The Robins School of Business at the University of Richmond landed in the 18th spot in this year’s rankings, up 5 places from 2021’s 23rd place. Robins has consistently climbed upward the past few years, having placed 26th in the 2020 rankings. The B-school has been more selective over the years as well, with a slightly more selective acceptance rate this year of 28.14% for the Class of 2021, up from last year’s 31.20% acceptance rate. The average SAT score went down some, at 1366 compared to last year’s 1384.
Employability for Robins graduates was at an all-time high, back to that of 2019’s, with 100% of the Class of 2021 securing full-time employment within three months of graduation, one of the only two ranked undergraduate B-school’s to score perfection in this year’s employment outcomes category besides Byrum. Internship rates decreased this year to 92% for the Class of 2021, down only 4% from 2020’s 96%.
Numbers-wise, Robins proves to be a stellar undergraduate business program. And much of that success can be attributed to the B-school’s focus on small class sizes with high professor engagement and experiential learning-focused education.
SMALL CLASS SIZES WITH QUALITY PROFESSOR ENGAGEMENT
The University of Richmond is a private liberal arts university. As a part of a liberal arts institution, the Robins School offers a business curriculum that’s rooted in liberal arts. Robins students have access to three business majors including Accounting, Economics, and Business Administration. Students can choose from concentrations such as Finance, Marketing, International Business, Business Analytics, Entrepreneurship and Management Consulting.
One of the main benefits of a Robins education is the attention that each student receives. With an average class size of roughly 20 students, professors can offer greater attention to every student’s needs and goals.
Many alumni responding to our alumni survey highlighted the small class size as a main differentiating factor of their Robins experience. In-class experiences become even more personal, with one 2019 alumni stating they worked in a group of two.
“The consulting project for Hospital Corporation of America gave experience of real consulting work and working directly with the client ourselves (myself and another classmate) and presenting to senior managers.”
On average, 2019 alumni rated the quality of teaching in business courses at Robins at a solid 9.2 rating. When asked to rate faculty availability for informal discussions and mentoring outside of class, alumni gave a whopping 9.7 average rating.
Many other B-schools can boast the expansive opportunities that are available to their students, but the fact that Robins places heavy emphasis on its small class size and attentive faculty speaks volumes about the individual care they put into each and every student’s development.
EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING-FOCUSED EDUCATION
Much of the coursework and out-of-the-classroom opportunities at Robins emphasizes experiential learning. By having an experiential learning-focused education that emphasizes teamwork and an application of their studies, students can develop important soft skills such as communication skills, adaptability, delegation, and time management. Surveyed 2019 alumni rated the opportunities given to them at Robins to nurture and improve their soft skills at a strong 9 average rating.
“The consulting practicum course was exceptional. It was a hands on, guided approach to consulting and allowed for real insight into the daily life, workload and responsibilities of a consultant. It helped with the soft skills of client interaction, operating within scope, managing scope creep, as well as networking,” one 2019 alumni told us.
Remarks such as these were common in many of the 2019 Robins alumni that responded to the survey. Whether it was through a course project or a competition, the main theme from every response was an education that placed strong emphasis on learning business in a way that reflected real-world conditions.
Another 2019 alumni said, “The business capstone course provided one (of many) incredible opportunities to continue to hone critical thinking skills. One component of this course was independently identifying a business problem in a major fortune 500 company and implementing a comprehensive business strategy to address it, with forecasted impact and rationale.”
Overall, the combination of small class sizes and opportunities for students to apply their learnings in the real-world makes the Robins education one that will continuously impress both students and employers.
Alumni say:
“The consulting practicum course was exceptional. It was a hands on, guided approach to consulting and allowed for real insight into the daily life, workload and responsibilities of a consultant. It helped with the soft skills of client interaction, operating within scope, managing scope creep, as well as networking. Additionally, this course provided real resume experience that could be discussed with future full-time employers during the interview process.”
“I was engaged in several ‘signature experiences’ that included making complete projects and proposals, some of our own making and some for classwork. It was unique because they were entirely student driven. The professors were there to mentor and bounce ideas off of, but they encouraged us to take the projects from beginning to end.”
“For my senior capstone class, we completed case studies on companies like Disney and Ryanair and recommended real-world strategic initiatives based on the company’s current positioning in the market.”
“I received money as part of the spider internship funds for my proposal to build out a smartphone application to help better serve students who are studying abroad. Without this opportunity, I would not have had the money or time to pursue the idea and bring the app to life.”
“We did a semester-long case study on a business as part of Strategic Management, the business administration capstone course. It was a great way to experience strategy consulting type work in a low pressure academic setting.”
Where The Class of 2020 Went To Work:
PwC – 12
Deloitte – 7
EY – 6
KCIC – 4
Barclays – 3
Harris Williams – 3
KPMG – 3
Truist – 3
UBS – 3
