MSBA program ranks No. 6 nationwide in new survey

Graduate | Dec 23, 2014 | Gabelli School of Business

Professor RP Raghupathi

Fordham University’s Master of Science in Business Analytics program has come a long way in a short time, and now it’s been recognized as one of the best.

The MSBA has been ranked sixth in the nation according to The Financial Engineer.

It enrolled its first students in 2012, when it was “one of the first [business] analytics programs in the country,” said RP Raghupathi, professor of information systems, who serves as the MSBA’s program director.

“We decided to focus on information technology-driven curriculum because that was our strength,” Raghupathi said.

The program has rigorous academic and enrollment standards, he added.

“We have tried to maintain the quality … of the application process,” Raghupathi said. “So we have very strict requirements for admission.”

The Financial Engineer ranking’s components are mean GMAT scores (30 percent), mean starting salary and bonus (25 percent), mean undergraduate GPA (15 percent), acceptance rate (15 percent), full-time graduates employed at graduation (10 percent) and full-time graduates employed three months after graduation (5 percent).

Fordham’s program has a heavy emphasis on real-world experience. Each course contains group project based on a real-world problem in which publicly available big data sets are used. In addition, the program benefits from industry’s help in crafting the curriculum.

“In fact, the program was launched in the fall of 2012 with a big event we did with IBM on business analytics because this was all emerging quickly and we … went ahead and seized the opportunity,” Raghupathi said.