The Gies College of Business of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign placed at No. 19 in our 2025 ranking of the Best Undergraduate Business Programs in the U.S.
In our three methodological categories, it finished highest in Academic Experience as measured by our alumni survey. It placed fourth in that category, 21st in Career Outcomes, and 28th in Admission Standards. That’s out of 104 schools ranked this year.
Gies’s program has become progressively more selective year after year. For the 2024 incoming class, the acceptance rate was 23.1% compared to 24.17% in 2023 and 27% in 2022. Their average SAT scores have also been climbing each year – with an average score of 1441 for the latest class, 1423 for 2023’s incoming class and 1421 for 2022’s.
Gies graduates have strong career outcomes both on the internship and employment front. Some 89% of Class of 2024 graduates had a business-focused internship before graduating compared to 92% for the previous class. In employment, 96.15% of 2024 grads found a job within three months while 94.87% did the same in 2023. The average starting salaries for this spring’s graduates was $76,742 with 71% getting signing bonuses of an average $6,003.
The top employers of the Class of 2024 include PricewaterhouseCoopers, Deloitte, KPMG, EY, Crowe, JP Morgan Chase & Co, Plante Moran, W.W. Grainger, PepsiCo, and Capital One.
CURRICULUM
For those looking for a B-school education that emphasizes cross-functional collaboration and a tight-knit community of support, the Gies College definitely merits consideration. Like other major state universities listed on our ranking, Gies provides a top-notch business education and true university experience in a college town.
The Gies College is unique in that it is housed in a major and academically strong university but recently terminated its full-time residential MBA program. While the college does have specialized master’s programs, the iMBA and undergraduate programs are the two marquee offerings. Either way, at Gies, undergraduate business students are given opportunities to solve real-world problems by working cross-functionally and supporting one another along the way in an environment that fosters inclusiveness, collaboration, and intellectual curiosity.
Gies students usually declare their major in their sophomore year from ten distinct majors including accounting, accountancy & data science, supply chain management, finance, information systems, finance & data science, management with a concentration (general or international), marketing, operations management, and finally the last one – strategy, innovation and entrepreneurship.
Uniquely to Gies, first and second year students engage with a job-shadowing program with corporate partners during winter breaks.
Regardless of which major they choose, all Gies undergrads take the Business Core, a select series of courses that offer a foundation in everything, beginning with business dynamics, where they are taught to teach and engage like business leaders, then taking on real issues and recommending solutions to real clients, stretching to global business.
Gies’ thoughtfully designed academic and extracurricular programs provide students with ample opportunities to apply what they’ve learned to real client projects. Gies also excels at maintaining international partnerships with world-renowned business schools. Many students study abroad their sophomore or junior year, and others participate in one of the many short-term international programs available.
CROSS-FUNCTIONAL COLLABORATION
The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign (UIUC) is best known for its prestigious engineering program. And at Gies, business students can tap into that by working alongside their engineering peers through the The Hoeft Technology & Management Program, a joint university minor within Gies College of Business and The Grainger College of Engineering. Interested students apply to the program and are chosen through a selective admissions process that includes an application and three interviews.
The Hoeft Technology & Management Program is a prime example of what makes Gies stand out as a business school. The B-school leverages the talent of the greater UIUC community to enhance the business education and offer students truly unique and collaborative learning experiences.
Other ways to engage in extracurricular activities include the Margolis Market Information lab, where students have access to state-of-the-art finance and business data software, the iVenture Accelerator, which supports student-led startups with knowledge, funding and access to resources and alumni, and Illinois Business Consulting, the largest student-run university consulting organization in the country. Case competitions are also staple in the program – each designed to address unique business challenges and provide students with opportunities to prepare and present as professionals.
SUPPORTIVE NETWORK
While UIUC is a public university of more than 30,000 undergraduate students, the Gies community is one that is tight-knit and supportive. Whether it’s through mentorship or coursework, students are supported by the Gies community throughout their four-year educational journey.
Making connections is an integral part of business education. And while networking is not unique to Gies, it seems that the level of support that extends beyond the classroom and even beyond graduation is truly unique to the Gies community.
ALUMNI SAY
“There were multiple experiences throughout the coursework at Gies. Pretty much every class had some sort of “end of the semester” capstone project. This was the norm – high achievers with exceptional interpersonal skills.”
“I was involved in Investment Management Academy, multiple experiential learnings, capstone projects, and external consulting projects through clubs, Academies, and the Gies Scholars program. I can directly attribute my success at work and obtaining my desired job to these experiences. Only so much can be learned in standard classes without application, but the Gies CoB did an exceptional job of teaching me to apply my learnings. I talk about these experiences to this day, multiple years after graduating.”
“Although I did not get to study abroad because of Covid, I did get to go to Brazil during the summer after my freshman year. This experience was key in better understanding the geopolitical environment of our world at large while gaining exposure to how international companies operate. We also completed a capstone project during this trip.”
“Best business school by far, I will shout it from the rooftop. My first role post-graduating from the Gies College of Business was an investment banking analyst at Goldman Sachs. The rest of my colleagues were majority from ivy league or “target” schools. I was always proud to be an alumni of the Gies COB and show that we, too, can accomplish anything we set our minds to. Best alumni network in the greater Chicago land area.”
“I received a fantastic education at Gies College of Business and would attend again given the chance. In fact, I wish I only applied to Gies and didn’t waste money applying to other schools that would have given me a subpar education and experience as compared to what U of Illinois offered to me. I have not a single regret attending this school, and quite frankly pity people who did not experience UIUC.”
