Choosing the right DL MBA for me

Hello everyone,

I have been visiting these forms for a month or so now, and am hoping that you can provide me with some guidance towards a DL MBA program that meets my needs. A little background on myself… I have a PhD in medical research from a B&M university, and I am presently working as a manager at a pharmaceutical company in Canada. My goals in pursuing an MBA are to build my skills and knowledge as a manager, while at the same time (hopefully!) improving my marketability and my salary.

I have been researching the various programs for a little while now, and my basic criteria are as follows:
1. Quality of the program. I would like an MBA from an accredited school with a well-established history and reputation.
2. Little or no residency requirements. I cannot afford to take much time away from my job, so programs with long or frequent residency requirements are out. Similarly, I cannot afford to take a lot of time off for exams.
3. Cost. I will be paying for this out of my own pocket, so I am limited to approximately $30,000 Canadian, give or take (equals about $23,500 US, or £13,000).

Based on this “wish list”, I initially came up with Warwick, Strathclyde, and Henley. They are all triply accredited (AACSB, AMBA and EQUIS), well-respected schools within my price range. However, I think the residency requirements might be too much; once I start factoring in all the travel costs, it gets to be pretty pricey. Next I came up with UMass-Amherst (AACSB, no residency, within my price range). However, I have not yet written the GMAT, nor do I have any of the “foundation” courses, so that will add to the time and cost. I am still thinking about this…

Which brings me to my next question, which I hope does not sound too idiotic. How important is accreditation vs. name recognition of the school? For example, I say “Henley Management College” to my colleagues, and they say “Huh?” Whereas I say “University of London”, and they all say, “Oh yes, I’ve heard of it!” Which makes me start thinking that I might be better off with the cheaper, zero residency U of L Imperial College MBA, even though it’s only AMBA and not AACSB. I don’t know… I have a friend who has an MBA from a non-accredited school in Europe that I’ve never heard of, and it does not appear to have harmed his career in any way. It seems that people just see the “MBA” on the resume and that’s good enough for them. When I start thinking about it in those terms, I wonder why I don’t just get an MBA from University of Leicester, which is AMBA, zero residency, and roughly HALF the cost of UMass-Amherst. I am really torn about this – any perspective you could give would be greatly appreciated!

Thanking you in advance,

Marjie

 

From your list of criteria, perhaps you should add the Edinburgh Business School MBA to your list. They can be found at www.ebsmba.com. EBS is part of Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland, and they have one of the largest distance-learning MBA programs in the world.

 

I saw this in a thread before and found it interesting.
Try the link and download their "Business & Management & Online MBAs 2004" - a free 100+ page, downloadable guidebook to the best accredited, business distance learning graduate schools operating in the USA today, including 120 online MBA programs.

http://www.geteducated.com/bdlgs_bm.htm

 

Henley, to the best of memory is 23,000 sterling, so it's probably on the expensive side for your requirements. and despite the fact that everybody in Europe has heard of Henley, the transatlantic recognition is zero.

Of those you've mentioned this side of the pond, Warwick is the best, but I have to admit that I think that their choice of electives is dull, dull, dull and their system means that you'll take 3-5 years to complete the programme.

Imperial is one of the best universities in the UK, but the MBA is a University of London external degree, which is a plus or minus depending on who you're talking to.

If you're looking at the top end of UK universities, then you might also want to look at Durham http://www.dur.ac.uk/dubs/ although it may come in over the top end of your budget.

If you can stretch to a few bucks more, you should definitely consider ASU and Indiana.

Angela

 

You can also look at University of North Alabama. They have a Online/DVD MBA with many concentrations.

http://www2.una.edu/business/mba/index.html

Its a state school and the business school is accredited by ACBSP and i heard sometime back they are applying for AACSB.
Tuition=$300/credit

 

A few more in your price range, reported to be of good quality:
U of Nebraska - Lincoln (AACSB): http://dcs.unl.edu/
Cali State - Dominguez Hills (currently in AACSB accreditation process): http://mbaonline.csudh.edu/
Bradford University (AMBA, EQUIS): http://www.brad.ac.uk

 

Universities that I like:

Warwick (which you mentioned) - This is theoretically one of my favourite schools.

UMass - A good choice with a recognizable name

Texas A&M University - AACSB and within your budget. Good name recognition and no one in Canada knows the difference between the Commerce campus and whatever other campus is considered "better". No GMAT if you have over a 2.75 GPA, and since you have a PhD I'm guessing you're good on this.

University of Southern Queensland - No AACSB but a school that I like a lot. Good value for the money in my opinion (only about $11,000 Canadian + books).

Imperial College - Whenever I mentioned that I was studying the UoL LLB to people they were really impressed by the London name. Even when I'm sure they've never really heard anything actually about University of London, they just think it must be good. Definite plus.

Morehead State has AACSB and is not costly (US $13-$14k).

I agree with the post that California State DH is an interesting choice, same thing with North Alabama. (Edit: Cal State DH and UNA will both require you to do foundation type programs).

 

An interesting question on accreditation vs name recogition.....

It's more on how other people precive these. But I always wonder how many people really care about the accreditation, nor would they look for what accreditation the school has, or even the meaning behind the accreditation.

Name recognition is more a common issue since it's likely a problem if the employer has no idea on what the school is. It's pretty embrassing when they are asking what school it is, or telling you that no idea about it.

Afterall one's capability rules. That is a reflection on how well you got from your learning.

Interesting, IC DL MBA programme has some classmates from the health sector... medical doctors, business people in pharm industry/hosiptal, research pathologist, imaging scientist....

I would be happy to anwser queries about my study.