Walton College Ranks 24th in U.S. News for Third Year

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. –For the third year in a row, the Sam M. Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas has placed in a tie for 24^th among the nation’s top public undergraduate business schools, according to the U.S. News & World Report 2010 America’s Best Colleges.

In addition, the college’s supply chain management/logistics specialty was ranked in ninth place among the public undergraduate schools offering that specialty, up from 11^th place in the 2009 ranking.

The Walton College moved from 43^rd place to 42^nd place among both public and private undergraduate business schools and, in peer assessment score, from 3.2 to 3.3.

“This positive ranking over time is consistent with the Walton College’s reputation as a leading business school, both in the state and nationally,” said Walton College Dean Dan Worrell. “Since the 2005 rankings, the Walton College has stayed in the top 25 public undergraduate business schools, as well as in the top 45 public and private schools.”

In the U.S. News & World Report 2006 America’s Best Colleges, the Walton College moved to 24^th place. In the 2007 ranking, the Walton College came in at 25^th place and returned to 24^th place in both the 2008 and 2009 rankings.

“We attribute this ranking to the efforts of many people,” added Worrell. “Our faculty, students, staff, academic colleagues, university administrators, alumni, donor, employers and board members have all played a significant role in the Walton College’s continuing success.

“These sustained high rankings help us recruit and retain top faculty — an area where there is tremendous competition among leading business schools. This national recognition also helps us attract talented students as well as increase the value of their degrees. A favorable ranking opens doors for our students because employers frequently use rankings to decide where they will recruit new employees.”

The U.S. News rankings are determined through a survey, which each year asks business school deans and senior faculty to rate the approximately 457 U.S. public and private undergraduate business programs accredited by the AACSB International – the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business.

The Walton College supply chain management/logistics specialty was ranked in 15^th place among both public and private undergraduate business schools offering this specialty, as it was in 2009. In the Southeastern Conference, only the University of Tennessee is ranked higher in supply chain management/logistics.

Tom Jensen, Wal-Mart Lecturer in Retailing and chair of the Walton College department of marketing and logistics, said, “It is a great honor and recognition for our faculty who have developed the supply chain programs and taught the students and to our students who have performed in the classroom and on the job. Our academic programs have grown in both quantity and quality over the past few years. We are especially pleased that the public universities ranked in the top 10, for example, Michigan State University, Ohio State University and University of Tennessee, have recruited our doctoral students to be faculty and teach supply chain management/logistics at their institutions.”

The Supply Chain Management Research Center is housed in the Walton College. The center connects faculty and students with the transportation and logistics organizations in some of the nation’s largest corporations. Its board of directors comprises key logistics executives from 29 national and international companies. This support enables the college to greatly enhance the quality of its undergraduate and graduate programs in transportation and logistics.

The Walton College is tied for 24^th place among public undergraduate schools along with the business schools of the University of Pittsburgh, University of South Carolina and Virginia Tech University. The college also tied for 42^rd place among all public and private business colleges with private Boston University and Tulane University.

In the Southeastern Conference, the Walton College trails only the University of Florida and the University of Georgia.

The top five public business schools in this year’s U.S. News ranking included University of California at Berkeley, University of Michigan, University of North Carolina, University of Texas and University of Virginia.

The Walton College received $50 million from the Walton Family Charitable Support Foundation in 1998. Since that time, the college has created new graduate and undergraduate programs, established multiple centers, greatly enhanced its technology and built a new state-of-the-art graduate school building. The 77,000-square-foot Willard J. Walker Hall, constructed with a lead gift of $8 million from the Willard and Pat Walker Charitable Foundation, opened in 2007. The college has also added research facilities in the J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. Center for Academic Excellence.