Financial Times Ranks Katz School’s Full-time MBA Program 1st in “Best Value for the Money” in U.S.

The Financial Times has ranked the University of Pittsburgh Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business’ full-time MBA program 1st in the United States for the third consecutive year in the “Best Value for the Money” category and 8th in the world in that category.

The Katz School’s program also was ranked 9th among public U.S. universities in overall rankings, up from 27th last year. In overall worldwide rankings, the Katz School’s program moved from 56th last year to 25th this year, tied with Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Management.

The other U.S. public institutions ranked in the top nine were the University of Michigan, the University of Virginia, UCLA, the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Arizona, the University of Maryland, the University of North Carolina, and the University of Texas at Austin.

Among the other Pennsylvania institutions in the Financial Times’ overall worldwide rankings, the University of Pennsylvania was ranked 1st, Carnegie Mellon University was ranked 24th, and Pennsylvania State University was ranked 34th.

The compilation of the Financial Times 2009 ranking of full-time MBA programs began in July 2008. A total of 157 business schools that met the criteria for participation were included.

To be eligible to participate, a business school had to be internationally accredited by a body such as the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, the Association of MBAs, or the European Quality Improvement System; have a full-time MBA program that has been running for at least five years; and have graduated its first class at least three years ago. To aid in the accuracy of its ranking process, the Financial Times, through its independent auditor, conducted random audits of the data submitted by schools, including the Katz School’s data, which were audited in December 2008.

The London-based Financial Times is printed at 24 print sites across the globe, has a daily circulation of 435,319 (ABC figures, December 2008), and a print and online readership of 1.3 million people.