Rutgers MBA ranked No. 37 by Bloomberg Businessweek based on strength of networking, compensation, and diversity

Rutgers Business School-Newark and New Brunswick is ranked No. 37 in the U.S. in Bloomberg Businessweek’s 2021-2022 Best B-Schools MBA ranking, which evaluated such factors as compensation, learning, diversity, and the strength of alumni networks.

Among the nation’s public business schools, Rutgers is No. 15 for the quality of its Full-Time MBA Program based on the new ranking, which placed it as the No. 1 public business school in the Northeast.

Rutgers Business School earned its highest scores for the compensation offered to its MBA graduates, the strength of its networking, and the diversity in its MBA program and faculty. Other key factors were learning (the range and real-world relevance of instruction and curriculum) and entrepreneurship (training to start a business).

“We’re excited that Bloomberg Businessweek is recognizing Rutgers’ track record of advancing students’ careers, even during difficult economic times,” said Doug Miller, associate dean for MBA Programs. “It is encouraging to see how much they appreciate the faculty, connections to alumni, the entrepreneurship ecosystem, and the terrific return on investment of the Rutgers MBA degree.”

For the first time, Bloomberg Businessweek weighed the racial, ethnic and gender makeup of MBA programs in the U.S. Rutgers Business School was ranked No. 21 in diversity based on data as well as responses from students and alumni. The new index was developed to assess how business schools were addressing institutional racism and discrimination that have excluded certain minority groups and women from U.S. MBA programs.

While Rutgers received a favorable rating on diversity, Miller said the MBA program continues to make improvements. “We are investing in ways to expand and enhance the diversity of our graduate student body, which is important for any top business school,” he said.

The Bloomberg Businessweek ranking came on the heels of Fortune’s first-ever MBA ranking, which also listed the Rutgers MBA Program as No. 37.

“We looked for programs that not only see their graduates head into good jobs right out of the gate (with high starting salaries) but also have a track record of placing alumni into the highest echelons of Corporate America,” Fortune’s editors wrote about the inaugural ranking. “Salary, school brand, and leadership trajectory: That’s the core of our ranking.”

Lei Lei, dean of Rutgers Business School, praised Miller as well as Dean Vera, the assistant dean and director of the MBA Office of Career Management, for their work to connect RBS students to the world’s leading companies.

“We are very excited about our strong standing in Fortune’s inaugural MBA ranking,” Lei said. “The ranking focuses on all of the factors we believe drive our MBA program’s strong return-on-investment, most importantly, job placement.”

“At Rutgers Business School," she said, "we are continually innovating our MBA curriculum to ensure that our students are well prepared to use technology and the data it produces so they are not only competitive job candidates but also strong business leaders and effective decision-makers for the future."

The Rutgers MBA Program is also differentiated by the preparation students receive to be competitive candidates for jobs in the nation’s top companies.

“We work hard to help our students succeed in the very competitive summer internship and full-time job search,” Vera said. “The offers and higher salaries they receive are the results of our coaching and strong employer relationships we’ve cultivated at RBS.”