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University of Southern California
Marshall School of Business
Getting In
PROGRAM BASICS
USC Marshall School of Business
University Park Campus
Bridge Hall 101 MC-0804
Los Angeles
,
California 90089
Private Institution
Web site
Program e-mail address:
Program telephone number:
(213) 740-8885
AACSB accredited:
Yes
Year in which the undergraduate business program was founded:
1920
Length of entire institution:
Four Year
Business program length:
Four Year
Degrees offered:
Degree/Program Name:
BS Business Administration
PROGRAM COSTS
Annual Tuition (Resident):
$ 37,096
Annual Tuition (Non-Resident)
$ 37,096
Cost per academic credit (resident)
$ 1,249
Cost per academic credit (non-resident)
$ 1,249
Required fees
$ 598
Books:
$ 796
Room and board:
$ 11,298
ENROLLMENT
Full-time undergraduate business student enrollment:
3,509
Part-time undergraduate business student enrollment:
0
Distance undergraduate business student enrollment:
0
Total College enrollment for 2008-09:
33,500
ADMISSIONS
Interviews for entire college:
Recommended
Additional application requirements for entire college:
International Freshman whose native language is not English must take the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or the SAT or the ACT. International Transfers whose native language is not English who have completed specified college coursework are exempt from submitting a TOEFL score; other international transfers whose native language is not English must take the TOEFL. All transfer students must complete a supplemental application if they are applying to the business school.
Upcoming application deadlines for entire college:
Semester: Fall
Deadline: 12-01-2008
Freshmen admitted into business program:
Yes
Percentage of business students admitted as freshmen:
74 %
Are the freshman admits to the business program required to complete pre-business courses before beginning upper-lever courses in the junior year?
No
Freshmen admitted by:
Indicate interest on university application
Minimum requirements for business program:
Entrance exam requirement other than SAT/ACT for business program:
No
Interview to enter business program:
Recommended
Additional application requirements for freshman admits:
N/A
Additional requirements for internal transfers:
N/A
Total number of full-time applications for entire college:
44,208
International applicants, entire college, 2008-09:
8 %
Female applicants, entire college, 2008-09:
54 %
Selectivity--applicants admitted to undergraduate business program, 2008-09:
22 %
Yield -- applicants enrolled in undergraduate business program, 2008-09:
35 %
Relative Importance of Application Elements:
Secondary School Record:
Very Important
Class Rank:
Considered
Talent/Ability:
Important
Interview:
Considered
Extracurricular Activities:
Important
Volunteer Work:
Considered
Character/Personal Abilities:
Considered
Application Essay:
Very Important
Work Experience:
Considered
SAT/ACT Scores:
Very Important
Recommendations:
Very Important
High School GPA:
Very Important
Admissions program managed by:
The university admissions office
Total undergraduate business program applicants, 2008-09:
5,547
Applicants enrolled in undergrad business program 2008-2009:
42 %
Applicants admitted to undergraduate business program, 2008-09:
20 %
CLASS PROFILE
Class Profile:
Female: 41
%
International : 8
%
Entering students by age:
Mean: 18
Median: 18
Citizenship of Entering Students
U.S.: 89
%
Canada: 3
%
Other countries: 8
%
Unknown: 0
%
Percentage of US citizens in entering class who are:
African American: 5
%
Asian American: 31
%
Hispanic or Latino American: 9
%
Multiethnic/Multiracial : 11
%
Native American: 0
%
White (Non-Hispanic): 44
%
Chose not to report: 0
%
Other: 0
%
Entering students from the following region:
Northeast: 5
%
Mid-Atlantic: 2
%
South: 3
%
Southwest: 9
%
Midwest : 8
%
West: 73
%
Possessions and territories: 0
%
SAT Scores for full-time entering business students on 1600 scale:
Mean: 1391
Median: 1400
SAT middle 50% range on 1600 scale:
From:
1,320
To:
1,470
Mean: N/A Median: N/A
From: N/A To: N/A
Percent of Students Who Were In:
HS GPA of 3.75 or higher
91 %
HS GPA of 3.5 to 3.74:
6 %
FINANCIAL AID
Financial aid handled by:
Central financial aid office at the university
Scholarships awarded to students in the business program based on:
A combination of need and merit
Scholarship consideration process:
As part of the admissions application
Other scholarship considerations:
N/A
School offers guaranteed loans:
No
Financial aid web site
Academics & Lifestyle
PROGRAM BASICS
Business students who graduate within four years:
80 %
Business students who graduate within 6 years:
88 %
Freshman retention rate:
97 %
PROGRAM REQUIREMENTS
Credit hours required for graduation:
Degree: BSBA
Hours: 128
Other degree requirements:
N/A
ACADEMICS
Average class size in required business courses:
43
Average class size in business electives:
37
Average class size in non-business electives required for admission to business program:
31
Class size:
Classes with fewer than 20 students: 23
%
Classes with 21 to 50 students: 56
%
Classes with more than 50 students: 21
%
Required business courses that reached maximum enrollment by the first day of class, previous academic year:
41 %
Required business courses that had waiting lists, 2007-08:
0 %
CURRICULUM
Number of elective courses available in business program:
108
Electives added current year:
Entertainment Marketing
Rhetoric of Investing & Valuation
The Business of Interactive Digital Media
Learning About International Commerce
The Business of Sports Employment Law
Year of the last major change to the business program's core curriculum:
2004
Leading areas of study:
Accounting
Entrepreneurship
Finance
Marketing
Organizational Behavior
Special programs for business students:
Experiential programs in Asia, Europe and South America include overseas travel for 80% of freshmen class as well as upperclassmen. Global internships, joint degree and honors programs, alumni mentoring program, and career development workshops are also offered.
Business program offers work study or co-op opportunities:
Yes
Many Marshall students have work study jobs as part of their financial aid package. Students are employed throughout Marshall and other USC offices.
Business program offers study abroad opportunities:
Yes
Study abroad program description:
Study abroad programs are available at Marshall for an entire semester to one of the top 16 business schools in 13 countries. Students can also participate in week long visits to Asia and global summer internships.
Volunteer work and community service opportunities:
Yes
Volunteer opportunities description:
Marshall Community Service Day (volunteer program). In some courses students receive school credit while providing consulting services to nearby businesses. All Marshall student organizations perform one community service project per semester. The Society & Business Lab (SBL) manages undergraduate consulting teams which include: Marshall Consulting Program, Alpha Kappa Psi business fraternity, Los Angeles Community Net Impact (LACI) and Trojan Consulting Group.
Business clubs and extracurricular activities:
35 student organizations
A student government
Experiential fieldtrips
Externships
Mentoring Programs
Career Conferences
Case Competitions
FACULTY
Faculty:
Full-time faculty : 131
Adjuncts and visiting faculty: 33
Permanent/tenured professors: 31
Percentage of permanent/tenured professors who are women: 13
Percentage of permanent/tenured professors who are underrepresented
minorities: 0
Prominent faculty:
Warren Bennis
Lawrence Harris
Edward Lawler III
STUDENT LIFE
Largest on-campus organizations for business students:
USC Entrepreneur Club
Latino Business Student Association
Global Business Leaders
Asian American Business Association
Delta Sigma Pi
Freshmen are required to live on campus:
No
Business students are grouped in learning communities:
Yes
TECHNOLOGY
Wireless network available:
Yes
Technological improvements made in the last three years:
Online Admissions, Registration, Course Management, Faculty Evaluation, Career Advising, Room Reservation and Staff Performance Evaluation Systems. CRM (Salesforce.com). Doubled student email quotas and network storage. Remote disaster recovery site. Campus-wide upgrades to all classrooms (hardware & software). Marshall’s systematic program to develop new technology and pedagogy for the delivery of instruction has included introduction and/or expansion of: mobile wireless computer labs; utilities that support student/faculty access to research and research resources; digital media capture in ELC facilities; advanced blade-servers for research computing; mobile streaming capabilities in classrooms; remote access to all lab software; ‘serious gaming' computer laboratory simulation; behavioral laboratory.
Trading laboratory available:
Yes
Alumni Affairs & Careers
ALUMNI
Total number of undergraduate business program graduates since inception:
48,529
Total living alumni:
45,273
Percent of alumni who gave, 2007-08 academic year:
29 %
Mean alumni gift 2007-08:
$ 2,691
Median alumni gift, 2007-08:
$ 594
Single donation in excess of $10 million in 2007-08?
No
Prominent alumni:
Name: Marc Benioff
Title: Founder & CEO, Salesforce.com
Name: Robert McKnight
Title: Chairman & CEO, Quiksilver
Name: Robert Rodriguez
Title: Principal & CEO, First Pacific Advisors LLC.
CAREER SERVICES
Percent of 2008 graduates who provided employment information:
87 %
Seeking full-time employment in business: 86
%
Not Seeking full-time employment in business: 14
%
Number of companies recruiting undergraduate students on campus in previous academic year:
205
Companies that posted full-time job offers/positions on school job boards, previous academic year:
1,397
Other activities and services provided for business majors:
The Career Advantage Program (CAP) pairs over 300 sophomores, juniors and seniors with over 100 alumni mentors for an academic year. There is also an externship program for sophomores and juniors to job shadow with alumni. Recruiter receptions and business etiquette workshops are held throughout the year. We offer ten experiential trips for students to Asia, Europe and South America. The corporate outreach program includes small student groups traveling to meet with renowned entrepreneurs, investors and senior executives.
Job offer results, 2008 graduates:
Accepted first job offer by graduation: 75
%
Accepted first job offer in three months following graduation: 10
%
Accepted first job offer more than 3 months after graduation: 11
%
Did not report having accepted a job offer: 4
%
Top hiring firms:
Deloitte Touche Tomatsu
PricewaterhouseCoopers
Ernst & Young
KPMG LLP
Merrill Lynch
Wells Fargo
Bank of America Corp.
Target Corp.
Citigroup Inc.
Lehman Bros.
BDO Seidman
Houlihan Lokey Howard & Zukin
Accenture
Fisher Investments
Nestle
Graduate compensation:
Mean base salary: $
51,000
Median base salary: $
53,000
Mean signing bonus: $
5,000
Median signing bonus: $
3,500
Grads accepted jobs in following functional areas:
Consulting: 17
%
Finance/Accounting: 58
%
General Management: 2
%
Human Resources: 1
%
Management Information Systems: 0
%
Marketing/Sales: 18
%
Operations/Production: 4
%
Logistics/Transportation: 0
%
Other: 0
%
Grads accepted jobs in following industries:
Accounting: 25
%
Consumer Products/Retail: 5
%
Consulting Services: 6
%
Financial Services: 25
%
Government/Education: 1
%
Pharma/Biotech/Health: 2
%
Manufacturing: 2
%
Media/Entertainment: 6
%
Petroleum/Energy: 3
%
Real Estate: 4
%
Sports/Leisure: 1
%
Technology/Science: 5
%
Non-Profit: 0
%
Transportation: 1
%
Utilities: 0
%
Other: 14
%
Percentage of job acceptances, US and Canada:
US: 100
%
Canada: 0
%
Grads accepted jobs in the following US regions:
Northeast: 4
%
Mid-Atlantic: 2
%
Midwest: 2
%
South: 0
%
Southwest: 3
%
West: 89
%
US Possessions/Territories: 0
%
Number of companies recruiting interns on-campus, 2007-08 academic year:
249
Internship postings on job boards, previous academic year:
1750
Top internship recruiters, 2007-08:
Merrill Lynch
Citigroup Inc.
Deloitte Touche Tomatsu
PricewaterhouseCoopers
Ernst & Young
KPMG LLP
Morgan Stanley
Walt Disney Co.
Wells Fargo
Goldman Sachs Group
Time Warner Inc.
Universal Studios
Sony Pictures Entertainment
Marcus Millichap
Graduate Comments
The programs that the undergraduate office provides are incredible. It is so easy to go into the office and talk to anyone and develop relationships with the faculty and administration. The programs are also amazing! There is a Career Advantage Mentor program where we get paired up with an alumni as a mentor for a year and the experience I have gained from that such as a tour of Mattel's design studio and a tour of the Boeing aircraft facility. I have personally started two organizations in the Marshall school; they are very willing to help students get their ideas up and rolling. I can’t say enough about Marshall.
Teamwork and collaboration are stressed in every business class and that helps me as a student because I am able to communicate with my peers and we are able to pool our talents and experience together to achieve a common goal. Professors foster a sense of trust and camaraderie within the classroom and this makes us love what we learn and put forth our best efforts in the classes.
Putting the economic crisis aside, Marshall's ability to place students with the best companies after graduation is just pathetic. Marshall takes pride in its alumni network, but how many contacts do they have in consulting professions? Only 25 since 1976. How many of those 25 are employed at top-tier firms? Only 3 (2 are at Deloitte, and 1 is at Bain & Co). What's more outrageous is that more consulting firms recruit from UCLA than here. LEK, Booz-Allen-Hamilton, and Deloitte Consulting all hire UCLA students - who have no business training whatsoever - but refuse to even consider Marshall applicants. I think the Marshall School has overestimated its reputation in the eyes of top consulting firms.
Here's the deal with Marshall: There are a lot of students... about 4,000 business majors. Of those students, 2,500 don't really affect the larger scheme of things, 1,000 are intelligent people who will do well in the business world and make decent contributions to corporations, 300 really take advantage of what Marshall offers and will be difference makers and 200 will be leading companies and paving new entrepreneurial paths. The latter 500 I just mentioned would match up with the top 500 at any business school across the country. USC is no longer a Southern California-centric institution. With the scholarship money the school has used to bring in top students, and the rising quality of faculty and academic offerings, USC has a current mix of students that will make noise in the near future.
The school has a very practical teaching manner yet it does create a very competitive atmosphere, for better or worse. The professors are available for students quite often relative to other schools. It does seem that there are a lot of connections USC has to offer based primarily in the Southern California region of the nation, more so than anywhere else.
The business program is a very tight-knit group. People are close to each other within the program; especially within specific concentrations such as Finance, and Entrepreneurship.
Those who seek advice from professors here will not be disappointed: the teachers make themselves available, and often bend over backwards to ensure your career's success by giving you access, or actually, introducing you personally to their professional contacts. The more you put into the program, the more you get back, and I've gotten so much more than I ever thought I would from Marshall and the outstanding professors.
The one flaw in the business program is the Marshall Curve. Each class has to be curved to end up with a GPA ranging from between a 3.0-3.3 depending on what class it is and the overall performance of the students. Recently, I received a B in a class even though I would have received a much higher grade without the curve. Although I got a 97.5% on my final project, the grades were so high in the class that I still received a B. If the Marshall Curve were to be abolished and students received grades based on the quality of their work and how well they performed on tests as opposed to how the class did as a whole, the Marshall School would be even better. That is my only complaint about the Marshall School, other than that, the program is great.
Marshall immerses students in the Los Angeles business community from day 1. Additionally, Marshall does an outstanding job of exposing students to international business. This past year, Marshall sent 80% of freshmen students abroad during spring break for business-oriented experiences. I went to Shanghai three years ago. The connections you make with prominent individuals while at Marshall mean as much as the classroom learning.
Like many others have mentioned previously, the Marshall network is one of the selling points. Many people seem to have had success meeting with alumni and developing themselves professionally. However, the extent to which the Marshall network is admired and useful may be a bit exaggerated, since many people at Marshall already have connections through personal means to benefits the network aims to provide, such as internships and other employment-related opportunities.
We have a great balance of conceptual and practical teaching methods. We do many case studies, which help us learn real world techniques. We also learn a lot of theory that helps us conceptualize strategies, law, the economy, accounting, management, etc... It is very well rounded, and I literally feel as though I am currently capable (as a graduating senior with 2 business concentrations and an econ. minor) of performing almost any important role in running a business.
The Experiential Learning Center is an amazing resource. We simulate real life business situations and practice handling them. I have grown so much because of it. Also, the diversity of our professors and our small classrooms. Another element of the business school is our concentration classes. These classes are very small and have been the most valuable to me because I can pick the classes that have the most relevance to my future career. In addition, we have a great network; the Trojan Family.
Marshall has great networking opportunities including career panels, Trojan network services and a unique program called "Career Advantage Program", where alumni in various industries mentor a small group of two-four students for a semester and often develop long lasting relationships. In addition, the small classroom environments and enthusiastic teachers allow for great interactive learning opportunities. The majority of our work is completed in groups which allows us to strengthen our communication skills that will be integral to successful careers.
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