Washington State University Reviews of MBA Programs

"I dropped this program because I wasn't satisfied with the classes. The quality of the teachers is subpar. Also the faculty (financial aid department/bulsars office) seem totally incompetent. They tried to charge me a massive amount of money for my classes despite withdrawing during the refund period. I wouldn't waste money on this program."

"The WSU online MBA program is a very slow program that is not academically rigorous/challenging. The Online MBA program did not prepare me for a financial career and has not opened many doors. The program is set up and mandates that students may only take one course at a time. Unfortunately there is no way to speed up the program/your graduation as courses are offered on a rolling cycle, meaning that many courses are not offered for months/years. Washington State University does not require the GMAT for admittance, but they do require foundational/core courses which can be transferred in (from your Bachelor's program), however if you did not take or pass a foundational course during your undergrad, you are required to take the equivalent foundational course before you can start the MBA program. This is a hidden cost/time waster which was not clearly explained during the admissions process. This can add a semester or even a full year to the program (not to mention additional costs). One trick which would never be explained to you, is that you can take multiple courses at the same time if and only if one of the courses is a foundational course. Courses are 7 weeks long (semesters are 14 weeks), only a single MBA course is offered during each 7 week cycle, as the University has Professors teach multiple different courses throughout the program (as a cost savings initiative), meaning you can take two MBA courses per semester (one at a time) and if you miss a course, you will need to take it when it is next offered (2 years later), but if you have foundational courses that are required on top of the MBA program, you can often take a foundational course and an MBA course simultaneously. Some MBA courses have prerequisites requiring the completion of the foundational course prior to admission into the MBA course, but many MBA courses have no prerequisites, so if there are two courses offered at one (foundational and MBA), you can take both. WSU Academic Advisors are always changing and you will likely have multiple different advisors throughout the program, so definitely double check their work. An academic advisor will creat your "most efficient graduation course schedule", however they do not know which electives you will be taking and or when those electives will be offered, so you will need to plan our your own schedule, taking into account what discipline you'd like to take your electives in/when those courses will next be offered. You may need to take an elective as one of your first courses in the program, even though your "most efficient graduation course schedule " has electives listed during year two of the program. As for academic rigor, most of the program courses utilize Pearson's eLearning portal, where students need to pay for access (for 7 weeks), into the Pearson's course portal in order to access the course textbook and assignments. Person's generates quizzes and homework assignments automatically and most professors do not dare to alter the Pearson's assignments. For the vast majority of courses in the MBA program, you will not need to attend (zoom) an instructors lesson (Professor/Assistant Professor), as nearly all assignments are based solely off of the Pearson's learning material (unaltered). A few Professors alter the assignments a bit, and one Professor (as of 2022), completely creates their own course and requires students to take online Proctored exams (you must record your test taking and your only scratch paper is a white dry erase board, that you must show your work on and erase completely after taking the exam), but for the most part, courses are very cookie cutter. Most courses consist of 7 weekly discussion posts and a final exam. Some courses add a group project to the final exam or in lieu of the final exam. A few courses have weekly homework assignments/quizzes in addition or in lieu of other assignments, but in general the work load is no more than 5 hours per week. Many (all) of the finance courses/accounting courses that utilize Excel, give students the Excel formulas for each assignment and all the students needs to do is to alter the data input to match the current question. If you're looking for very high level introductions into subjects, this program is for you. If you want to become a Master of these subjects, this program is not the program, as the courses barely scratch the surface of any subject it touches. Final Summation- Courses are offered one at a time - You may have gaps/half semester/entire semesters where not a single course that you need is offered. Courses are generally very easy/very high level. The program will likely take 2.5 - 3 years minimum. Most courses are run by the TA/Assistant Professor. Most course work answers are given to students by the Professor before any exam/major assignment. Most course work answers come directly from the text book/online answer bank."

"The WSU MBA program is only a year long and is a cohort so you get to work closely with your peers and get to know your professors. The program also requires a study abroad portion to give an opportunity to network with international companies."

"Washington State University provides top-notch education and resources for those pursuing a MBA. It is highly competitive in terms of acceptance and the program is intense. The faculty and advisors are very helpful and truly have your best interest at heart. The only con is the application process. The advisors are great but they want a lot of information and their standards are extremely high."

"I'm in the On-line MBA program and WSU has put together an awesome learning experience. For the most part classes are interactive with lots of support from the faculty and plenty of opportunities to network. The on-line facilities, such as the library, are second to none. Can't say enough good about the experience so far!"