The Wharton School is the business school of University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1881 through a donation of Joseph Wharton, making it the world’s first collegiate business school.

In conjunction with the other schools and colleagues of the university, Wharton grants B.S., MBA, offers a Ph.D. program, and holds several diploma programs. With the most electives of any business school[citation needed], Wharton offers concentrations in Accounting, Business and Public Policy, Entrepreneurial Management, Environmental Management, Finance, Health Care Systems, Human Resource and Organizational Management, Insurance and Risk Management, Legal Studies and Business Ethics, Management, Marketing, Multinational Management, Operations and Information Management, Real Estate, Retailing, Statistics and Strategic Management.

Since the 1990s, the popular and financial press has consistently ranked Wharton as one of the world's top institutions for business education. Moreover, it has been ranked the best business school in the world by the Financial Times in every year in which the newspaper has ranked business schools, except for 2005, when it tied with Harvard Business School. Wharton usually receives the highest reputation scores from academics and recruiters.

The school has over 300 faculty members, translating to an 8:1 student-to-faculty ratio. The school claims that its faculty are the world’s most published and most cited among business schools[citation needed]. Research published in the peer-reviewed Academy of Management journal ranked Wharton as top institution in the simultaneous pursuit of scholarly achievements and excellence in teaching. Most recently, the Chronicle of Higher Education rated Wharton's Marketing and Management departments as the first and second in the world for research productivity, respectively.

The admissions process at Wharton is highly selective — it is one of the most competitive business schools in the U.S. A high GPA, high GMAT score, and very strong non-quantitative credentials are typically prerequisites to admission.

The School publishes an influential[citation needed] on-line journal, Knowledge@Wharton, that is "the envy of every other school", and a newly established publishing house Wharton School Publishing. Wharton maintains the world's largest[citation needed] financial, economics, management, marketing, and public policy data warehouses accessible through state-of-the-art web-based data management services, called WRDS.

(From wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Read Wharton Alumni Magazine, Fall 2007 Online

Features:

On the Fast Track
Thomas S. Robertson—Wharton’s 13th dean—moves at the speed of business.

At a university whose founder famously said, “Time is money,” Thomas S. Robertson doesn’t waste a second. Wharton’s new Dean is driven by three impulses: Move, do, and move on.

Robertson follows his frequent brisk runs not with a cold drink, but with a hot jolt of caffeine from a cappuccino. On the golf course, he plays like every hole is downhill, zooming over the fairways until he runs up on a foursome who regard golf as a leisurely game. When he tours a museum, he views and absorbs so quickly his companions are left two or three rooms behind.

“I have a high need for variety seeking,” said Robertson, who became Wharton’s 13th Dean on August 1. “I get bored easily. I like to make decisions, and I like to move quickly.” Robertson is starting a second career at Penn. He ended his first 23-year career as a professor and administrator at Wharton when he left in 1994 to serve as a professor and later deputy dean at London Business School.

Robertson returned to the U.S. in 1998 to become dean of Emory University’s Goizueta Business School. During his seven-year tenure, he was credited with building Goizueta into one of the strongest schools at Emory and positioning it as a leading international business school. Prior to his return to Penn, Robertson was executive faculty director of the Institute for Developing Nations at Emory. ...

Asking the Big Questions
Undergraduate scholars tackle heavy-duty finance problems.

On & Off Ramps
Taking a detour from a high-powered career—and finding the road back.

Download Wharton Alumni Magazine, Fall 2007

PDF format, 7MB, 44Pages.

New Senior Leadership Announced

Michael R. Gibbons, I.W. Burnham II Professor of Investment Banking and Professor of Finance, has been named deputy dean, where he will serve as the School’s chief academic and program officer. Gibbons has been a Wharton faculty member since 1989, and has served as chairperson of the Finance Department from 1994-2006. He has also played a key role in many other School initiatives, including serving as a member of two strategic planning committees.

Gibbons, who earned his PhD at the University of Chicago, has also taught at Stanford University and the University of Chicago.

Georgette Chapman Phillips has been named vice dean and director of the Wharton Undergraduate Division. Phillips, the David B. Ford Professor of Real Estate and Professor of Legal Studies and Law; Chairperson, Real Estate Department, has chaired the Real Estate Department since 2003. She has served as a faculty member at Wharton and Penn Law since 1992 and has been honored for her teaching with Undergraduate Division Excellence in Teaching Award in 1994 and the Rapaport Award for Excellence in teaching the Undergraduate Core in 1997.

Phillips earned her JD from Harvard University. Prior to her academic career, she practiced law as an associate with Toll, Ebby Langer & Marvin, Drinker Biddle & Reath, and Willkie Farr & Gallagher.

Thomas J. Colligan has been appointed vice dean of Executive Education, where he will oversee Wharton’s offering of nondegree executive education programs, including open enrollment and custom programs. Since 2004, Colligan has been a managing director of Duke Corporate Education, a for-profit corporation delivering custom executive education, and affiliated with Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.

Colligan recently ended his career with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), where he served on the governing board and management committee and developed the firm’s marketing strategy after the merger of Price Waterhouse with Coopers & Lybrand. As vice chairman of PwC, he developed firm-wide strategies for deepening relationships with PwC’s top 100 clients, representing $1.5 billion in revenue. He also spearheaded the firm’s global audit practice in the technology, telecommunications and entertainment areas, overseeing operations in 100 countries.

Colligan holds a BS in Accounting from Fairleigh Dickinson University (cum laude) and has attended a number of advanced management programs, including those at Harvard and the University of Virginia.

Peter Degnan has been named senior associate dean for Finance and Administration, where he will oversee Wharton’s operating and capital budget, human resources, computing, and facilities. He has extensive experience managing financial and administrative functions, such as finance, operations, information technology, and general administration. He worked as managing director for UBS Warburg Japan and was responsible for the complete integration of the merger between UBS and SBC Warburg operations in Japan. Prior to his work with UBS, Degnan spent 14 years with Lehman Brothers, Inc., where he held several senior executive positions, including chief credit officer and chief financial officer for Lehman operations in New York, Hong Kong, and Tokyo.

He joined Wharton in 2002 as director of MBA Career Management, where he successfully reengineered the MBA recruiting process. In 2004, he was appointed executive director of Executive Education, helping to lead the important expansion of the School’s international client base and custom program offerings.

Degnan holds an MBA from New York University’s Leonard N. Stern School of Business and a BS degree from Georgetown University.

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