Hi,

I'm looking for an AACSB Online MBA. I have a few questions:

- I need to make sure - does the business school wide AACSB apply to all programs, including online? It's not clear to me. Can business schools advertise that they have an AACSB Online MBA even if the accreditation is not specifically for the program?

- I know that all programs are not the same and that more expensive programs are usually better, ie they are ranked higher etc. But there is a big gap in AACSB Online MBA programs - for example the UNC program is more than $100,000 but I have also seen programs that are less than $20,000. Is it really true that you 'pay for what you get' even if it has AACSB?

AACSB accredits entire schools, not individual programmes.

Broadly speaking, yes, you get what you pay for.

Thank you for the quick reply! It's hard for me to really understand the programs in the middle - I understand you are paying for a ranked degree with the UNC program for example but why would I pay say $50,000 for a program if I can just do an AACSB accredited one for $20,000 or less? Maybe I am just misunderstanding the value proposition.

Well, some might pay more for faculty, classmates, alumni or services that better meet their needs.

Some of the US programs ranked in the most recent FT ranking are less than $50,000: Isenberg and WSU Carson for instance.

Don't forget about the distance learning technology and support. The more pricy programs will often feature software / systems that have less friction and have been more robustly tested.

Don't undervalue that: you have a limited amount of time for your studies, and if you need to spend some of that troubleshooting connections or wondering why you can't connect to a message board, this is likely to be frustrating. You can often ask the schools for a walk through or an overview of the technology they use.

Does anybody have any experience with the following schools?

East Carolina University
Ball State University
Louisiana State University (Shreveport)

These schools are highly regional and probably don't recruit *that* many people, especially on internationally-oriented message boards like this.

In general since these are AACSB accredited you'll be assured of getting a quality education. But in terms of networking opportunities and network building, career services, and all the other bells and whistles involved in larger online MBAs, you probably won't see much.

Thanks for your reply mba hipster. I am mostly interested in having an MBA from an accredited school and I am on a budget. These are the schools I found that had tuitions that were reasonable plus they have AACSB accreditation. It's good to hear that I would get a quality education. I don't really need networking opportunities or career services.

You should really try illinois imba

Great suggestion. The Illinois program is a great value, and will probably have a better network than those other, smaller schools.

[quote]You should really try illinois imba
[/quote]
Ok!