U.S. MBA Programs with the Most International Students

US MBA programs are seeing a strong rebound in international student enrollment after declines during the Trump administration and COVID-19. Discover which schools lead the recovery.

U.S. MBA Programs With The Most International Students

Business schools in the United States saw a collapse in international enrollment during the Trump presidency, for two main reasons: The U.S. government actively discouraged foreign investment in U.S. universities, and starting in March 2020, the introduction of Covid-19. These two reasons combined spelled wide-ranging disaster for the economic well-being of B-schools, which have long been highly dependent on the revenue they receive from full-freight-paying international students.

The good news for U.S. schools — from the elites on down — is starkly evident in the MBA Class of 2023 data. In short, the rebound after the Trump years is pronounced, almost startlingly so. At every single business school in the top 25 (and many more outside it), the number of foreign students is up compared to 2020, and at most of them, it’s up significantly. With the exception of three schools, the number of foreign students is up compared to fall 2019, when the last classes before the onset of Covid-19 enrolled.

Columbia Business School — one of the few B-schools to buck the 2020 headwinds and maintain a normal rate of international MBA students — is the leading B-school in 2021 as well: 48% of the current class are from outside the U.S. or hold dual citizenship. That’s up from 44% last year and surpasses its previous record of 47% from 2019. Columbia was followed by Stanford Graduate School of Business (47%) and Duke Fuqua School of Business. Overall, nine of 27 schools and five of the top 10 have 40% or more international students, compared to just one school — Columbia — in 2020. Twenty-two of 27 schools reach 30% or more, up from just nine schools, while only one school — No. 27 Georgia Tech Scheller — is below 20%. In 2020, five schools held that dubious distinction.

2021: SWEET RELIEF FOR TOP B-SCHOOLS

In 2020, three years of anti-immigrant rhetoric from the U.S. government had already taken a serious toll on MBA programs’ ability to attract international MBA candidates — though Donald Trump wasn’t the only impediment in the talent pipeline between overseas and the U.S. But the federal government’s hostility to any form of immigration exacerbated the ever-increasing cost of an MBA, and when the coronavirus pandemic hit in 2020, the bottom fell out.

Government-imposed travel restrictions and difficulties in obtaining student visas depressed already-dwindling international student numbers in a typical MBA class. Forty-one of 49 ranked schools reported losses — and all but eight of those schools saw double-digit percentage losses. Some schools fell right off the cliff in the 2017-2020 period: UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School lost 57.4% of its international students, the University of Texas-Austin McCombs School of Business lost 41.5%, and Trump’s alma mater, Wharton, lost 41.4%. The pain was evenly distributed across regions: In the West, USC Marshall School of Business lost more than 30%, and in the Midwest, the University of Michigan Ross School of Business lost 29%.