The Kelley MBA: What You Need To Know
Since 1947, the Kelley School of Business has brought MBA students together in a collaborative and welcoming learning environment. Kelley provides an intimate learning experience that emphasizes professional development and building leadership skills, through dedicated faculty and professors who offer generous office hours, dinner parties, and tailgating events. You’ll get to know our alumni well, too.
This 21-month program accepts around 130 students a year, and is designed to be customized to fit personal and professional development goals. Faculty Chair Kyle Cattani says, “The Full-Time MBA Program at Kelley is in the sweet spot of size—big enough to offer lots of choices and resources, yet small enough that students, faculty, and staff get to know each other very well. The result is an incredibly supportive environment and a culture of helping each other in academics, careers, and life.”
Kelley sustains a culture of collaboration, recognizing that successful leaders are also successful team members. A candidate’s professional and extracurricular experiences should demonstrate an understanding of what it takes to lead, and how to work well with others. To apply, students must provide academic records, GMAT or GRE scores, an admissions essay and a letter of recommendation. Most accepted applicants also have at least three years of full-time professional work experience.
Kelley has fashioned a reputation as a true MBA innovator, from being one of the few programs to give a single grade for the entire core curriculum to having first-year career foundation Academies that provide experiential learning, consulting projects, and coaching to students in six core areas that range from consumer marketing and strategic finance to consulting and supply chain management. Students begin their degree with integrated core courses, intended to provide them with a strong foundation of business fundamentals they can apply to interest areas further down the line in the MBA.
There are many opportunities for students to explore and build their skills beyond required courses. What truly distinguishes the MBA experience at Kelley from others is Me., Inc., a highly innovative initiative to focus early attention on career management, personal brand building, and personal leadership. The program is ongoing, with second-year MBA students serving as coaches to both individual incoming students and their core teams.
Kelley also used student feedback to build out a global consulting experience called Global Business and Social Enterprise. GLOBASE involves three international trips that begin with student teams working remotely with clients (an important skill to practice in this day and age) before traveling to clients’ home country for a week-long on-the-ground engagement.
Kelley MBA Rankings Data
Kelley MBA Employment Stats
Kelley no longer publishes in its employment report its top employers, preferring to list all of the firms that hired the school’s graduates.
Stretch Schools: Cornell, Carnegie Mellon, UCLA, USC
Match Schools: Texas, Emory, University of Southern California, Georgetown
Safe Schools: Minnesota, Notre Dame, Washington University, Rice, Vanderbilt
Notes: MBA Program Consideration Set: If you believe you’re a close match to this school–based on your GMAT and GPA scores, your age and work experience, you should look at these other competitive full-time MBA programs as well. We list them by stretch, match, and safety. These options are presented on the basis of brand image and ranking status.
Relevant Features
Here’s Practical Advice For Teaching Online, From An Expert At The IU Kelley School Of Business
2020 Best & Brightest MBAs: Daniel Bernardes, Indiana University (Kelley)
Indiana Kelley Becomes The Latest School To Go STEM
Meet Indiana Kelley’s MBA Class Of 2021
Dean Of The Year: Idie Kesner of Indiana University’s Kelley School Of Business
