The Schmidthorst College of Business at Bowling Green State University came in at No. 75 in our 2023 rankings this year – dropping only slightly from last year’s No. 73 finish. The B-School ranked best in the Academic Experience category, coming in at No. 36.
Their most recent incoming class had an acceptance rate of 89.40%, and their average SAT scores landed at 1175. BGSU saw a dip in employment outcomes compared to last year – with just 66.43% of the Class of 2023 landing full-time employment within three months of graduation, as compared to last year’s 76%.
Internship rates improved, with a good 75% of the Class of 2023 securing at least one business-related internship by the time of graduation as compared to last year’s 69% for the Class of 2022.
The university’s approach to undergraduate business education focuses on lifelong learning with tools for students to design a personalized education that will follow them long after graduation.
LIFE DESIGN
The undergraduate experience at BGSU starts with a newly launched student focus initiative that it calls Life Design. The initiative is designed to help students find their purpose and develop personal and professional success plans. Through workshops and seminars over their four years, students continuously update and develop their college and life plans.
On the surface, Life Design may seem like any other B-school’s approach to student development. But the initiative at BGSU is more holistic and long-term focused with pillars such as career, connections, purpose & passion, and health & wellness. To offer students a toolkit of knowledge that they can utilize beyond graduation, BGSU hired life design coaches to support students in all aspects of academic, life, and career development.
“It is designed to allow for discovery-based learning, hands-on experimentation, and collaboration to support the development and education of future business leaders and entrepreneurs,” Zubair Mohamed, associate dean of the Schmidthorst College of Business, told us.
Additionally, through a new Signature Work initiative, students apply their learnings to a project report.
The Life Design initiative embodies BGSU’s commitment to giving students more than just a degree. It’s about giving them the tools they need to design a more accomplishing career, reflective mindset, and fulfilling life. Faculty were rated a 9.2 by the Class of 2019 alumni in terms of availability for informal discussions and mentoring outside of class.
ENGAGING IN A “SIGNATURE EXPERIENCE”
Hands-on learning is integral to the undergraduate business education at BGSU. Some 72.22% of surveyed alumni report engaging in a “signature experience” whether through project work, simulations, global immersion, experiential learning, senior thesis, or capstone project.
“For our marketing specialization, we were assigned to teams for the entire semester for our capstone project,” one alum told us. “We partnered with real local businesses to assess their current marketing, research their audience, and create a tangible and attainable marketing plan for the organization to help them reach their goals. We presented the marketing plan to the business and our teammates. One aspect that made this project extremely unique was the ability to actually help a real business reach its goals before we even left the classroom. The other one was the ability to cultivate everything we had learned over our time at Bowling Green — particularly our ability to work as a team — to succeed in our project.”
For many, the capstone project is through Capsim – an intuitive business simulation software that places students in the role of executive management at a multi-million dollar company. Students compete against other real or simulated teams to grab market share and grow their business.
“I participated in Capsim, and it teaches you how to run a business and what decisions or sacrifices you may need to make to advance your market share and increase your overall profits,” one alum said. “It was great to put your knowledge to the test and understand how businesses work. It’s not the textbook readings or small projects that made my experience memorable, it was the case study and virtual simulation that I completed that reinforced all my knowledge and prepared me.”
Across these various experiences, the one common theme is active learning. Students engage with one another in teams, are expected to prepare for meetings and lead discussions, and constantly apply their learnings to address real business problems.
At BGSU, students are encouraged to look beyond simply landing a dream job or hitting a high GPA. They’re given tools to design a personalized journey that takes into account all aspects of their life — from their career and connections to their purpose and wellness. In turn, students are not only well-prepared for whatever career path they choose to pursue, but also the life that they plan to lead.
Alumni say:
“During my senior year at BGSU, I had the opportunity to complete a mock sales process to understand the details of a sales cycle. This understanding and hands-on experience, paired with alumni insight and teaching, was an incredible way to prep for my current sales role and learn the basics of business etiquette.”
“I obtained two internships while at BGSU. My second opportunity was in Washington D.C, which allowed me to further develop as a student and future employee. Living and working so far from home also allowed me to learn more about myself. This opportunity would not have been possible without BGSU and I will forever be grateful for the experience.”
“Opportunity to participate in CAPSIM simulations, study abroad, intern abroad, golfing workshops, and soft skills workshops all through the College of Business at BGSU. All of these opportunities helped me reach my collegiate and early career goals and exposed me to a plethora of knowledge and experiences to build me into a well rounded young professional.”
“Many projects throughout my time at the college of business engaged us as business professionals not just students with both alumni and local business leaders. This gave us real world experience to speak on when questioned in interviews or business meetings.”
“The Capstone project gave students the opportunity to figure out how decisions made can affect a business. We were each assigned a company and we were able to make strategic decisions and see how our decisions affected the performance of our company.”
