0%
39	WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management	34	Germany	32%	12%	31.6%
40	AGSM at UNSW Business School	No response	Australia	33%	–	31.3%

Source: Corporate Knights

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NEW RULES, NEW ORDER

The ranking covers schools’ flagship MBA programs, not specialty climate or sustainability degrees. Schools accredited by one of three recognized accreditors, or designated PRME Champions, can opt in.

Corporate Knights analysts score the curriculum on the sustainability content of required MBA courses, using publicly disclosed information. The alumni impact score measures how many recent graduates work at impact-focused organizations, using data the schools disclose. Schools can also ask for revisions to their scores.

New this year is a 10% bonus for schools that take part in a recognized sustainability assessment, such as Sulitest’s TASK, which tests whether students actually learn the material.

Althea Reyes, the Corporate Knights senior research analyst who oversaw the 2026 project, says the changes respond to a drift she sees across the sector. “A lot of schools have treated sustainability like a trend,” Reyes says, adding that newer priorities – AI in particular – have pulled some schools’ attention away from climate.

TOP OF THE U.S. CLASS

Vermont’s one-year Sustainable Innovation MBA (SI-MBA) has finished in the global top three for the second year in a row. Its final weighted score rose from 72.7% in 2025 to 85.8%. Its curriculum score climbed from 75% to 84%, and its alumni impact score held at about the same level, 50% this year compared with 52% last year.

Grossman is one of just six schools in the top 40 with an alumni impact score of 50% or higher. The others are Cape Town, Kogod, Victoria, Bard and Duquesne. Duquesne’s Palumbo-Donahue School of Business posted the highest alumni impact score in the ranking at 70%, surpassing Bard’s 56% high-water mark from last year, but slipped from sixth to 10th overall.

“This recognition is a testament to the extraordinary community that defines the Sustainable Innovation MBA,” says Vikas Anand, dean of the Grossman School of Business. “What makes this achievement especially meaningful is the increased emphasis on alumni impact. Our graduates are demonstrating every day that business can be a force for positive change.”

The SI-MBA combines business fundamentals with systems thinking, sustainability and innovation. It ends with a practicum in which students work with outside organizations on sustainability and innovation challenges.

“This ranking reflects the intentional design of the SI-MBA experience,” says Srini Venugopal, director of the SI-MBA program at Vermont Grossman. “Our goal is not simply to teach sustainability, but to prepare graduates to lead change wherever their careers take them.”

Ben Tacka, a 2015 graduate who now serves as commercial development lead at Phaidra Prism, gave this year’s commencement address at Vermont. “The SI-MBA showed me that sustainability isn’t a separate function within an organization,” Tacka says. “It’s a lens for understanding how business decisions create value for people, communities, and the environment.”

WHERE GRADS LAND NOW COUNTS DOUBLE

The heavier alumni weighting helped schools with strong outcomes data. Victoria rose from ninth to sixth and was the top Canadian school. Its program, like Vermont’s, is called an MBA in Sustainable Innovation. Cheryl Mitchell, its academic director, describes her students as “realist idealists.”

Schools whose graduates are less concentrated in impact roles lost ground. UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business fell from 13th to 28th, and Warwick Business School dropped from 11th to 26th. UBC Sauder slid from 14th to 23rd, and La Trobe fell from 15th to 24th. Bard dropped from fourth to eighth, even with a 62% alumni impact score.

NEWCASTLE’S 29-SPOT LEAP

Newcastle University Business School made the biggest jump in the top 40, climbing from 59th to 30th. Loughborough Business School rose from 39th to 14th, a year after jumping from 63rd to 39th. HEC Montréal climbed from 41st to 20th, EADA Business School Barcelona from 22nd to 11th and ESMT Berlin from 21st to 12th.

Manchester Metropolitan University (16th) and the University of Lincoln (38th) are new to the ranking. The University of Guelph’s Lang School returned at 25th after opting out last year.

The United Kingdom placed the most schools in the top 40, with 13. Canada had seven and the United States six. Australia, the Netherlands and Germany each had three, South Africa two, and Peru, Spain, and Belgium one each.

For Corporate Knights, the question going forward is whether B-schools stick with sustainability as the headlines shift. Reyes says the ranking will keep evolving as school practices do.

See Corporate Knights’ full 2026 Better World MBA report here.

DON’T MISS CORPORATE KNIGHTS 2025 RANKING: THESE 40 B-SCHOOLS ARE REDEFINING SUSTAINABILITY

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