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The battle between two of the largest graduate school testing giants has been heating up recently as more business schools warm to the idea of providing students with an alternative to the Graduate Management Admissions Test (GMAT). Now another top-ranked business school is weighing in. The University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School (Wharton Full-Time MBA Profile) plans to allow MBA applicants to submit the Graduate Record Exam (GRE), for admission in the fall of 2010, says Admissions Director J.J. Cutler. It's part of a move by the school to attract a broader applicant pool, including dual-degree students, younger applicants, and international applicants from far-flung countries without GMAT access.
"We are trying to open up a little bit the different types of people that we want to apply to business school and we don't want to create additional hurdles for them to do so," Cutler says.
More B-Schools Embrace the GRE
Wharton is following closely on the heels of Harvard Business School (Harvard Full-Time MBA Profile), which made waves this spring when it announced that it would allow applicants to submit the GRE for admissions. The institutions are joining the ranks of a small but rapidly growing number of business schools that are embracing the GRE, a standardized exam that students use to apply to a wide variety of graduate schools. The movement comes at a time when younger applicants�fresh out of college or just a year or two after graduation�are showing an increased interest in business school. For these applicants, many of whom have already taken the GRE, business schools that accept the test allow them to transition into an MBA program without studying for and taking another exam.
There are now more than 250 MBA programs that allow students, some on a case-by-case basis, to submit GRE scores with their applications, including most recently the University of Virginia's Darden School of Business (Darden Full-Time MBA Profile), Queen's School of Business (Queen's Full-Time MBA Profile) and Tulane's Freeman School of Business (Tulane Full-Time MBA Profile). While most of the schools say they still prefer most applicants to use the GMAT, they say the GRE is becoming a valuable tool in attracting sought-after and unconventional business school candidates who might not otherwise apply.
"The GMAT is a very successful standard for business schools, but that is certainly not the only standard," says Bill Sandefer, director of graduate admissions at Tulane's Freeman School. This type of attitude represents a seismic shift in business school admissions. For decades, the GMAT test, given by the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), has been the undisputed king of the management education world. The exam has been used since 1954 by business school admissions officers to evaluate candidates on their math, verbal, and critical-thinking skills.Opening the Door to Competition
Up until recently, the GMAT exam had a virtual monopoly over business school standardized exams. That all changed on Jan. 1, 2006, when GMAC cut its ties with the Educational Testing Service (ETS), with whom it had a decades-long partnership to develop and deliver the GMAT exam, moving instead to a new testing administrator, Pearson VUE. The severing of ties meant that ETS no longer had to abide by a non-compete clause with GMAC, giving it the green light to court business school admissions officers and promote the GRE as an alternative exam. Under the previous agreement between ETS and GMAC, this type of activity was forbidden.
"Once they ended the contract with us, we were able to move into this market," says David Payne, head of the GRE program for ETS.
To capitalize on the opportunity, ETS has been aggressively marketing the GRE to B-school admissions officers in recent months, placing advertising campaigns in key business publications, paying visits to business schools admissions teams, and developing new testing tools that it hopes will convince more schools to use the GRE, says Payne. ETS has also been promoting the exam as a more affordable option for students; it costs $150 to take the GRE, versus $250 for the GMAT.
Top Schools Sign Up for GRE
ETS made headway several years ago when the Stanford Graduate School of Business (Stanford Full-Time MBA Profile) and MIT's Sloan School of Management (MIT Sloan Full-Time MBA Profile) announced they'd allow students to submit the GRE instead of the GMAT. The testing group's most significant coup to date was convincing Harvard Business School this spring to accept the exam for its MBA, as well its 2+2 Program, which accepts students straight out of college on the condition that they get two years of work experience before enrolling. Payne hopes that will have a ripple effect in the business school community.
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