Many b-schools produce well-rounded grads — encouraging students to forage well beyond their majors. Cornell, set amid the bucolic splendor of 4,000 wooded acres in Ithaca, N.Y., takes academic exploration a big leap further. In addition to the variety they encounter outside the business program, students get a second dose inside, where they're required, strangely enough, to take a full year of biology—thanks to the program's affiliation with Cornell's agriculture school—as well as five electives ranging from consumer behavior to emerging markets. They're also encouraged to look beyond the program for business-related courses, studying human relations in the School of Industrial & Labor Relations, or leadership in the Johnson Graduate School of Management, home of Cornell's MBA.

That's one reason Cornell, graduating a little over 200 business students annually, jumped four spots this year. "If you are a quant person who never wants to do marketing, this isn't the school for you," says Cindy van Es, a statistics professor.
At schools with both an undergrad and MBA program, the younger students sometimes get the short end of the resources stick. Not at Cornell, where the two programs have separate faculties and facilities. There is one drawback, though. While upper-level courses may have as few as a dozen students, packed lecture halls of as many as 600 are common for introductory courses, which are shared with many nonbusiness students. Still, Program Director Ed W. McLaughlin says professors are recruited with the understanding that teaching undergraduates is a top priority. Chrissie Eckhart, a senior starting at HSBC in the fall, says one finance professor in a lecture class with 300 students knew everyone by name: "Professors really care about students."

Attracted by top-quality candidates, recruiters are more than willing to make the trek to Ithaca. The top 10 recruiters for business majors include eight big New York investment banks, among them Lehman Brothers, Morgan Stanley, and Merrill Lynch.

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\But for Cornell students with a hankering for power suits and city living, the upstate location takes some getting used to. Senior Jerald Chau, a Hawaii native and soon-to-be business analyst at Fannie Mae, calls Cornell's location "the boondocks," but says he has adapted. "Instead of surfing," he says, "I snowboard."

Villanova (No. 12)
In the sunlit atrium of Bartley Hall, home to Villanova's business school, students are bound to bump into at least one professor who knows their name. Downstairs in the "Exchange," servers decked out in dollar-bill ties dish out sandwiches with names like "the Naz Stack," while a stock ticker runs overhead. There, undergrads work on group projects, check e-mail on school-provided laptops, or plot investment strategies for use around the corner on the Applied Finance Lab's mock trading floor.

It's this personal attention, up-to-date technology, and emphasis on real-world learning that earned Villanova the No. 12 spot this year. That the school managed to leap seven spots in one year is a testament to a major improvement in student satisfaction. "People are happy," says Denis Connell, a senior accounting major. "You can't escape it."

When James M. Danko arrived as dean in 2005, he wanted the business school to join the ranks of nationally recognized programs. He spent his first 100 days as dean meeting individually with faculty to sort out their needs. One of his first big moves was to lose the dowdy "College of Commerce & Finance" name, and in its place came the sleeker-sounding Villanova School of Business. "I'm concerned about Villanova's long-term brand," Danko says.

Among Danko's ideas for keeping Villanova on the cutting edge are plans for a new innovation center, which will be largely funded by alumni. He also commissioned a new undergraduate center in Bartley Hall, where B-schoolers will be able to get help for everything from a death in the family to advice on where to get the best haircut. The new facility opens in September.

The changes go well beyond the cosmetic. A revised curriculum this fall will include more advanced calculus to meet the growing needs of high-caliber students, and, next year, freshmen will begin taking new introductory courses, including business communication. Faculty are learning how to use financial technology tools in the classroom and have been visiting such companies as Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, and Johnson & Johnson to pick the brains of executives generally.

And under Danko's leadership, previously overlooked fields such as marketing are finally getting their share of attention. Says Michael Radice, a senior marketing major: "They are bringing in people who are hiring all across the board."

Prospective students are taking notice of the improvements. Last year applications were up 35%, with a similar increase likely for this year. "The basketball team is hot," says Danko. "Well, so is the business school."

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