The Ithaca College’s School of Business landed at an impressive No. 66 in this year’s 2023 rankings – leaping ahead a whole 12 places from last year’s No. 78 in the 2022 rankings. Of the three methodological categories, Ithaca scored best in Career Outcomes, landing at No. 55.
The B-school had a much more selective acceptance rate of 76% for the most recent incoming class compared to last year’s incoming class with a 82.81% acceptance rate. The newest class’s average SAT scores averaged 1258 – similar to last year’s 1261 but down a few points.
As far as year-over-year comparisons go, Ithaca was one of the most impressive B-Schools this year in terms of career outcomes and internship rates. Internship rates shot up to 96% for the Class of 2023 in contrast to last year’s 84% for the Class of 2022 landing at least one internship before graduation. Employment outcomes were also excellent, with 89.04% of the Class of 2023 securing full-time employment within three months of graduation compared to last year’s 82.36% for the Class of 2022.
Ithaca College School of Business offers an extraordinary undergraduate business program that emphasizes learning by doing with strong experiential learning opportunities, an in-depth professional development program, and cutting-edge resources.
EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
Ithaca College School of Business offers the following portfolio of undergraduate majors: Accounting, Finance (with Asset Management, Corporate Finance, and Wealth Management tracks), International Business, Marketing, Management, Sport Management, and Secondary Concentrations in Corporate Accounting and Sports Marketing. The Management concentration now offers two tracks; one in Analytics and one in Strategic Leadership. Within each major curriculum, experiential learning is well-integrated with plenty of case studies, consulting projects, and service-learning opportunities to give students hands-on experiences.
All first-year students are required to take a comprehensive “World of Business” course, where they are introduced to the key functions of business and work in student teams to run a simulated company. One thing that makes this course especially unique is that the World of Business professor also acts as students’ official advisor for their first two years. This creates a strong mentorship as the professor gets to connect with students more and understand their goals and interests.
Another strong example of the experiential learning at Ithaca is in its Sports Management program. Past students have participated in faculty-led internships at events such as Super Bowls (L-LIII), Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, NCAA basketball tournaments, and the “Cortaca Jug” game at MetLife Stadium (the annual college football matchup between the Red Dragons of the State University of New York at Cortland and the Bombers of Ithaca College).
PROFESSIONS PROGRAM
Ithaca College takes a truly holistic approach to professional development. All undergraduate business students are required to take the Professions Program, a four-year professional development curriculum that includes networking and interview skills, personal branding, professional dress, and etiquette. Students begin by taking part in workshops such as “Making Success a Habit” and “All-Star Interviewing.”
What really makes the Professions Program unique, however, are the courses. In “Informational Interview,” students explore a career path of interest and conduct an interview with a professional in their field of interest using the skills that they learned in their workshops. In “Career Exploration,” students spend 30 hours shadowing an organization in their field of interest and interviewing employees to learn more about their role and the business. While many B-schools offer resume and etiquette workshops, Ithaca College takes professional development one step further by requiring students to apply their workshop learnings into action.
CUTTING-EDGE RESOURCES
Within the B-school, students have access to a number of state-of-the-art facilities and resources to utilize. Ithaca has two technology labs; the Neeson Business Analytics Lab and the Neeson Digital Marketing Lab, as well as a trading room.
The cutting-edge resources are a strong example of how Ithaca College approaches business education. Here, learning exists both within and beyond the classroom environment. They apply their knowledge by using the software that practitioners use every day. Because, at Ithaca College, learning business is a lot like doing business in the real world. And that’s exactly what makes it unique.
Alumni say:
“Many of the projects we did through the Management concentration were great at building skills around collaboration and working with others. For one of them, we partnered with a local company of our choosing to help consult on a business case they’re currently facing. It was an excellent learning experience with a real organization.”
“I can speak from experience that Ithaca preps students for excel readiness even more than those that I work with who graduated from top business schools across the country. I’ve noticed new hires at my company that have never taken a business analytics course, and I’m thankful Ithaca has made this a requirement for graduation. It’s not something to be taken for granted, and an extremely valued skill for new college hires.”
“For one of our Business Development classes, we were required to go into the local Ithaca community and work with small business owners to formulate a plan to improve aspects of their business. It was really great to work hands-on and observe a business while trying to figure out how to improve their operations.”
“I worked with a local company to provide a digital marketing plan for their business. This experience allowed me to apply the knowledge and skills I learned in class to real-world situations where my decisions had an impact.”
