Chicago’s Executive MBA program named second in the nation behind Northwestern

The University of Chicago Graduate School of Business (GSB) has been named the second best school for executive MBA’s by BusinessWeek magazine. BusinessWeek’s rankings, published in the magazine’s October 15 issue, evaluated customer satisfaction at Executive MBA (EMBA) programs at 82 schools. Northwestern University’s Kellogg Graduate School of Management came out on top.

Chicago’s GSB and the Kellogg school were the only two to receive all “As” from students in the BusinessWeek survey. The schools were evaluated on the strength of their teaching, curriculum, and support.

The graduate poll made up 50 percent of the schools’ overall score, while the opinions of EMBA directors at the surveyed schools comprised the other percent.

Student respondents cited Chicago’s attention to students’ status as mid-career, family-oriented adults as one of its strengths. In addition, students praised Chicago’s teachers, in-depth courses, and support staff.

Business schools’ expansion of their programs to overseas locations over the past few years has met with mixed reviews. According to graduates of Chicago’s Barcelona EMBA, the Chicago professors flown out to teach them did not address enough foreign business issues.

EMBA programs are typically two-year degrees sought by high-potential senior managers. Often, students’ employers pay the high tuition (for some over $100,000), which provides a valuable source of income to the business schools. Tuition for Chicago’s most recent class was $82,000.

After Northwestern’s Kellogg and Chicago’s GSB, the top five EMBA programs were the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University, and the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina.

The University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business was ranked third last year in BusinessWeek’s ranking of full-time MBA programs.

ELCA head bishop installed in Rockefeller Chapel

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) installed a new bishop Saturday at the University of Chicago’s Rockefeller Chapel.

Bishop Mark Hanson, 54, will assume leadership November 1 of the 5.1 million-member church, which is the fifth largest denomination in the United States.

Hanson will succeed Bishop H. George Anderson as the presiding bishop of the ELCA after acting as bishop of Minnesota’s St. Paul Area Synod. He will have a six-year tenure in his new position.

Hanson plans to address the ELCA’s 25-year rift with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod as well as the issue of homosexuals in the church.

Currently, the ECLA allows celibate homosexual clergy but not same-sex marriage. The church is in the midst of a four-year examination of the issue that will end in 2005.