[商学院活动] Top B-School Stories of 2010

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Top B-School Stories of 2010Hiring improved, applications tanked, two top programs got overhauls, and three more found new leaders. And that was just the beginning

MBA Job Placement: The MBA job market began to recover this year from one of the most dismal hiring seasons in recent history, with 2010 MBA graduates finding it slightly easier to land jobs than their 2009 counterparts. While placement rates bounced back from recession-era lows, many schools were still a long way off from their more robust placement levels of 2007. However, a surge in late spring and summer hiring helped MBA graduates find their footing in the job market. In 2010, about 12 percent of graduates at Bloomberg Businessweek's 30 top-ranked U.S. full-time MBA programs were still without a job three months after graduation, an improvement from 2009, when more than one in five students were jobless. Salaries were flat or down at the majority of schools,with fewer students receiving signing bonuses in 2010 and more flocking to small or midsize regional firms. All signs suggest 2011 will be a better year for MBA graduates, with early reports trickling in that more recruiters are hiring students from summer internships, coming to campus, and advertising positions on school job boards.

B-School Applications: The boom in MBA applications, brought on by the economic crisis that began in 2008, slowed significantly in 2010. Of the top 30 full-time U.S. MBA programs surveyed in the summer, 10 reported declines in application volume averaging 6.1 percent. Among them were University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, which was down 9 percent; UC-Berkeley's Haas School of Business, down 11 percent; and Cornell's Johnson Graduate School of Management, down 12 percent. Although some schools reduced their application fees and saw an uptick in volume, they were the exception and not the rule. Schools with a global reach were buoyed by increased interest in MBA programs among international applicants. Still, many were left wondering if business school applications had peaked.B-School Globalization: A booming economy and an uptick in the number of high-quality business schools put Asia's management education scene in the spotlight in 2010. In July, four leading Asian business schools said they were banding together to attract more students from the U.S., Canada, and Europe. In India, a handful of leading North American B-schools and universities are looking to have a more permanent presence in the region by establishing campuses and creating degree programs. Duke's Fuqua School of Business and York University's Schulich School of Business are among the schools that this year announced they are hoping to open sprawling state-of-the-art campuses in India, pending passage of a law that would permit foreign universities to establish their own campuses on Indian soil. Meanwhile, ambitious Chinese students are increasingly forgoing a Western MBA and opting for a degree from one of the top Chinese business schools. And institutions in the U.S., Europe, and Asia are turning their attention to Africa, setting up research centers, programs, and campuses there.

Admission Essay Ghostwriters: It comes as no surprise that MBA applicants hire admissions consultants to help them get into B-school. What is surprising, however, is that some B-school wannabes are hiring companies to write entire admissions essays for them. Blake Reynolds, owner of Perfect Words in New York, and David Burton, general manager of Essaywriter in Leeds, England, told Bloomberg Businessweek in the fall that their companies, for a fee, have written application essays that MBA candidates may have passed off as their own work. Reynolds said his writing has helped people get into top business schools including Harvard, Kellogg, and Columbia Business School. While the essay writers defended their work as being helpful to qualified candidates who were busy or faced language barriers, the business schools were not amused. Harvard called the use of ghostwritten essays "unethical," while Kellogg issued a statement reminding applicants they are supposed to only turn in original work.

Public Schools and Budget Cuts: Public universities had a rocky year in 2010, hit by a combination of deep state budget cuts and the aftershocks of the recession. The severe cutbacks come at an inconvenient time for many schools, with demand for public universities and colleges surging nationwide as families look for more affordable options for college. With insufficient state funds, dozens of public schools resorted to laying off hundreds of employees, raising tuition by a double-digit percentage, reducing financial aid, and capping enrollment. The University of Washington raised tuition by 14 percent, while the University of Montana considered a four-day workweek, just a few of the austerity measures schools were forced to consider. The severity of the cutbacks was somewhat offset by an infusion of federal stimulus funding. But with that cash expected to run out by the 2012 fiscal year and states expected to continue slashing budgets, financial relief is still a long way off for many schools. A recovery is not expected to kick in for many schools until at least 2013 or 2014, according to a recent report from Moody's Investors Service (MCO).

The Return on a College Degree: Ever heard the saying "A college degree is worth a million bucks"? In June, Bloomberg Businessweek partnered with PayScale, a Seattle-based company that collects wage information, to determine the true value of a college degree. PayScale examined pay reports from 1.4 million graduates of U.S. colleges and universities with no advanced degrees to calculate the return on investment, or ROI, of an undergraduate degree from more than 500 schools. The results were surprising. For starters, the study showed the value of a college degree might be closer to $400,000 over 30 years and varies depending on where you studied and the school's graduation rate. There were only 17 schools in the study where grads can out-earn a high school graduate by $1.2 million over the 30-year period. MIT, with a 30-year ROI of $1.7 million, topped the list of schools in the survey. Private universities dominated the high end of the list, but public schools proved to be a better value. Colleges and universities with strong engineering and science programs did better than others because people who enter those fields usually have lucrative jobs. The upshot: College grads fared better than high school grads, but the majority of them would have been even better off if they had invested their college fund in the stock market 30 years ago.