Overview

• The latest Wall Street Journal rankings place Babson College second nationally for a second straight year, with Stanford first, Harvard fifth, MIT eleventh, and Bentley twelfth.
• The methodology, developed with College Pulse and Statista, centers on outcomes such as salary boost, time to pay off net price, graduation rates, student-reported learning environment, and diversity.
• Babson’s entrepreneurship-first model features a yearlong freshman course that provides teams up to $3,000 to launch businesses, with seniors required to pitch a venture in a capstone.
• Babson officials cite career results to match the rankings’ focus, reporting 97.7% of graduates employed or in graduate school within six months and average starting pay above $77,500.
• The school’s showing caps a rapid rise from No. 126 in 2022 to the top 10 in 2024 and now a second consecutive year at No. 2, drawing fresh attention to outcome-driven rankings.