Are two year full time MBA programs losing favour with applicants? It would seem so as the number of applications numbers for full-time, two-year MBA programs in the US were down at 53% of business schools, according to the GMAC 2016 Application Trends Survey report.
This was in sharp contrast to 2014, a year in which 61% of two-year programs reported an increase in application numbers.
Across the world, 48% of two-year programs reported a drop in applications compared to last year, while 9% reported no change.
Less than half of programs surveyed by GMAC witnessed year-on-year application growth for the first time since 2012.
Europe Favours 1-year MBA
The survey found that almost three-quarters of full-time, one-year MBA programs in Europe reported an increase in applications numbers this year. It marked a departure from the past for the region that had been witnessing stagnant growth in business programs for several years.
However, this growth remained restricted to Europe. Less than half of one-year MBA programs in the US, East and Southeast Asia reported a rise in applications this year.
Survey Methodology
GMAC had collected responses from 100 full-time, two-year programs in the US and from 33 programs from other countries for the Survey.
In the one-year format, the survey covered 105 full-time MBA programs of which 25 are based in Europe, 46 in the US and 12 in East and Southeast Asia.
The decline in applications was more in the case of two-year programs with smaller class size of 53 or lesser number of students and mid-sized with 54 to 120 students on the rolls.
Compared to the previous year, 57% of those with large class sizes (more than 120 students) saw a rise in their application numbers. However, only 40% of mid-sized programs and 33% of small programs reported an increase.
Domestic Applicants Fall in the US
Less than half of applicants to full-time, two-year MBA programs in the US are citizens of the country. While only 47% from the US were among the applicants, almost a similar percentage was from Asia-Pacific. Central and South Asia made up 21% of the year’s total, with a further 19% from applicants in East and Southeast Asia and 1% from in Australia and the Pacific Islands.
The remaining 12% of applications received were submitted by those holding citizenship in Latin America (3%), the Middle East (4%), Africa (2%), Europe (2%) and Canada (1%).
More Applicants from Outside in Europe
One-year MBA programs in Europe had more number of applications come from outside the country. The proportion of domestic applicants was as low as 11%.
About 23% of the applicants were from Western Europe and 4% from Eastern Europe. The number of applicants from Asia-Pacific was much higher.
Central or South Asian countries accounted for 23%, East & Southeast Asia 12% and Australia & Pacific Islands 1%. Applicants from Africa or the Middle East comprised 15%, Latin America 12% and 10% from the US or Canada.
Scholarships
Almost 27% of the applicants could hope to get some form of merit-based MBA scholarship from the school while the share of need-based scholarships was just 10%.
Employer sponsored scholarships were available for just about 1-9% of the students for 2-year programs as reported by 47% of the schools.
For the 1-year program, while 30% of the schools reported that none of their students will have employer funding, 37% reported between 1-9% and a 13% said it would be 10-19%.
Rise of EMBA online MBA
Almost 51% of executive MBA (EMBA) programs saw an increase in application volume this year, a rise of eight percentage points over the previous year. This was for the first time since 2008 that an increase in applications has been reported by a majority of responding programs.
A total of 63 EMBA programs responded to the survey, of which 46 are based in the US. A majority of the 33 online MBA programs which responded to the survey reported an increase. Master’s in data analytics programs also saw a significant year to year rise. (Image Courtesy: Stanford)
