Can anybody give me some advice on which one of these MBA programs is the best? I am looking primarily at budget when making my decision:

+ Rochester Institute of Technology (Saunders)
+ California State University (Fullerton)
+ Bentley University
+ San Diego State University
+ Baylor (Hankamer)
+ Iowa State University

Also open to others as well so suggestions welcome. Thanks!

It depends. This is such a broad range of school that it's almost impossible to say which one is the best.

In general I would think that Iowa State and Baylor would have marginally better salaries than the other ones; and they probably also have the more competitive cohorts (the average GMAT at Baylor is 630ish compared to SDSU's 612.)

But it should ultimately depend on your career goals: Baylor has decent placements in pharma or biotech, Iowa State places well in manufacturing firms. Ask the schools directly for placement reports or scour LinkedIn for info about where graduates end up.

Do you have any idea about these schools, in terms of which is better for the technology consulting industry? Or others with low tuition fees. :)

I am not sure that any one is better than the others for tech consulting. I would start with schools that are strong with placements in consulting, and then see if those schools offer more tech-oriented curriculum.

Something like Carnegie Mellon - Tepper would be ideal, quite honestly.

Other, lower tier schools that may seem more affordable, which you might look at include ASU Carey and Georgia Terry.

I think that Carnegie Mellon might be a little too expensive but the others may be doable. I will look into them more closely. Thanks for the advice.

Can anybody give me some advice on which one of these MBA programs is the best? I am looking primarily at budget when making my decision:

+ Rochester Institute of Technology (Saunders)
+ California State University (Fullerton)
+ Bentley University
+ San Diego State University
+ Baylor (Hankamer)
+ Iowa State University

Also open to others as well so suggestions welcome. Thanks!

It depends, what are your goals?

Would you be applying as an international student who wants to work in the US after graduating? If so you'd probably be much better off if you saved up a bit more and went for a ranked MBA program instead.

My goals are to work in either operations management or supply chain management in a company in California. Yes, I am applying as an international student. Do you know of any ranked MBA programs in California that have lower tuitions fees?

Take a look at Shortcut to find the best US MBA www.find-mba.com/board/36065

Honestly, there are no low-cost, high-quality programmes in California. You get what you pay for.

For international students, there are really no "bargain" MBA programs in California. Even UC Irvine, the lowest-ranked CA school on the Businessweek, is only marginally less costly than even Haas.

But the thing is that you have to look at the return on investment too: look at the average post-graduation salaries for these schools, and you can see that the ranked MBA programs do end up paying for themselves, time after time.

Most of the data is on the Businessweek rankings.

Is San Diego State University a good alternative to these ranked MBA programs?

I don't think it's in the same league.

It looks like the average salaries post-graduation are around $60k on average, versus $85k at Merage and $103k at Marshall.

Just do the math: investing more to get a ranked program will most likely pay off in the long run.

I see. It sounds like it's going to be hard to find a quality MBA program that's also a value. I guess I may have to get some more funds together. Thanks for your help.

I don't think it's in the same league.

It looks like the average salaries post-graduation are around $60k on average, versus $85k at Merage and $103k at Marshall.

Just do the math: investing more to get a ranked program will most likely pay off in the long run.

I looked on LinkedIn, and found 7,544 SDSU alumni with MBA degrees. Eight of them work at EY. That is not enough to increase the average salary by much.

Read: How to use LinkedIn to find the best school www.find-mba.com/board/33571

Yes, I'm not sure that SDSU is considered a feeder school into EY. In any case I would assume that the school's Master of Science in Accountancy program funnels more students into the Big Four.

And even so, not all EY jobs pay excellently. If you wanted a high paying EY job you'd probably be better off looking at the MBA programs from NYU, Wharton, even Kellogg.

I don't necessarily want to work at EY but just find this whole thing interesting. The school's profile on BusinessWeek says that 5 grads out of 39 went to EY (not sure what year they base their data on), which I had assumed would make the average salary increase somewhat... But I suppose you're right, not all EY jobs pay $100k+.