FCBE Lands in Top 25 Percent in Key Ranking

For release:  November 1, 2011

The undergraduate program at the Fogelman College of Business & Economics has been ranked in the top 25% of all AACSB-accredited business schools by U.S. News & World Report. The report, which was released this fall, places Fogelman’s programs above those of business schools in a number of higher-ranking universities.

“We beat Texas Tech, we beat Ole Miss — and all of these universities have deep, deep pockets,” said Dr. Rajiv Grover, Dean of the Fogelman College of Business & Economics.

But to Grover, the ranking itself is not the college’s biggest accomplishment. It’s how the ranking happened. “The big deal is that we did this with zero marketing,” he said. “The way this ranking is done is that deans and faculty members (at other colleges) report on what they think about the undergraduate program. So if they have rated us well enough for us to be ranked, that means they have heard of what’s going on over here.”

“What’s going on” at Fogelman includes a range of new initiatives that fall under the auspices of the new Avron B. Fogelman Center for Professional Student Development — such as Business Etiquette, Professionalism First!, Fogelman Feeds and Fogelman Fit, among others. By taking a holistic approach to student development, these programs aim to produce graduates who are “business-ready” and well-prepared to tackle the challenges they’ll face in today’s competitive business climate.

Fogelman also has developed a range of new, specialized MBA programs, including its Customer-Driven MBA program, the nation’s only full-time, corporate-sponsored MBA program designed to meet specific industry needs. It comes alongside the college’s International, Entrepreneurship, Executive, Executive Health-System Pharmacy, Professional and Online MBA programs, all of which give the college a competitive edge, Grover said.

And the next step for Fogelman, he said, will be to seek ranking for the college’s MBA lineup. “We will supply data for MBA rankings for the first time next year,” Grover said. “We didn’t try because we didn’t yet have a first batch of CDMBA graduates, and you need salaries of a graduating batch. Next year, we will be putting in the effort to get our MBA program ranked.”