The latest episode of Business Casual dives into the intriguing shifts within the U.S. News 2026-2027 MBA rankings, a hot topic for prospective students and business education enthusiasts. Hosted by Paula Lem, with insights from Caroline Diarte Edwards and Maria Wich-Vila, the discussion dissects the reasons behind Stanford’s ascent to the top spot, leapfrogging over Wharton. The hosts explore the method behind the rankings, emphasizing the weight of employment success metrics such as employment rates post-graduation and median starting salaries.
Caroline highlights how Stanford’s location in Silicon Valley and its smaller program size contribute to its ranking success. The proximity to venture capital and private equity opportunities results in attractive salary packages for graduates. Despite Stanford’s prestige, Caroline notes the contrasting benefits of larger programs like Harvard, which offer expansive alumni networks that could be undervalued by ranking methodologies.
Maria offers insights into changes in the U.S. News ranking criteria, remarking on the shift from subjective surveys to more quantitative assessments. This adjustment has led to results that align with intuitive expectations of top business schools’ standings. This nuance is vital for applicants aiming to understand the dynamics behind school rankings, encouraging them to consider both quantitative outcomes and qualitative experiences when evaluating their MBA options.
Episode Transcript
Note: This transcript was generated by AI and may contain minor inaccuracies.
[00:00:06] – Paula
Hi everyone, I’m Paula Lem with Poets and Quants, and welcome to our weekly podcast, Business Casual. So I’m joined today by my lovely co-hosts, Caroline D’Arti Edwards and Maria Wikvila. As you know, Caroline was Head of Admissions at INSEAD and is co-founder of Fortuna Admissions, and Maria is founder of ApplicantLab. And between them, I think I calculated this the other day, they’ve got, I think, 32 years of admissions experience.
[00:00:38] – Caroline
So, uh, we should stop counting.
[00:00:40] – Maria
It’s amazing because we’re only 35 years old.
[00:00:43] – Caroline
Exactly. Yeah, we started when we were 15.
[00:00:47] – Paula
So you’re in good hands. Uh, and those of you who listened in last week know that it was my first time on the podcast. And it was— we did a handover from our outgoing editor, John Byrne. So John, if you’re tuning in, we miss you, but also we hope you’re out having fun and not tuning in. So this week we are back to doing what Business Casual does, namely talking about all things NBA news. And because we didn’t get to it last Thursday, I’d like to kick off a discussion about the recent US News MBA rankings. So to recap, the big news there was Stanford has climbed ahead of Penn, beating out Wharton for number 1. And in the bigger picture, we’ve got some sharp jumps in this ranking, sudden drops, and overall volatility. So I would love to get your thoughts on that, Caroline and Maria, whether there have been, you know, any big surprises for you, what your takeaways are. And I should say before I turn it over to you that attainment success is a big part of this ranking. So this is by far the largest factor looking at employment success.
[00:02:11] – Paula
And within that, things like employment rates at graduation, 3 months after, and the median starting salary and bonus for graduates. So, who wants to kick us off?
[00:02:27] – Caroline
Well, I can jump in. So, I think this is the most important ranking, at least for the US market. And if you look at the top of the ranking, I think it makes quite a lot of sense, right? So, you have the M7 schools right at the top of the ranking. And it is, given how selective those programs are and given the strong employment outcomes and the impressive salaries that the graduates command, then I think that there is a great deal of logic behind the ranking and the result of the ranking. It’s interesting to see that Stanford is back in the number 1 position. I think that Stanford, Of course, it benefits from the incredible prestige of the school, being in Silicon Valley where graduates command very impressive salaries, which is partly due to the nature of the jobs that they’re taking, often going into private equity, venture capital, and the high cost of living in Silicon Valley means that the salaries are often higher than they might be elsewhere. In the country or internationally. So I think Stanford benefits from that in that the average salary is given a boost by the location of Stanford and the industry mix of the jobs that graduates are taking.
[00:03:55] – Caroline
And then also, you could make an argument that Stanford benefits from having a smaller program. Because they do get thousands and thousands of applicants, and given that they have purposely kept the program relatively small compared to, for example, Harvard or Wharton, that does mean that their selectivity percentage is higher than those other schools. And given that selectivity and acceptance rate feeds into the ranking, that gives Stanford a boost here as well. So I think that the methodology does favor Stanford, and I’m not sure if perhaps you could make an argument that having a smaller program, in some ways, yes, that is a benefit to students, but in some ways it’s not. So you can make an argument that for HBS, having a larger class feeds into having a larger network, and that is a network that pays dividends. Throughout your career. And of course, the Stanford alumni network is incredibly valuable as well. But the size and breadth and depth of the HBS network is incredibly valuable, and that is perhaps undervalued in this ranking. So those are my headline thoughts. What do you think, Maria?
[00:05:17] – Maria
Yeah, I think a few years ago, if I’m not mistaken, US News actually changed its methodology quite a bit in terms of the amount of weighting that it would give. And it used to be that 40% was based on this quality assessment that was surveys of deans and leaders at other institutions, and then also surveys of recruiters. And for years, I think on this very podcast, we have crit— criticized that because it’s very subjective. There are all kinds of reasons why a very good school would get a lower mark on a survey that is very subjective. So, I think that what’s interesting is that now that US News has in fact focused more on a quantitative, quantifiable measure, we are starting to see more of a, more of what we would intuitively expect. We would expect to see Stanford, Wharton, Booth, Kellogg, Harvard. We would, that’s sort of like the ranking that we would roughly expect. Those, those year-to-year fluctuations might change, but overall it seems to be directionally correct. So I think, you know, I don’t know that US News and World Report was listening to us, when they made these changes. I’m sure they probably listened to us on repeat.
[00:06:25] – Maria
I’m just kidding. But, you know, it sounds like they, they must have heard this critique from other people as well. And so they did make that change. And I think it’s now, you know, yielding dividends insofar as it’s creating a ranking that most people are looking at and saying, like, you know what, I think, I think this makes a lot of sense. Now, one of the issues with an ordinal ranking where you must by definition put schools in a certain order, you can’t just say here’s a good bucket of schools and here’s the next good bucket of schools. Is that really, you know, if, if sort of 50% is based on this attainment number, uh, a couple of things I’d want to point out. Number one is that the difference between sort of the top 5 schools in terms of that salary number, it’s only about a 5% swing. So yes, Stanford has the highest number, as you pointed out, Caroline. I think part of that is because of living in the Bay Area. If they’re staying in the Bay Area, uh, those numbers have to be a little bit higher to account for the higher cost of living.
[00:07:23] – Maria
But, you know, I also do think Stanford does tend to send more people into these elite private equity venture types of, types of roles. However, it’s not such a dramatic difference. I mean, we’re talking a swing of between, you know, $197,000 to $206,000. You know, it’s a, it’s about 5% difference. So I would, I would caution folks from looking at these rankings and really taking them as a very concrete difference. I mean, 5% here and there. Is not material in a huge sense. And similarly, and we’ve talked about this before, another part of this ranking in terms of how they measure attainment of outcomes is they look at, okay, what’s the percentage of the class that is employed 3 months after graduation? And this is also a metric that, look, I understand in the absence of metrics, you gotta go with whatever metric you can find, but this is a slightly misleading metric because I do feel that it essentially sort of punishes Stanford and Harvard because both of those schools are at the 80% range versus some peer schools that it might be at the 86, 87, higher 80s range. But that’s— we’ve made the point here before that that’s because I think graduates of these schools have more options and they will be a little bit more choosy in terms of holding out for that opportunity that they’re really looking for.
[00:08:45] – Maria
And as a result, that’s another reason why I think that this metric you know, maybe a little bit flawed in terms of determining the program quality because at these other programs, the high-quality students have the luxury of holding out for more. But overall, I think that this is a good— it’s a good change in the U.S. News ranking, and I think it is moving us more towards what we intuitively would expect to see.
[00:09:08] – Paula
And as you say, I mean, there hasn’t been too much movement at the top, not, not terrible surprises, right? The schools have moved up or down a couple of spots, but it is all largely that group that you’d expect to see. What we haven’t talked about though is the sort of the tiers below that, and there we see a lot of movement. So speaking of the biggest winners and losers, so we have North Carolina, Kellan Flagler, jumped up 7 places to 21st. We’ve got UT, Texas, Jindal jumped 8 to number 23, which is its highest ever ranking, actually. And Emory, Gosweta fell 6 places. So that’s just a few examples, but what do you make of those movements sort of a little bit lower down the list, Caroline?
[00:10:09] – Caroline
Well, I haven’t dug into the data that’s driving those. I know it can look quite dramatic, but as Maria pointed out, it’s often small movements in the data that drives the reshuffling. And so it’s complicated for schools, right? Because those small differences don’t necessarily mean that there’s any qualitative difference in the experience of students or the outcomes that they can expect. But because there’s often, you know, these rankings are measuring very, very slight differences between schools, then that reshuffling can create headlines that can look quite dramatic and actually more dramatic than the underlying factors. I think what is important is the longer-term trends. We always see in rankings from year to year that there’s some reshuffling. And of course, they wouldn’t publish it if it was just the same as last year, right? These are publications that are looking to make a story. So, they want there to be some differences compared to what they published last year. But I think that from a candidate perspective, the longer-term trends tell you more than the sort of volatility from one year to the next. And I think it’s also really important for candidates to dig into the data and look at, you know, what is driving the underlying differences.
[00:11:37] – Caroline
And also to think about, you know, is this ranking reflecting criteria that are really important for you personally? Because there is no perfect ranking, right? Every candidate has a personal set of criteria that is important to them. And so you should never take a ranking as a reflection of what the ranking should be for you personally, and you should never take a ranking at face value. You should always dig into the criteria and consider if those criteria are your criteria that influence your decision. And beyond that, also dig into the data behind that because as we’ve discussed, some schools get a benefit from the design of their program. As I mentioned, I think Stanford benefits from being a slightly smaller program at this ranking. Some schools benefit from their location because most of these schools feed into quite a local market for recruitment. So over 50% of Stanford graduates stay in the Bay Area when they graduate. The graduates from the East Coast schools largely stay on the East Coast. And so some schools will be feeding into local markets where the cost of living is lower, and therefore that has an impact on average salaries.
[00:13:06] – Caroline
That’s not necessarily a bad thing for candidates, right? Because what you care about is your overall cost of living and the return on investment overall. And so, So it’s important to understand the nuances. But I think the volatility in this ranking is more on the lower end of the ranking, if I understand correctly, rather than at the top. I think that it’s probably some small differences that is driving that shuffle around.
[00:13:38] – Paula
[Speaker:LS] That’s a good reminder to take things with a pinch of salt. I’m curious You know, these schools that dropped the most, Texas Christian University, Northeastern, Baylor, how much does that slide down ultimately matter, really? You know, given that this is quite a volatile ranking, if they make up the loss next year, does this ultimately hurt their reputation with students?
[00:14:04] – Maria
I don’t think it does, because I would assume that those programs draw from a very localized set of folks who are probably already living in that market. Or who are interested in moving to that market, right? If you know that you definitely want to set up roots in a certain city, there’s a lot to be said for going to a business school in that city because while you’re in school, you’ll have the ability to network with employers, do projects with potential employers, and you’ll also start to be able to network with other business leaders. And as, as Caroline pointed out, a lot of people tend to stay in the geographic location wherever their school is located. And so that not only means that you as a fresh graduate might have more opportunities, but there’s also a very good chance that that network compounds over time. So 50% of the class from UCLA stays in Los Angeles. That’s year after year after year after year. So it just keeps growing and growing and growing. So if you know that you want to stay in Los Angeles and this is fresh on my mind because yesterday I was going back and forth with a client about this very decision, you know, it makes sense for you to stay to choose a school that is where you want to stay, where you want to live and put down your roots.
[00:15:09] – Maria
So I don’t know, like, yes, those fluctuations at the lower end can be, can be really dramatic, but I don’t think that they, that they’re really going to make an impact in terms of like there’s going to be a huge avalanche of new applicants coming in when they go up and then a huge receding of applicants when those, when those rankings go down, because I think people going to those schools are are valuing different things.
[00:15:34] – Paula
Yeah, I mean, obviously, you know, that patterns, and there are certain patterns also that repeat every year, but did you have any big surprises, things that surprised you in this year’s ranking?
[00:15:49] – Maria
I mean, I’m glad as a Harvard alum, I’m glad to see Harvard finally starting to bounce up a little. No, I mean, I, you know, these fluctuations happen a bit year to year. But like I said, I think, I think earlier, given the prior weightings, I do think that Stanford was unfairly punished in prior years. HBS was unfairly punished in prior years. I also think that the, the fact that reput— this sort of, again, amorphous reputation ranking, very opaque, very easy to sort of game if someone, you know, I would assume that a dean at a business school is quite familiar with game theory. And so You know, I would feel that I think there are some schools like, I think Yale, for example, has been essentially unfairly punished in these rankings for many years because they started off not as a pure broad-based business school, but they started off as more of like a public-focused, more focused on the nonprofit space specifically. And then they’ve broadened from there. And I feel like maybe in the eyes of old— not that all administrators at business schools are old, but people who have been in the space for a long time, shaking that reputation might have been hard.
[00:16:55] – Maria
So I almost wonder if You know, I would expect to see Yale start to move up as well.
[00:17:02] – Paula
So that’s, that’s another good one. So expectations for, well, we’ve only just had this year’s ranking, right? But what are your expectations for movement in the course of the next year leading to next year’s ranking?
[00:17:19] – Maria
It’s all going to depend on how the job market is. I mean, I think a lot of, because now 50% of it is employment, the school, I mean, the schools can do a lot, but they can’t work magic necessarily. So I don’t know if I have a prediction.
[00:17:34] – Paula
Well, that’s actually, that’s an interesting point. I mean, I guess with tech currently doing well, more or less, right? And traditional consulting sort of not maybe doing as great, maybe that’s one reason schools that focus on tech might do better in the coming year. But as a total newbie to this, I should stop putting out my theories. So yeah, any other things you wanted to kind of point out of this ranking, Caroline?
[00:18:13] – Caroline
Well, just one other thing that in the top 10, I think we also have Stanford and Berkeley. And just going back to the point about location, I think that both, both of those schools benefit from location and feeding into a job market, again, a very dynamic job market, which is fantastic for graduates and, and, and huge benefit, but again, a high cost of living job market. So I think that those schools also benefiting from that factor. Yeah.
[00:18:46] – Paula
Going back actually to the top 10 in Stanford, I think it’s worth saying that, you know, if we’re looking at FT’s ranking, Stanford’s not even ranked, right? And it hasn’t been for the last 2 years. So I wondered, is this performance significant or more significant given that, that it’s not really a part of that ranking?
[00:19:10] – Caroline
Well, I think this particular ranking, US News, carries much more weight. I think it’s the reference point for many candidates in the US, whereas the FT ranking is seen as more of an international ranking and probably carries more weight with candidates outside of the US. But I don’t think that international candidates are going to be fooled by the FT ranking that Stanford should not be on their radar screen. So I don’t think Stanford is suffering particularly by not being in the FT ranking.
[00:19:41] – Paula
Sure. Yeah, I mean, one other thing we haven’t talked about actually is the Executive MBA ranking. And again, we’ve got some musical chairs going on. So Penn Wharton is on top again, as a brief recap, but in number 2, we’ve got MIT Sloan, which is up 8 places over last year. So, That’s a much larger jump in that top 10 there, but again, largely a sort of list that you would expect to see, the order you’d expect to see. So I think we’ve largely talked about this, what’s gone on this year in US News. So unless we’ve got any objections from either of you, I would love to ask you about round 2 decisions. Which are out now. And I’m curious to see whether there are any sort of trends you’re observing so far. Caroline, I hear you’ve got some applicants weighing up Harvard versus Stanford, which is not a bad problem to have. How do you make that decision?
[00:20:52] – Caroline
Yeah. Yeah. So I think that acceptance rates are probably increasing this season. I think application volume is down, and so candidates are benefiting from a season where they’re more likely to get exemptions offers. And we are seeing a lot of candidates with offers from the very top schools, including multiple candidates— sorry, multiple offers from, from top schools, as you mentioned, including Harvard and Stanford. So it’s a great position to be in, first of all, and candidates do agonize over this decision. So the first thing to keep keep in mind is you are very lucky to have more than one offer from a top school. So generally, I think you can’t go wrong, right? And it’s extremely rare that we hear from a former client who’s gone to a top school and who has any regret about their decision, just because there are, even if perhaps you decide, well, maybe I would’ve been better off being on the West Coast, or I would’ve been better off being on the East Coast. There are so many ways of taking advantage and making the most of the experience that you have, that, and it’s such, the curriculum, the network, the recruitment opportunities are so incredible, the ecosystem that you are part of, that first of all, it’s very difficult to go wrong, I think, with any of those top schools.
[00:22:24] – Caroline
But I think it’s important for candidates to take a long-term perspective. Sometimes when people are making this decision, they start obsessing over the average salary of candidates coming, or students coming out of one school versus the other, or the precise employment rate on graduation for one school versus the other. And I think that it’s important to really take a longer-term perspective of which school is going to benefit your career, not just when you graduate, but also think about 5 years down the line, 10 years down the line. As Maria mentioned, if you are really focused on building your career in a certain geography, then having an outstanding network in that particular geography will pay dividends throughout your career. And I think that sometimes candidates underestimate the benefits that they will get from the network and how important and valuable that will be to them. And also students, I think, often kind of assume that when they graduate from business school, they will be on one continuous positive trajectory in their career, and it will always be a picture of success, right? And hopefully it will be, but most people go through a lot of ups and downs in their careers, and many MBA graduates will have to reinvent themselves at some point in their career.
[00:23:52] – Caroline
And I’ve seen that a lot with my INSEAD classmates, with my husband’s Stanford GSB classmates. That unexpected things happen and having the benefit of that network behind you, having people who know you, who love you, who are willing to open doors for you is incredibly valuable. And so, that network benefit really does compound over time. And I think that that’s very much underestimated by candidates when they are making that decision. So, I would really encourage candidates to take a long-term perspective. And that’s also something to take into account when you have scholarship offers, because sometimes candidates may have free rides at schools further down the rankings, right? They may have offers from Harvard or Stanford plus a free ride at a Kellogg or a Booth. And of course, it depends on multiple factors if you want to work in a certain industry or you want to work in a certain geography, it may well be worth taking the school that has the scholarship offer. But I would encourage candidates to make the calculation of their return on investment, including the scholarship offers, really taking into account the longer-term payback and how they see that playing out over time, because sometimes that can make a big difference to the calculation.
[00:25:24] – Paula
I mean, yeah, that, that’s an interesting one. If we’re weighing up full ride from Kellogg, you’ve got $197,000, uh, that’s your 2-year average in earnings versus Stanford is $206,000. So as Maria said, you know, it’s, it’s not a huge difference, but I guess then geography becomes the big factor, right? Like where, where, as you said, where, where you’re trying to, to grow your network and be in the longer term. Yeah.
[00:25:52] – Maria
And I think also, you know, the network is a huge part of it and also looking at the different curricula between the different schools. So if you are looking at schools that are within the same tier in terms of quality, once you start digging into those electives that they offer, there can be dramatic swings in terms of the variability of which electives one school offers versus another. Right. Stanford has famously a number of amazing classes that are very focused on interpersonal effectiveness. Versus other schools that might only have one, if maybe, maybe they have zero. And so you really have to look at yourself and say, well, what am I looking to get out of this program? Not just the numbers, but what— how am I looking to develop? How am I looking to grow? And I think once you start to do that, you will start to see, wow, there’s actually a pretty big difference. And I agree with Caroline wholeheartedly. I do think— I mean, look, as admissions consultants, like, we’ve already helped you get in, so we don’t have any skin in the game. Like, when we give you this advice, we have no agenda whatsoever.
[00:26:50] – Maria
Ever, because we’ve already done our job. Our work here is done. But I do strongly feel that if, if it is possible for you to take out a loan to attend the more elite program, I strongly encourage people to not be pennywise, pound-foolish here. If a, if a dramatically lower-ranked school, or a school that is perhaps equally ranked but just not as good for you, again, perhaps for geography reasons, if they offer you a huge scholarship versus a loan at another school, but that other school actually is the better school for you, take out the loan, figure it out, because these, these benefits do compound with time and the decades. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. It’s such a cliché thing to say, but it’s true. So don’t just think about that, that initial like, oh, let me see what the difference— that first post-MBA salary, let me compare it. Think about who you’re going to be 10, 20, even 30 years from now.
[00:27:41] – Paula
Yeah, I’m trying to square this with my penny-pinching mindset right now, but Good to think of the bigger picture. One thing I haven’t asked about is, you know, when do students need to make their decision by here? What’s the timeline?
[00:28:00] – Caroline
I mean, typically it depends on the school, but typically you have a couple of months to make a deposit. So you do get some time to make a decision.
[00:28:11] – Maria
And once you do make a deposit, I mean, if you do end up getting in off of a waitlist in another school and that’s the school you’re dying to go to, like, you’ll lose your deposit, but it’s not like you’re set in stone. You can in fact change and go to that other school, unless of course if you had made some sort of a binding early decision type of thing, but that’s not as common in the MBA world. So don’t feel that you’re necessarily locked in. You will have to forfeit that deposit, that’s true, but that optionality, it’s a good price, it’s a fine price to pay, I think, if it gives you that optionality. So.
[00:28:44] – Paula
And I mean, we’ve talked about having to weigh up two very good schools and, you know, having, having some really good options. But are there other trends that you’re observing so far in these round two decisions? Generally, it sounds like acceptance rates are up based on what you said, Caroline.
[00:29:05] – Caroline
Yeah, I think so. I’ll be very interested to see the data that P&Q publishes at some point on application volumes by school, because I do think that volumes are down, and particularly driven by the drop in international candidates. So I think there is a weakness in the domestic market, but even more so in the number of international applicants. And we’ve heard that from schools, and I know at the recent CentreCourt event that P&Q had hosted, top schools including Kellogg and Stanford were talking about how they were still keen on seeing more international candidates. So, it’s a shame because I suspect that we will see a drop in the percentage of international students on these programs, which is a loss for schools. It’s a loss for the other students who benefit a great deal from the international perspective that those students bring. So it’ll be very interesting to see the class profile data and then the data that you publish at some point on application volumes.
[00:30:18] – Paula
And a win for non-US schools as well.
[00:30:22] – Caroline
Yes, I think so. I think other schools are benefiting. They are getting the Trump bump, while the US is getting the Trump slump.
[00:30:32] – Paula
Well put. I think, Maria, I— we’re coming up to time, but any, any final thoughts on round 2? Thoughts, wisdom, tips for applicants?
[00:30:45] – Maria
No, I just— I, I’ve seen the same thing as Caroline. I do think that there has been a sizable reduction in applicants, particularly from overseas, to the US programs. And so that this was a great year to apply. If you were sort of a borderline or you were a little bit concerned about your candidacy, I do think that folks are getting really fantastic offers that maybe they wouldn’t have gotten a year or two ago. So, you know, I think it’s for the people who took the risk because it is viewed as more risky now, I think, given the geopolitical situation. But for folks willing to take that risk, I think it is, it is going to pay off for them. So congratulations to everyone who applied and made the leap and yeah, good, good, good thinking, good decision-making.
[00:31:30] – Paula
Congratulations for me too. And I think we’ll end on that high note. So thank you everyone for listening and please come back to us next week. This is Business Casual, Poets and Quants podcast, and I’m Pola Lem, my lovely co-hosts again, Maria Wikvila and Caroline DRT Edwards. Thank you.
