The MBA experience isn't much different for women than it is for men; international students have lower assessment of quality as compared to their U.S. counterparts; and many top students in MBA programs are beginning to question the value-added of the MBA degree.

These are some of the findings of a recent study that looked at the relationship of student gender and satisfaction with MBA programs and examined the assessment of MBA programs by international students.

As part of the Student Satisfaction Project, sponsored by AACSB and Educational Benchmarking, Inc., institutions with full- or part-time MBA programs were invited to participate in a survey designed to capture the many elements that might be associated with students' overall satisfaction with these programs.

Full-time and part-time students in participating schools responded on a 1-7 scale for each of 120 questions. The survey results are from the spring 1996 study. The 1997 data currently are being analyzed and will be featured in a future issue of Newsline. Some 3,300 graduating full-time MBA students, and over 2,350 part-time MBA students took part in this survey.

For both the full- and part-time surveys, a series of factor analyses were conducted to capture the elements of student satisfaction. Overall satisfaction, too, is an important indicator. Overall student satisfaction, then, is a combination of the following questions:

• To what extent did your MBA experience fulfill your expectations?
• When you compare the total expense to the quality of education, how do you rate the value of the investment you made in your MBA program?
• How inclined are you to recommend your MBA program to a close friend?

The full-time and part-time surveys also included a number of additional items that might influence student satisfaction. Among these were GPA(grade-point-average) in the MBA program, years of work experience and GMAT scores. Other questions related to the workload in required and elective MBA courses.

As might be expected, there are any number of relationships among these questions that could be described. For example:

"As we reviewed the results of the full- and part-time surveys, there were three areas that we thought would be particularly interesting to university administrators who have responsibility for various aspects of MBA programs, full- or part-time," said Joe Pica, managing director of EBI. "One of these is an examination of differences in MBA student satisfaction as a function of gender. Another addresses a potentially troubling situation as regards international students. Finally, we note what has been referred to as the 'tyranny of the GMAT.' We suspect that the latter will cause considerable consternation among those whose responsibilities include the selection of MBA students," said Pica.

Women comprise 33.8 percent of the student body in full-time MBA programs, 37.9 percent for part-time programs in this study. "Much has been said about the potential differences in the MBA experience for women," said Pica. "Much also has been said about differences in entry profiles (e.g., GMATs, work experience). Yet the information from the full- and part-time MBA surveys suggests that there is little substance to such concerns," he said. "It is true that women, on average, have lower entry GMATs. Interestingly, however, for both full- and part-time MBA programs, women have more work experience, not less. Also, average GPAs for both women and men in MBA programs are virtually identical."

The assessments of MBA program satisfaction are very similar, as well (see Table 1). Notably, women in both full- and part-time MBA programs actually find the student environment to be better, not worse, than their male counterparts. On other indicators, women and men in full- and part-time MBA programs do not report different levels of satisfaction. The one exception is that women in part-time MBA programs do express slightly less overall satisfaction with the overall program.

International students comprise 24.1 percent of students in full-time MBA programs in this study. "Many schools overtly seek to increase their percentage of international students in an effort to provide an environment more facilitative of internalization/globalization in their programs and curriculum," said Pica. "At a pragmatic level, international students are nonresident, out-of-state students who, in public institutions, normally pay higher tuition.

"It would appear that contemporary schools of business might have a sobering problem with regard to the assessments of MBA programs provided to these international students," he said. As noted in Table 2, international students have lower assessment of overall MBA quality as compared to their U. S. counterparts. "Beyond that, their assessments of the quality of faculty and instruction for required and elective courses; placement and career services; students organizations and extracurricular activities; academic quality, teamwork and camaraderie of classmates; and access, responsiveness and leadership of the dean also are lower," said Pica. "These patterns are very similar to those observed for part-time international MBA students as well, a group that comprises 9.78 percent of part-time MBA students in the study."

International students come to MBA programs with special needs based on coming from a different cultural background and usually less proficiency with the English language. "American MBA programs tend to say, 'Here's the program and here are the requirements. Good luck and we hope you adjust to the way we do things,'" said Pica. "Very little — nothing at most places — is done effectively to help international students with the transition, with their language skills, or to make them feel like they are desired," he said. "Classmates get frustrated with them because of their difficulty with the language and very few schools take advantage of the diversity that these students bring to enhance the learning experience for domestic and international students. I am not at all surprised that they are not as happy with the MBA experience and I think this points to a serious shortcoming that programs need to address," said Pica.

"It is fair to say that GMATs have had a major influence on the selection criteria of many, probably most, graduate schools of business," said Pica. "More-over, it probably is fair to say that most institutions would prefer higher average GMATs for their matriculating students than lower. Also, many schools would tout their average GMAT for matriculating students as a surrogate for entering class quality, i.e., 'We are pleased that our average GMATs have increased over the last five years,' or 'Our GMATs are up 7.5 percent from last year.'"

These results of the full- and part-time MBA surveys indicate a trend across many satisfaction dimensions that MBA directors may find disquieting, said Pica. "In many instances the relationship between GMAT scores and elements of MBA satisfaction are nonlinear; they are, in fact, the shape of an inverted 'U.' This suggests that students with both relatively low GMATs and those with relatively high GMATs are less satisfied with many aspects of the MBA program," he said. It is those students with more mid-range GMAT scores who seem to be more satisfied with the MBA program.

However, this tendency only is apparent for full-time MBA students. "We see no evidence of such relationships for part-time programs," said Pica. "Importantly, however, while there is no evidence of a nonlinear relationship, there are many examples of students with the highest average GMAT scores being the least satisfied with part-time MBA programs. This is true for overall satisfaction with the program; quality of faculty and instruction for required and elective MBA courses; access, responsiveness and leadership of the dean; students organizations and extracurricular activities; and, academic quality, teamwork and camaraderie of classmates. Apparently, at least by standards of the GMAT, the 'better' students in part-time programs are by far the severest critics."

Results from the full-time MBA programs may be even more sobering. As noted, many of the satisfaction relationships are nonlinear. In such cases, both the low average GMAT students and high average GMAT students are less satisfied. Overall student satisfaction with the MBA program has that character. Assessment of placement and career services; the quality of faculty and instruction for required and elective MBA courses; access, responsiveness and leadership of the dean; quality of computing facilities; and, student organizations and extracurricular activities indicate this trend, as well.

"One could only speculate on the dynamics of these results," said Pica. "Could it be that the lower GMAT students are struggling? Could it be that the students with the highest GMATs arrive with equally high expectations? Are many institutions not providing a challenge to these students such that they come to question the value-added of their experience in the MBA program?"

"This business of the 'tyranny of the GMAT' is well-named and awkward," said Dan Dalton, business dean at Indiana University. "We all know that Business Week relies in large part on student assessments for its biennial rankings of MBA programs. It's a bit sobering if we believe that the better students, or at least those with very high GMAT scores, may be among the group who may be inclined to be the least satisfied with our programs and curricula," he said. "Clearly, we must all find a way, perhaps through special programs, honors-like curricula options and similar vehicles to challenge and provide a high level of value-added for these students. Curiously, undergraduate curricula have had this character for many, many years. Should we be thinking about equivalent forms for MBA programs?"

While some of the survey results are provocative, their interpretation should be tempered with a bit of caution. "Clearly, these results refer to average attitudes across several thousand full- and part-time students in many universities," said Pica. "Accordingly, a given school could have a very different performance profile. Most schools would find that a far more useful approach would include an individual assessment. Even better would be an assessment that could be compared to other schools with which it regularly competes. A more narrow comparison, for example, of private schools with similar private schools would likely be more informative," he said. A similar comparison of comparable schools in more or less contiguous states might be informative, as well. "Minimally, some schools may want to compare their own experience against the averages noted here to be certain that they, too, do not currently have some of the troubling trends," said Pica.

Future "Newsline" articles will address student satisfaction in Undergraduate Programs as well as faculty satisfaction with many elements of Undergraduate and MBA education.

Educational Benchmarking, Inc. (EBI), in partnership with AACSB, develops and makes available benchmarking reports applicable to management education.