Stanford Graduate School of Business

The Stanford MBA Program welcomed 398 new students to campus this academic year. As you may have noticed, the only real constant in Stanford MBA class profiles from year to year is that almost every statistic changes, and the Class of 2014 was no exception. There are many reasons for these fluctuations. With our small class size, even two students can, and do, shift a percentage here or there. But the most relevant factor is that our candidate pool is ever-changing.

These fluctuations also speak to our admission process: we don’t admit categories; we admit individuals. There are no quotas or targets in the admission process, and each applicant is evaluated entirely on his or her own merits. This is why we consider a class profile illustrative, rather than informative. In truth, there is no metric that can measure character.

Since we admit person by person, rather than group by group, we never know a priori what a class profile will reflect. Though the admission criteria remain constant, there were minor shifts in the Class of 2014 profile, including:

• The representation of international students increased to an all-time high of 42%, comprising 53 non-U.S. countries.
• U.S. minority representation reverted from last year's 20-year high of 27% to a more typical level of 20%. All types of diversity matter at Stanford. Our outreach efforts will continue to foster students whose unique perspectives will enhance our learning community.
• The breadth of undergraduate study continues to dazzle us. This year, a few more engineers and humanities majors joined the MBA program, with a handful fewer students who studied business.
• The industry mix changed slightly, but the absolute number both of schools, (especially non-U.S. institutions), and of organizations represented, reached an all-time high. Two-thirds of our new students are the sole person to come directly from that organization.
• Work experience in the class increased slightly to 4.2 years from 4.0 years. This is a peak for the last decade.

What are we really looking for? Read about admission criteria.

» More Class Profiles