The Tuck School of Business was stripped of its title as the number one business school in the nation, ranking second this year on The Wall Street Journal/Harris Interactive Ranking of America's list of top national business schools. Tuck placed first on the list in three of the past six years.
The University of Michigan's Ross School of Business topped this year's ranking for the second time in six years. Following Tuck on the list were the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University, Columbia Business School and the Haas School of Business at the University of California Berkeley.
"Michigan and Dartmouth are clearly the schools to beat," the Journal wrote, considering the schools' recent dominance in the rankings. The University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business was the only other school to rank first during the past six years.
Paul Danos, the Dean of the Tuck School who formerly served as senior associate dean at Michigan, said that he did not fret about being second instead of first this year.
"There's thousands of business schools in the world and we've been first, second and third on this ranking. And overall there are six major rankings of business schools. We're in the top 10 in all of the major rankings," Danos said.
According to Danos, Tuck's small size in comparison to other business schools on the list can be both a blessing and a curse when it comes to rankings.
"We win in everything that is related to a per-student basis. We don't win when it comes to volume," Danos said.
Tuck's smaller size allows a greater focus on students' individual experiences, allowing them to interact with faculty more than at schools with a larger student body, Danos said.
Corporate recruiters voted on schools based upon three separate components: whether they planned to recruit at the school in the future, how many recruiters each school has attracted in the past year and the recruiters' ratings of each school. Recruiters' ratings are based on 21 categories including academic quality, students' personal ethics -- where Tuck students have ranked number one -- and employer satisfaction with students that have graduated from each school, a component that Danos said helped propel Tuck above many of its competitors,
"I think that we will always be close to the top on any kind of survey that ranks employee satisfaction with our students," Danos said.
Tuck also received the highest scores for students' teamwork abilities, well-rounded qualities and work ethics. Recruiters have found that Tuck students possess "an excellent mix of firepower, practical experience and humility," the Journal reported, in contrast to Harvard University Business School students, who some recruiters claimed are "arrogant and less collegial than the MBAs they meet at other schools." Harvard ranked 14th on this year's list.
The Journal, however, faulted Tuck for a student body that can be considered "soft or laid back," its "limited global curriculum" and its location "in the middle of nowhere." Polls also revealed that some recruiters were displeased with the time and expense of traveling to Hanover. Tuck's position in the rankings elevates its profile with people who may not be familiar with the school, Danos said.
"We are very well known in some circles and not in other circles," Danos said. "These rankings are published everywhere and are on the internet and they are a tremendous source of information about the school."
