ROI Is More Important Than Rankings for Business Students: Report
Credit: Education Images / Universal Images Group / Getty Images- ROI is on the rise as a priority for prospective business students when searching for a school, according to a new GMAC report.
- Rankings are declining as a factor for business students.
- Gen Z students are particularly focused on career outcomes and salaries.
- While rankings are on the decline, students still said the quality of their education is their top priority.
Business students are increasingly focused on return on investment (ROI) rather than rankings when searching for a school, according to a new report.
The Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) found in its 2025 Prospective Students Survey that ROI is rising in importance while program rankings are diminishing significantly.
ROI, including skills and opportunities, was selected by 42% of prospective students as one of the top three factors they researched in potential graduate programs as of the 2024 survey. That’s up from 38% in 2023.
Career outcomes also saw a year-over-year uptick, rising from 37% to 39%.
Rankings, on the other hand, saw a dramatic year-over-year decrease in student interest. While 37% of students said they weighed school rankings in 2023, just 29% said the same in 2024.
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Those findings reflect what younger students are looking for: 67% of the 4,912 respondents to the GMAC survey were Gen Z (born from 1996-2012).
GMAC CEO Joy Jones said in the report that business schools need to focus on outcomes in reaching students.
“How business schools position their value to candidates is even more critical as prospective students zero in on the ROI of their graduate management education (GME),” Jones said in the report.
“From how programs integrate artificial intelligence or social impact into the classroom to how business schools help students finance their degrees, prospective students are considering a range of criteria on their path to GME.”
Other program aspects that saw a year-over-year decline included program curriculum, the cost of a program, and alumni networks.
“The decline in students who report rankings among their most important factors when they research GME has occurred across demographic groups and geographies,” the report reads.
“Men and women both experienced statistically significant dips in concern about program rankings and increasing interest in research about ROI from 2023 to 2024.”
The report notes that Gen Z students tend to be more focused on career outcomes, including jobs and salaries, than millennials. Roughly 41% of Gen Z students surveyed reported that career outcomes were a priority compared with 34% of millennials (born from 1981-1995).
The decline of rankings as a factor in students’ school search doesn’t mean students are ignoring educational quality, the report notes:
“While program rankings may be decreasing in importance when business school candidates are researching GME, candidates also tell us that the overall quality and reputation of a business school — inclusive of rankings as well as faculty and accreditation — is still the number one factor when ultimately making a decision to apply to a particular program,” the report reads.
The move away from rankings means that candidates are “defining quality beyond the ranking publications,” according to the report.
Students outside of the U.S. tend to focus on QS and the Financial Times when they do weigh rankings, while U.S. News & World Report, Forbes, and The Wall Street Journal were the main rankings publications weighed by U.S. students.