Exceptional Career Outcomes Boost Darden to No. 1 Ranking in US News

Powered by its leading results in career outcomes and salaries for graduates, the University of Virginia Darden School of Business shares a position as the No. 1 public business school in America, according to new rankings from U.S. News & World Report released today.

It’s the first time Darden has climbed to the top position among public schools in the U.S. News rankings, up from No. 2 a year ago and No. 3 the prior year. Overall, Darden is ranked No. 11 among all U.S. schools.

“It’s an honor for the entire Darden community to be the best public business school and to see years of hard work recognized by U.S. News among our peer schools,” Dean Scott Beardsley said. “It is especially gratifying to have such positive results in categories that reflect the incredible talent of our students and the value of the education that they receive here, leading to their success in finding excellent jobs after the program and building rewarding careers.”

Darden was recognized among several key individual U.S. News categories. Highlights include:

• Tied for No. 1 among publics, with the University of California, Berkeley,
• 1 for “employed at graduation” rate for students of any school,
• 1 for “employed three months after graduation” among Top 15 schools,
• 1 public school for “average starting salary and bonus,” and
• Ranked No. 11 overall, including public and private institutions.

In a time when career placement success at business schools across the country is under pressure, Darden’s industry-best results continue to demonstrate the value of Darden’s tight-knit community, student-centered classrooms, its commitment to the case-method and the continued success its Career Services unit and efforts.

In the key categories, Darden returned a two-year average of 86.8% of full-time MBA graduates employed at graduation. That topped all U.S. schools, public and private.

Darden also topped all public schools with its average starting salary and bonus total of $198,059. And Darden earned the highest ranking among its competitive peer schools for the two-year average of full-time graduates who were employed three months after graduation (92.4%).

U.S. News also creates specialty rankings from its survey of business school deans, in which deans are asked to name up to 15 top schools in each category. Darden earned a No. 5 specialty ranking for MBA for Management.

Overall, the new U.S. News rankings continue Darden’s momentum from recent years.

Darden came out on top for the second year in a row in The Princeton Review’s Best Business Schools 2024 edition of all graduate MBA schools, based on the strength of multiple Top 10 ranking categories and overall composite methodologies.

In the 2024 academic year, Darden was ranked the No. 1 public business school in the world by Financial Times, the No. 1 public business school in the U.S. across all rankings by Poets & Quants, and No. 3 business school overall in the U.S. by Bloomberg Businessweek.