Wharton ranked third best MBA program in the country

Penn has been ranked No. 3 in a list of the best overall MBA programs in the country, according to a WalletHub report released earlier this month.

Penn followed Harvard and Stanford Universities in the overall program rankings. Three overarching aspects of the MBA program were used for evaluation: return on investment, student selectivity and program quality, and campus experience. 

In determining specific rankings, nearly 100 MBA programs at universities across the nation were examined on the basis of 10 factors. Those factors included the overall average base salary of recent graduates, cost of tuition, gender diversity, professor ratings, average GMAT score, and average undergraduate GPA. 

Penn tied with Stanford for #1 national ranking in “Highest Average GMAT Score,” and tied with Massachusetts Institute of Technology for third highest average base salary. Though the overall return on investment is high for Penn’s MBA program, it was not ranked within the top categories in aspects of “Highest Gender Diversity” and “Highest Employment Rate”.

Drexel University’s MBA program was ranked #75 with the third-lowest average GPA score, while Penn State was holistically ranked at #37 and University of Pittsburgh was ranked at #44 in the country.

In comparison to this latest data, U.S. News and World Reports still ranks Penn’s Wharton School as the #1 MBA program in the nation as of early 2019. 

This score report from WalletHub came shortly after Penn announced that the Wharton School will extend its early admission program to any eligible undergraduate or graduate student, rather than to just Penn students as in past years.

Though recent MBA graduates are proven to earn around $150,000 and most students report having positive experiences, overall attendance and applications to MBA programs, including Wharton’s, continue to decrease across the country, CNBC reported.

It remains to be seen how Wharton's decision to extend early admission program applications will affect enrollment rates and rankings in the coming years.