Positive feedback from recent UT Dallas Naveen Jindal School of Management graduates, alumni from years past and employers who have recruited them propelled the school forward four places — to No. 32 among U.S. schools — in the 2021-2022 Bloomberg Businessweek Best B-Schools MBA rankings.
Among public university programs represented in the new rankings, “the Jindal School placed at No. 11,” said Dr. Hasan Pirkul, Jindal School dean and Caruth Chair. “We can all take pride in this, because it speaks to our continued growth as one of the leading public business schools in the nation.”
Bloomberg Businessweek updates the rankings biennially, and the new standings relied on data drawn from full-time MBA programs and students. The Jindal School fared well in two of five component categories — referred to as Indexes — of the rankings, which were released Sept. 15. The school scored 100% and came in at No. 1 in Learning, and 95.1% and No. 4 in Networking.
Invested in Every Student
In Learning, queries were created to “explore the quality, depth and range of instruction,” an explanation of methodology said. “We focus on whether the curriculum is applicable to real-world business situations; the degree of emphasis on innovation, problem-solving and strategic thinking; the level of inspiration and support from instructors; class size; and collaboration.”
By MBA industry standards, the Jindal School runs a small full-time program, Dr. Monica Powell, JSOM senior associate dean and dean of graduate programs, said. “But when you’re small, you can meet the needs of every individual student.
“It is clear from the results, that we’ve done that exceptionally well,” Powell said “In order for us to rank No. 1 in learning, our students had to feel like our faculty were invested in every student’s individual success.”
The Road to Opportunity
For the Networking Index, Bloomberg Businessweek studied classmate-to-classmate connections, student and alumni engagements, alumni to alumni collaboration, career-service-center achievements, and “the school’s brand power, from recruiters’ viewpoints.”
Networking is the road to opportunity, Powell said. “Any MBA in any program nationwide — worldwide — knows that. … When you can network with great individuals who can add value to how you do your job or how you manage your people or how you connect with new business opportunities or clients, then that is a very enriched experience.”
The Jindal School not only connects students to enriched learning experiences while they are in the program, it also helps alumni continue to build and grow their networks, Powell said. “One thing that is really remarkable is that all of those alumni, they come back and assist a program that has made a difference in their lives. So they really help current students with taking what they have learned and exponentially growing it for the people that are behind them.”
“To be No. 4 is networking is amazing for any school but when you take into consideration that we are a young school, and therefore have a smaller number of alumni, it makes it even more remarkable,” said Lisa Shatz, Jindal School assistant dean and director of the school’s MBA programs. “It is evidence that all the alumni in the world won’t help if there isn’t a culture of giving back and stepping up when students need you. Pay it forward is alive and well at UT Dallas.”
No. 16 in Entrepreneurship
In other indexes, JSOM ranked 16th in Entrepreneurship, one place ahead of UT Austin. It ranked 45th in Compensation and 52nd in Diversity, a new component category inaugurated with the rankings this year.
In all, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked 119 programs around the world, subdividing them by region. The United States was the largest region with 84 ranked programs. In Europe, 23 programs were ranked; in Asia Pacific, seven; and in Canada, five.
Results were derived from 19,955 surveys returned by students who graduated between October 2020 and Sept. 30, 2021, alumni who graduated between October 2012 and September 30, 2015, and employers who recruited MBA grads for full-time jobs in 2019 and 2020.
