10 B-Schools Where Full-Time Students Have the Highest GMAT Scores

The U.S. News Short List, separate from our overall rankings, is a regular series that magnifies individual data points in hopes of providing students and parents a way to find which undergraduate or graduate programs excel or have room to grow in specific areas. Be sure to explore The Short List: College and The Short List: Grad School to find data that matters to you in your college or grad school search.

The Graduate Management Admission Test has drastically changed in the last year, and not just in terms of format. There has also been a significant change in the demographics of test-takers.

In 2012 a record number of women took the GMAT, according to the Graduate Management Admission Council. Women accounted for 43 percent of test-takers worldwide, an increase of almost 2 percent from 2011.

[Remember five tips for taking the revised GMAT.]

Business schools with the highest GMAT average for full-time students are also seeing new trends in their data, primarily based on applicants who took the test before the June 2012 revision that added an integrated reasoning section.

Columbia University is now one of the top 10 b-schools with the highest GMAT average for full-time students. Incoming fall 2012 MBA candidates averaged a score of 715. GMAT scores range from 200 to 800.

Northwestern University, which placed 10th on the highest GMAT average list for fall 2010, fell to the 11th spot. Incoming full-time students at the Kellogg School of Management averaged a score of 714 in 2010, but the average has since dropped to 708.

Clark Atlanta University students have the lowest average for fall 2012 with a score of 400, while students at Stanford University averaged 729, the highest reported score.

[Overcome a weak business school application.]

A total of 140 ranked b-schools provided GMAT data about their students to U.S. News. Unranked schools, which did not meet certain criteria required by U.S. News to be numerically ranked, were not considered for this report.

Below are the 10 business schools with the highest average GMAT scores for incoming full-time students in fall 2012.

Don't see your school in the top 10? Access the U.S. News Business School Compass to find additional GMAT data, complete rankings and much more.

U.S. News surveyed 448 schools for our 2012 survey of business programs. Schools self-reported a myriad of data regarding their academic programs and the makeup of their student body, among other areas, making U.S. News's data the most accurate and detailed collection of college facts and figures of its kind. While U.S. News uses much of this survey data to rank schools for our annual Best Business Schools rankings, the data can also be useful when examined on a smaller scale. U.S. News will now produce lists of data, separate from the overall rankings, meant to provide students and parents a means to find which schools excel, or have room to grow, in specific areas that are important to them. While the data comes from the schools themselves, these lists are not related to, and have no influence over, U.S. News's rankings of Best Colleges or Best Graduate Schools. The GMAT data above are correct as of April 9, 2013.