Having spent four consecutive years in the second place on the Financial Times ranking for best online MBA programs, Warwick Business School has finally obtained the top spot.
It has moved IE Business School (Spain) from the first place to the second, leaving Isenberg School of Management in the third place.
Average salaries of online MBA alumni compared to ‘campus’ alums
The assessment of the twenty ranked online programs was mostly based on alumni career progress plus on faculty and student body diversity and, of course, quality of teaching the online program, FT reports. Career progress is measured according to the average alumni salary (three years post-graduation), as well as the increase of said salary in comparison with what it was before the graduates took the MBA program.
All in all, the average salary of graduates with an online MBA degree is mostly equal to full-time MBA program graduates’ salaries. Alumni who graduated from business school in 2014 have an average salary of $147,000 – even a bit higher than full-time program graduates have. People who obtained their MBA degrees in 2013 had an average salary of $140,000 (online MBA) and $142,000 (full-time MBA).
There is a significant difference between increases in salary for graduates of online and full-time degrees. For online graduates, the average post-MBA salary grew by approximately 32%, while full-time alumni enjoyed a ‘pay rise’ of 107%. In the end, their average salaries turned out to be equal, but it happened during different career stages. Most online MBA alumni are in their forties (six years older than their campus counterparts), and they had a much higher salary at the beginning of their education.
The school topping the ranking
Graduates from Warwick, the school with the top-ranking online program, showed the largest salary increase year-by-year. Their average salaries grew by $13,000 up to $183,000. The salary is second-highest in the rankings – IE graduates still have more, $184,000, $7,000 less than in 2017.
Warwick Business School got the first place for alumni career progress and research (together with Indiana’s Kelley School of Business). In the category of achieved aims it got the third place, the fourth in value of money and fifth for career consulting. Warwick’s student body includes 850 foreign students from 106 countries. Contrastingly, U.S.-based online MBA programs managed to attract only 4% of foreign students among themselves. At European schools, more than 50% of students are always international. In 2014, 70% of online MBA students were not from the European Union.
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