MBA applicants can get carried away with rankings. In this series, we profile amazing programs at business schools that are typically ranked outside the top 15.
First years at Boston College’s Carroll School of Management begin their MBA experience within a cohort of close to 100 students, enjoying a close-knit classroom environment in which they gain exposure to broad management skills, with a particular emphasis on business ethics. Both the curriculum and the student community at the school engender a set of core values: “honesty and integrity,” “mutual respect,” “pursuit of excellence,” and “personal accountability.” In addition to taking a class on public speaking and a structure, analysis, and integration workshop, students at the Carroll School must complete at least 20 hours of community service, which the school requires to help instill an appreciation for and a spirit of community service in its MBAs.
These values are also reflected in the school’s core “Management Practice” course sequence, in which students learn to think critically about the challenges involved in business leadership. As one graduate commented in Bloomberg Businessweek’s 2012 profile of the Carroll School, “In the background of your core classes, and many electives, is a strong consideration on the moral and ethical dilemmas that often arise in the business world. I never felt that ‘morality’ was being pushed on us, but the consequences of each decision we make were always placed in front of us and we were left to make up our own mind.”
