Columbia Business School
Columbia Business School (CBS) is part of Columbia University’s campus in the Manhattan borough of New York City. More specifically, the CBS campus can be found in the Manhattanville neighborhood, just North of its prior location in Morningside Heights. CBS provides a full-time, two-year MBA program that gives students the option of enrolling in either August or January, as well as an Executive MBA Program. Columbia MBA students enjoy the school’s location in New York City, one of the U.S.’s primary financial centers. They also receive especially strong training in finance, based in part on such customized, practical programs as the rigorous Value Investing Program for second-year students.
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FAQ
What is the tuition for Columbia's MBA program?
The tuition for Columbia’s MBA program is $84,496 per year. The total cost of the Columbia MBA program is $127,058 per year; this includes budgeted living expenses.
How hard is it to get into Columbia’s MBA program?
The acceptance rate for Columbia is just over 22%. It is important to consider the acceptance rate in the context of the student profile of those who are admitted. For example, the average GMAT score is 732.
What is the average GMAT score for admission to Columbia’s MBA program?
The average GMAT score for the incoming class at Columbia is 732. The range of GMAT scores is 600 to 780.
Does the Columbia MBA program accept the GRE?
Yes. The Columbia MBA program has accepted the GRE for a few years now.
What is the average GRE score for admission to Columbia’s MBA program?
The average GRE score in both the Verbal and Quant sections for the incoming class at Columbia is 162.
What is the minimum number of years of work experience required for admission to Columbia’s MBA program?
Columbia’s minimum number of years of work experience is at least 1 year of work experience.
What is the average number of years of work experience for admission to Columbia’s MBA program? (or, What is the average age of a Columbia student?)
The average number of years of work experience among students in Columbia’s MBA program is 5.
What is the median starting salary for graduates of the Columbia MBA program?
The median starting salary for Columbia MBA graduates is $175,000. The salary will vary by industry, with consulting and finance jobs generally commanding the higher salaries.
How long is Columbia’s full-time MBA program?
Columbia offers a traditional two-year MBA program. They also offer a 15-month option, that begins in January, known as J-Term.
What are the application deadlines for Columbia's MBA program?
Columbia's Round 1 deadline is September 10, 2024. The Round 2 deadline is January 7, 2025. The Round 3 deadline is April 1, 2025. The J-Term deadlines are June 18, 2024, and September 5, 2024.
What percent of Columbia MBA students are women?
The percentage of the class at Columbia that are women is 44%.
What type of interview does Columbia use for MBA admissions?
Columbia offers interviews by invitation. The interviews are resume-based. This means the interviewer has not had access to the application materials.
Admissions
The Class Profile
972 students joined the CBS MBA Class of 2026, with 734 starting in August and 238 starting in January. 2024 entrants reported on average a GMAT score of 732. Those who took the GRE landed an average score of 162 in both the Verbal and Quant sections. During their undergraduate years, the latest CBS class averaged an undergraduate GPA of 3.6. Students also averaged five years of prior work experience. Women make up 44% of the Class of 2026, and 44% of students identify as U.S. minorities. Forty-six percent of students are international citizens.
Those with professional backgrounds in financial services constitute 30% of the class, making financial services the most represented industry, while 25% of the Class of 2026 was previously in the consulting industry. Thirteen percent came from tech and 10% from media/marketing. As undergraduates, 30% of the class majored in business, while 18% pursued degrees in economics and 16% studied engineering.
Application Procedures
Beginning with the 2023-2024 admissions season, CBS moved from rolling admissions to the more traditional rounds of deadlines. Prospective CBS students can apply during one of three admissions rounds in early September, January, and April for August entry. J-Term deadlines land in June and September.
August term applicants targeting consideration for merit fellowships should apply by January. Applicants must have a bachelor’s degree or equivalent and submit transcripts from each academic institution attended, and GPAs should be reported in whichever scale is used on candidates’ transcripts. Applicants must also submit their GMAT, GRE, or EA scores, essays, a letter of recommendation, a résumé, a CBS application form and an application fee of $250. International applicants are not required to submit English proficiency test scores; English ability is assessed through the verbal GMAT and GRE test scores as well as the interview.
Interviews are only available by invitation from CBS and can be issued at any time following the Admissions Office’s receipt of materials. Interviews are usually conducted near an applicant’s location by an alumnus or offered via phone with a current MBA student.
Application Checklist
- GPA
- GMAT/GRE/Executive Assessment score(s)
- Transcripts
- Résumé
- Essays
- Recommendation
- Application Fee
- Interview
Essay Topic Analysis
Recommendation Questions
Columbia Q&A's
Columbia LiveWire and DecisionWire
Academics
Faculty
CBS employs about 150 full-time faculty members to teach students across six academic divisions and 26 special programs, centers and institutes. Columbia’s Executives in Residence features retired industry leaders elected to one-year teaching terms at CBS. Adjunct professors also lead a selection of classes each year.
Curriculum
Columbia Business School’s MBA program exposes students to a versatile range of lecture-, case- and project-based learning and offers students a high level of flexibility. Admitted students are divided into clusters of 65 to 70 people that take most of their core classes together in their first year. Each cluster is further sectioned into learning teams of about five students, who tackle many core course assignments as a group.
Classes at CBS follow a semester system, with three semesters—Spring, Summer and Fall—in each academic year. Towards the end of a weeklong orientation period in August, first-year students matriculating in the fall begin their first core course, called “LEAD: People, Teams, Organizations.” Academic Jump Start (LEAD, Accounting, Stats) for first-term MBAs is then offered after Orientation. Fall Semester courses begin after Labor Day and run through early December. There is then another orientation in early January for students who choose the “J-Term” option that allows them to enter the MBA program in Spring Semester. Spring courses begin for all MBA students in late January and last until mid-May. During Summer Semester, which runs from late May to early August, students who entered in the fall complete internships while J-Term students take classes. All students then complete the following Fall and Spring Semesters together, with commencement taking place in mid-May.
CBS’s full-term courses span a semester and are worth three credits apiece, while half-term courses are correspondingly worth 1.5 credits each. The full-time MBA program requires students to earn 60 credits in order to graduate, a condition students generally fulfill by undertaking 15 credits each semester.
The school’s schedule is structured so that students complete their core curriculum across their first two semesters, with the exception of Operations Management, which is taken in the first semester of the second year. Prior to the start of each semester, CBS offers exemption exams that allow students who pass to trade their core courses for electives. All students are given four slots for full-term electives beginning in their second semester. Besides Operations Management, the second year of the MBA consists entirely of electives.
While students do not have the option of selecting a major at CBS, MBA students can choose to focus their elective studies in one of 17 predetermined areas, called pathways, such as Climate, Economic Analysis, and Private Equity. One notable example of the school’s numerous special programs is the Master Classes, which are industry-focused electives that give second-year students firsthand experience in evaluating real-world problems alongside industry leaders. Students can also study abroad through Global Study Tours, Global Immersions, or CBS’s Chazen MBA Exchange Program, which gives second-year students the chance to spend a semester studying at one of 19 international partner programs or the Haas School of Business in California.
Other MBA Degree Options
Aside from the full-time MBA program, CBS offers an Executive MBA Program in New York, and an EMBA-Global Americas and Europe program with London Business School. Full-time MBA students may also pursue one of 11 dual-degree tracks, including the three- or four-year JD/MBA program through CBS and Columbia Law School.
Academic Divisions
Accounting
Decision, Risk, and Operations
Economics
Finance
Management
Marketing
Degree Offerings at Columbia
Full-time MBA Program
https://academics.business.columbia.edu/mba
Executive MBA Programs
New York, Americas, Europe
https://academics.business.columbia.edu/emba
Dual Degrees
Architecture, Dental and Oral Surgery, Engineering and Applied Science, International and Public Affairs, Journalism, Law, Nursing, Physicians and Surgeons, Public Health, Social Work, Teachers College
https://academics.gsb.columbia.edu/mba/academics/dual-degrees
Campus Life
Clubs, Conferences & Competitions
More than 80 student organizations contribute to CBS’s engaged extracurricular community. CBS builds “Club Time” into students’ schedules to facilitate deeper involvement with these social, professional and affinity- and service-oriented student groups. Student clubs organize events and projects ranging from happy hours and galas to the Harlem Tutorial Program. CBS students are also afforded opportunities for involvement in student government through organizations such as the Bernstein Leadership and Ethics Board, and Student Government Executive Board. In addition, MBA students spearhead many of CBS’s conferences. Some examples include the Private Equity & Venture Capital Conference, the Social Enterprise Conference, the Black Business Students Association Annual Conference, and the Columbia Women in Business Conference.
CBS provides students with further avenues to practically hone their business skills through competitions. For example, the Columbia Entrepreneurs Organization runs “Pitch Nights” that test the entrepreneurial creativity and viability of students’ business plans. Other competitions open to CBS students include international and regional competitions such as the American Bankruptcy Institute Corporate Restructuring Competition.
Campus Spaces
In January 2022, Columbia Business School officially and fully moved to its new Manhattanville campus, which had been under construction since 2008 and began to open in the spring of 2017. At 492,000 square feet, the two new buildings, Henry R. Kavis Hall and David Geffen Hall, combined are more than double the size of the school’s previous facilities at Uris Hall. The buildings feature technologically-advanced classrooms, multifunctional spaces, lounges, dining facilities, and study rooms. The campus offers bolstered connections between the school and the broader Columbia community, and a central public green space of 40,000 square feet. Columbia offers limited University-owned apartments, and CBS reports that many students choose to independently find off-campus housing.
MBA Careers
Career Services
The CBS Career Management Center equips MBA students with many resources to secure employment after business school. Students can undertake one-on-one advising sessions or attend workshops, clinics, seminars and panels organized by the center. Furthermore, the Columbia Career Network connects students with alumni mentors with shared interests and hosts both on- and off-campus events to engage alumni with current CBS students. Representatives of corporations are also brought to campus to give presentations on their firms, take part in panel discussions and recruit CBS students for post-MBA roles. Corporation representatives may also host virtual events. On-campus interviews for full-time positions begin in September, while those for summer internships begin in January.
Career Statistics
Three months after graduation in 2023, 84% of the 678 Columbia MBA students seeking employment reported receiving a job offer and 81% accepted a job offer, a figure that does not include the percentage of students starting a new business or returning to their previous employers. The median starting salary reported for graduates was $175,000. 36.3% of the class joined the consulting industry and another 35.7% joined financial services. Technology took in 10.8% of graduates while roughly 3% each pursued real estate or consumer goods.
Eighty-six percent of the Class of 2023 seeking employment stayed in the U.S. Five percent headed to Europe and four percent settled in Asia.
Financing
Tuition for the 2023-2024 academic year totals $84,496. The cost of the year, however, is placed at $127,058 for first-years to account for additional costs such as other mandatory fees, healthcare, books and supplies, room and board, and personal expenses. CBS also notes that students could encounter additional costs due to study tours and optional activity fees.
Domestic students can determine eligibility for Federal Direct Unsubsidized Loans and Federal Graduate PLUS Loans by filling out the FAFSA form. The school offers resources for non-U.S. citizens, including private loan options that do not require a U.S. cosigner for international applicants. Accepted students are automatically considered for fellowships—only first-years entering in August are eligible for need-based fellowships that year—and a separate application is required for students seeking need- or merit-based scholarships.
Program Tuition 2023 – 2024
Tuition $84,496
Mandatory fees $5,633
Health insurance $4,541
Books and supplies $320
Food and housing $24,822
Personal expenses $6,246
Computer $1,000
Total first-year budget $127,058
Recent News
Contact
Mailing Address:
Columbia University
Admissions Office
Geffen Hall Room 216
645 W 130th St
New York, NY 10027
Phone: 1-212-854-5553
Email: [email protected]
Web: https://home.gsb.columbia.edu/
Twitter: @ColumbiaMBA