The Wharton School ( ) is the

business school A business school is a higher education institution or professional school that teaches courses leading to degrees in business administration or management. A business school may also be referred to as school of management, management school, s ...

of the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...

, a private

Ivy League The Ivy League is an American collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference of eight Private university, private Research university, research universities in the Northeastern United States. It participates in the National Collegia ...

research university in

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

. Established in 1881 through a donation from Joseph Wharton, a co-founder of

Bethlehem Steel The Bethlehem Steel Corporation was an American steelmaking company headquartered in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Until its closure in 2003, it was one of the world's largest steel-producing and shipbuilding companies. At the height of its success ...

, the Wharton School is the world's oldest collegiate business school. It is one of six Ivy League Business Schools, and is the business school which has produced the highest number of billionaires in America and the 45th and 47th U.S. president

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...

. The Wharton School awards undergraduate and graduate degrees with a school-specific

economics Economics () is a behavioral science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interac ...

major Major most commonly refers to: * Major (rank), a military rank * Academic major, an academic discipline to which an undergraduate student formally commits * People named Major, including given names, surnames, nicknames * Major and minor in musi ...

and concentrations in over 18 disciplines in Wharton's academic departments. The undergraduate degree is a general business degree focused on core business skills. At the graduate level, the

Master of Business Administration A Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a professional degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration; elective courses may allow further study in a particular ...

program can be pursued by itself or along with dual studies leading to a joint degree from its law, engineering, and government schools. In addition to its tracks in accounting, finance, operations, statistics, and other academic departments, the doctoral and post-doctoral programs co-sponsor several diploma programs in conjunction with other schools within the university.

History

Founding

Joseph Wharton, a native

n, was a leader in industrial

metallurgy Metallurgy is a domain of materials science and engineering that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their inter-metallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are known as alloys. Metallurgy encompasses both the ...

who built his fortune through the American Nickel Company and Bethlehem Steel Corporation. As Wharton's business grew, he recognized that business knowledge in the United States was only taught through an apprenticeship system, and such a system was not viable for creating a wider economy during the

Second Industrial Revolution The Second Industrial Revolution, also known as the Technological Revolution, was a phase of rapid Discovery (observation), scientific discovery, standardisation, mass production and industrialisation from the late 19th century into the early ...

. After two years of planning, Wharton in 1881 founded the Wharton School of Finance and Economy through a $100,000 initial pledge, making it the first business school established in the United States.

ESCP Europe ESCP Business School (; ) is a French business school and ''grande école'' founded in Paris and based across Europe with campuses in Paris, Berlin, London, Madrid, Turin, and Warsaw. Established in 1819, it is considered the world's oldest busi ...

, established in 1819, and a few other business schools were established in Europe prior to Wharton's founding The school was meant to train future leaders to conduct corporations and public organizations in a rapidly evolving industrial era. Wharton was quoted as saying that the school was meant to "instill a sense of the coming strife n business life of the immense swings upward or downward that await the competent or the incompetent soldier in this modern strife." From the founding of the school, he defined that its goal was "to provide for young men special means of training and of correct instruction in the knowledge and in the arts of modern Finance and Economy, both public and private, in order that, being well informed and free from delusions upon these important subjects, they may either serve the community skillfully as well as faithfully in offices of trust, or, remaining in private life, may prudently manage their own affairs and aid in maintaining sound financial morality: in short, to establish means for imparting a liberal education in all matters concerning Finance and Economy." The school was renamed the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce, in 1902, and formally changed its name to simply Wharton School in 1972.

Development

Early on, the Wharton School faculty was tightly connected to an influential group of businessmen, bankers, and lawyers that made up the larger Philadelphia School of Political Economy. The faculty incorporated social sciences into the Wharton curriculum, as the field of business was still under development. Albert S. Bolles, a lawyer, served as Wharton's first professor, and the school's Industrial Research Unit was established in 1921. Wharton professor

Simon Kuznets Simon Smith Kuznets ( ; rus, Семён Абра́мович Кузне́ц, p=sʲɪˈmʲɵn ɐˈbraməvʲɪtɕ kʊzʲˈnʲets; April 30, 1901 – July 8, 1985) was a Russian-born American economist and statistician who received the 1971 Nobe ...

, who later won the Nobel Prize in Economics, created statistical data on national output, prices, investment, and capital stock and measured seasonability, cycles, and secular trends of these phenomena. His work laid out what became the standard procedure for measuring the

gross national product The gross national income (GNI), previously known as gross national product (GNP), is the total amount of factor incomes earned by the residents of a country. It is equal to gross domestic product (GDP), plus factor incomes received from n ...

and the

gross domestic product Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the total market value of all the final goods and services produced and rendered in a specific time period by a country or countries. GDP is often used to measure the economic performanc ...

, and he later led an international effort to establish the same statistical information for all national economies. Professor

Lawrence Klein Lawrence Robert Klein (September 14, 1920 – October 20, 2013) was an American economist. For his work in creating computer models to forecast economic trends in the field of econometrics in the Department of Economics at the University of Penn ...

, who also won the Nobel Prize in Economics, developed the first econometric model of the U.S. economy, which combined economic theory with mathematics, providing another way to test theories and predict future economic trends. Wharton professor George W. Taylor is credited with founding the academic field of study known as

industrial relations Industrial relations or employment relations is the multidisciplinary academic field that studies the employment relationship; that is, the complex interrelations between employers and employees, labor union, labor/trade unions, employer organ ...

.Shils, "George W. Taylor: Industrial Peacemaker", ''Monthly Labor Review,'' December 1995. He served in several capacities in the federal government, most notably as a

mediator Mediation is a structured, voluntary process for resolving disputes, facilitated by a neutral third party known as the mediator. It is a structured, interactive process where an independent third party, the mediator, assists disputing parties ...

and arbitrator. During his career, Taylor settled more than 2,000 strikes."George W. Taylor Dies at 71", ''The New York Times,'' December 17, 1972. In 1967, he helped draft the

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

State

civil service The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil service personnel hired rather than elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leadership. A civil service offic ...

law that legalized

collective bargaining Collective bargaining is a process of negotiation between employers and a group of employees aimed at agreements to regulate working salaries, working conditions, benefits, and other aspects of workers' compensation and labour rights, rights for ...

in the state but that also banned strikes by public employees—legislation widely known today as the

Taylor Law The Public Employees Fair Employment Act, more commonly known as the Taylor Law, is Article 14 of the state Civil Service Law (of the Consolidated Laws of New York, Consolidated Laws), which defines the rights and limitations of labor union, uni ...

.Donovan, ''Administering the Taylor Law: Public Employee Relations in New York,'' 1990. Wharton professor Wroe Alderson (1898–1964) is widely recognized as the most important marketing theorist of the twentieth centuryJones, D.G.B. and Shaw, E.H., (2003) ''A History of Marketing Thought, in the Handbook of Marketing'', ed. Wertz, B. and Wensley, R. and the "father of modern marketing." Wharton professor Paul Green is considered to be the "father of conjoint analysis" for his discovery of the statistical tool for quantification of market research. Wharton professor Solomon S. Huebner is known widely as "the father of insurance education." He originated the concept of "human life value," which became a standard method of calculating insurance value and need. He established the goal of professionalism in the field of insurance, developed the first collegiate-level program in insurance and chaired the Department of Insurance at Wharton, and contributed greatly to the progress of adult education in this area. Wharton professor Daniel M. McGill was widely regarded as the "dean of the pension industry," whose research contributed to shaping the modern retirement system both in the public and corporate sectors. In 1946, after

ENIAC ENIAC (; Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer) was the first Computer programming, programmable, Electronics, electronic, general-purpose digital computer, completed in 1945. Other computers had some of these features, but ENIAC was ...

was created at the University of Pennsylvania, Wharton created the first multidisciplinary programs in

technology management Technology management refers to the integrated planning, design, optimization, operation and control of technological products, processes and services, in order to manage of the use of technology for human advantage. It contains a number of manag ...

with the School of Engineering and Applied Science. Wharton faculty began to work closely with

AT&T AT&T Inc., an abbreviation for its predecessor's former name, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the w ...

Merrill Lynch Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated, doing business as Merrill, and previously branded Merrill Lynch, is an American investment management and wealth management division of Bank of America. Along with BofA Securities, the investm ...

, MasterCard, Prudential Insurance, and the

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District, Manhattan, Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is the List of stock exchanges, largest stock excha ...

in analyzing the strategic and commercial implications of information systems. The Wharton School's first business professor was an attorney, Albert Bolles. At the time, there were no other business schools, and no business professors could be recruited elsewhere. Bolles, a lawyer by education and training, and business journalist by career seemed to be the best option for Joseph Wharton. Bolles started his career as a lawyer in Connecticut in the second half of the 19th century. After resigning from his law firm, he started pursuing a new career in business journalism and was promoted to the editor role of ''Bankers Magazine'', a trade publication, in 1880. Upon joining the Wharton School, he began teaching business with classes on the law of governing finance and on the processes of commercial banking. Bolles' instruction in finance was influenced by his previous experience in ''Bankers Magazine'': he stressed conservative business practices, drawing on business history as much as he could. In his classes, inflationist Congressmen were "self-interested debtors." Besides teaching, Bolles advocated for several national reforms, including the uniform banking law. Wharton historian Steven A. Sass wrote about him, "Bolles thus fulfilled Joseph Wharton's pedagogic expectations and…got the new school off to a respectable start by the spring of 1883." In 1884, the first five business students were awarded a Bachelor of Finance degree. One graduate, Shiro Shiba, returned to Japan where he would become a member of the

Diet Diet may refer to: Food * Diet (nutrition), the sum of the food consumed by an organism or group * Dieting, the deliberate selection of food to control body weight or nutrient intake ** Diet food, foods that aid in creating a diet for weight loss ...

, the Japanese parliament, and another, Robert Adams Jr., later was named

United States Ambassador to Brazil The following is a list of ambassadors of the United States, or other chiefs of mission, to Brazil. The title given by the United States State Department to this position is currently ''Ambassador Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary''. ...

. Classes in business and finance abounded at the Wharton School, but it lacked in any other areas of business interest. Edmund J. James, with a doctorate from the

University of Halle Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (), also referred to as MLU, is a public research university in the cities of Halle and Wittenberg. It is the largest and oldest university in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. MLU offers German and i ...

in Germany, reinvigorated the school's curriculum, starting classes on political finance and administration. Later in 1885, James argued for redesigning the course of study at Wharton with elements of German higher education. He wanted to include training in banking, railroading, merchandising, manufacturing, and other similar branches, and expand the course's length to four years from the initial three. Joseph Wharton in November 1893 pledged an additional $75,000 to the school in order to implement James' ideas in the school's curriculum. A more comprehensive study plan was then rolled out. Between 1895 and 1915, James started teaching at Wharton the new fields of finance and management as they were developing in the business world. The Wharton School improved its reputation from a bunch of academic "misfits," and some of its alumni rose in the U.S. business world. During this period, the school continued to attract additional faculty members and expand its research programs. Wharton began awarding MBA degrees in 1921. The first woman to earn an MBA at Wharton was Alma K. Ledig, in 1931. In 1942, during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, in the same fashion of other schools, Wharton's full-time faculty dropped dramatically from 165 to 39 by 1944. According to school historians, members of the faculty were called upon for special posts. In 1959, Wharton adopted the curriculum that is now taught in most major business schools: the program was changed with liberal arts education doubling to almost half of the curriculum. In 1974 the social sciences department, along with the rest of the university's liberal arts programs, was moved to the newly created

University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences The University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences (also known as SAS) is the academic institution encompassing the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences at the University of Pennsylvania. Formerly known as the Faculty of Ar ...

. Since then, Wharton faculty have focused exclusively on various aspects of business education. Official historical names of the institution include the Wharton School of Finance and Economy, from 1881 to 1901, and the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce, from 1902 to 1971. The Jay H. Baker Retailing Center at Wharton was permanently endowed by alumnus Jay H. Baker in 2010. It is an interdisciplinary industry research center which was originally established in 2002. The center brings together retail leaders, faculty, and students to discuss the opportunities and challenges of retailers. The Baker Retailing Center also hosts an annual CEO Summit in New York City. On February 26, 2020, Erika H. James was named dean of the Wharton School, effective July 1, 2020. She is both the first woman and the first African-American to lead the business school.

Campus

Philadelphia campus

Huntsman Hall at the University of Pennsylvania

The Philadelphia campus of the Wharton School has four primary buildings, Jon M. Huntsman Hall, Steinberg Hall-Dietrich Hall, Vance Hall, and Lauder-Fischer Hall. In addition, the Steinberg Conference Center houses the Aresty Institute of Executive Education. Jon M. Huntsman Hall is the Wharton School's main building. The building is a 324,000-square-foot structure with 48 seminar and lecture halls, 57 group study rooms, and several auditoriums and conference rooms. It was constructed through a donation from Wharton alumnus Jon M. Huntsman. It also has a 4,000-square-foot forum, as well as a colloquium space on the top floor. Steinberg Hall-Dietrich Hall is a joint 180,000-square-foot structure comprising two adjacent halls. It was built in 1952 and expanded in 1983 through a donation from Wharton alumnus

Saul Steinberg Saul Steinberg (June 15, 1914, Rm. Sărat, Romania – May 12, 1999, New York City) was a Romanian-born American artist, best known for his work for ''The New Yorker'', most notably ''View of the World from 9th Avenue''. He described himself ...

, and houses the offices of several academic departments at the Wharton School. It also contains lecture halls, conference rooms and common areas for faculty and students. Vance Hall is a 107,000-square-foot structure built in 1972 to house Wharton's graduate programs, administrative offices, lecture halls, and meeting areas. Lauder-Fischer Hall houses the Joseph H. Lauder Institute for Management and International Studies, and focuses mainly on international business teaching and research initiatives. The Lauder Institute was founded in 1983 by Wharton alumni

Leonard Lauder Leonard Alan Lauder (March 19, 1933 – June 14, 2025) was an American billionaire, philanthropist, and art collector. Together, he and his brother, Ronald Lauder, were the sole heirs to The Estée Lauder Companies cosmetics fortune, founded by ...

and

Ronald Lauder Ronald Steven Lauder (born February 26, 1944) is an American businessman and pro-Israel political activist. He and his brother, Leonard Lauder, are the sole heirs to the Estée Lauder Companies, Estée Lauder cosmetics company, founded by their ...

. In 2014, the Wharton School launched the Student Life Space in Philadelphia's central business district. It is a 20,000-square-foot space with conference rooms, meeting rooms and over 20 group study rooms. It also serves as an incubator space for startup companies. In 2018, it was announced that a new 70,000-square-foot campus building for student entrepreneurship would be constructed, following a $25 million donation from the hedge fund manager and philanthropist Nicolai Tangen. The building will be located at 40th and Sansom Streets, and is set to be completed by 2020.

San Francisco campus

In 2001, Wharton launched a satellite campus in

San Francisco, California San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

. The Bay Area campus was created to capitalize on the growing

start-up A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship includes all new businesses including self-employment and businesses that do not intend ...

culture and related financing sector of

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...

. It serves as a hub on the West Coast for its students and alumni. As of 2012, the campus is open to executive MBA students and to full-time MBA students, who can decide to spend the spring semester of first year, or fall or spring semesters of second year of the MBA program in San Francisco in the Semester in San Francisco Program. For the full-time MBAs, the Semester in San Francisco Program focuses on entrepreneurship, technology, and venture capital.

Undergraduate program

Admissions process

Wharton undergraduate students in cohorts

Prospective Wharton candidates apply in their senior year of high school either through the early decision (ED) process or regular decision (RD) process. Unlike many other undergraduate business programs where students transfer in after their freshman or second year (University of Virginia's McIntire, Emory's Goizueta), Wharton applicants apply specifically for Wharton during their senior year of high school. These candidates are then grouped with a pool of applicants separate from those applying to the University of Pennsylvania's College of Arts and Sciences (CAS), School of Engineering and Applied Science (SEAS), or School of Nursing. Each of the other three schools also forms its own separate pool of applicants. The legacy status of applicants, defined as having a parent or another direct relative who attended the same academic institution, may be considered in the admissions process. This correlation has been observed in a number of empirical studies conducted on the nation's most elite schools, with a particular focus on

universities. Leading universities in the United States cite stronger alumni connections and continued support as the primary reasons for this practice.

Graduation and employment

Quadrangle Building at the University of Pennsylvania

Wharton undergraduate students are required to graduate with a B.S. in

with at least 1 of 21 current concentrations. Concentrations range from

finance Finance refers to monetary resources and to the study and Academic discipline, discipline of money, currency, assets and Liability (financial accounting), liabilities. As a subject of study, is a field of Business administration, Business Admin ...

and

accounting Accounting, also known as accountancy, is the process of recording and processing information about economic entity, economic entities, such as businesses and corporations. Accounting measures the results of an organization's economic activit ...

to lesser-known studies such as business analytics and Social Impact & Responsibility. Obtaining a concentration requires a student to take four classes outside of what is required in the core curriculum. Policy has recently changed such that Wharton students can graduate with a maximum of 2 concentrations rather than 3. In the 2015–16 school year, 334 employers participated in the on-campus recruiting process; each student received an average of 7.6 first-round interviews and 1.8 job offers. About 48% of Wharton's typical undergraduate class of 650 students go into different services in the financial field, with the top sectors being

investment banking Investment banking is an advisory-based financial service for institutional investors, corporations, governments, and similar clients. Traditionally associated with corporate finance, such a bank might assist in raising financial capital by und ...

investment management Investment management (sometimes referred to more generally as financial asset management) is the professional asset management of various Security (finance), securities, including shareholdings, Bond (finance), bonds, and other assets, such as r ...

, and

private equity Private equity (PE) is stock in a private company that does not offer stock to the general public; instead it is offered to specialized investment funds and limited partnerships that take an active role in the management and structuring of the co ...

. The next most common industry after finance is

management consulting Management consulting is the practice of providing consulting services to organizations to improve their performance or in any way to assist in achieving organizational objectives. Organizations may draw upon the services of management consultant ...

, which hires approximately 22% of the students, while a significant number of students enter marketing, sales, and the technology industry, particularly in

. For the Class of 2020, Wharton undergraduate students reported a median first-year base compensation of $86,217.

Graduate programs

MBA program

The school offers two paths, an MBA for full-time students and an MBA for executives. Students can elect to pursue double majors or individualized majors. During their first year, all students pursue a required core curriculum that covers traditional management disciplines—finance, marketing, statistics, and strategy—as well as the leadership, ethics, and communication skills needed at senior levels of management. Students pick electives in the second year. Wharton MBA students may pursue a dual degree with the

Lauder Institute The Joseph H. Lauder Institute of Management & International Studies (The Lauder Institute) is an institution that offers a joint degree program at the University of Pennsylvania, combining an MA in international studies from the School of Arts ...

Johns Hopkins University The Johns Hopkins University (often abbreviated as Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1876 based on the European research institution model, J ...

Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies The School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) is a graduate school of Johns Hopkins University based in Washington, D.C. The school also maintains campuses in Bologna, Italy and Nanjing, China. The school is devoted to the study of int ...

(SAIS),

Harvard Kennedy School The John F. Kennedy School of Government, commonly referred to as Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), is the school of public policy of Harvard University, a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Harvard Kennedy School offers master's de ...

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

, or with one of the graduate schools at the University of Pennsylvania. MBA students from the Class of 2021 earn an average first-year salary and guaranteed compensation of $155,000. Additionally, the class reported a median sign-on bonus of $30,000 and a median guaranteed bonus of $28,204. The MBA program annually receives around 7,300 applications for the 850 places in the class. Wharton co-sponsored the Executive Master's in Technology Management Program (EMTM) with the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science. Graduates received a Master of Science in engineering (MSE) in the management of technology from the School of Engineering and Applied Science. The EMTM program ended in August 2014. Wharton is also part of the Wharton-

INSEAD INSEAD ( ; French: ''Institut européen d'administration des affaires'') is a non-profit business school with locations in Europe (Fontainebleau, France), Asia (Singapore), the Middle East (Abu Dhabi, UAE) and North America (San Francisco, USA ...

Alliance. MBA students from each program can spend one period of study at the partner school, allowing Wharton students access to the INSEAD campuses in both

Fontainebleau Fontainebleau ( , , ) is a Communes of France, commune in the Functional area (France), metropolitan area of Paris, France. It is located south-southeast of the Kilometre zero#France, centre of Paris. Fontainebleau is a Subprefectures in Franc ...

and

Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...

. Students who are interested in careers in technology industries also regularly study at Wharton's San Francisco campus.

Doctoral programs

Wharton offers doctor of philosophy degrees in finance, applied economics, management, and other business fields (as opposed to some schools, which grant DBAs). It takes approximately four to six years to complete the doctoral program. Wharton also offers a dual master's degree in statistics and data science for students enrolled in other doctoral programs at the university. Students who are interested in careers in technology industries also regularly study at Wharton's San Francisco campus.

Executive Education

The Wharton School pioneered so-called 'executive education' (open-admissions course enrichment for professionals) and operates the Aresty Institute of Executive Education, commonly known as "Wharton Executive Education", a center for continuing business education for senior executives. The institute is named in honor of civic leader, business owner, philanthropist, and Wharton alumnus Julian Aresty and his brother Joseph Aresty, who together endowed the Aresty Institute for Executive Education in 1987. Wharton Executive Education offers programs for executives in areas such as finance, marketing, strategy, and innovation. Each year, more than 10,000 professionals worldwide attend Wharton Executive Education programs in classes taught by full-time Wharton faculty. Wharton offers more than 50 open enrollment programs for individuals on campuses in Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Beijing, China. Wharton also offers three long-duration open-enrollment programs that confer alumni status upon successful completion. These programs are the Advanced Finance Program, Advanced Management Program, and the General Management Program. Some programs eligible for alumni status, Wharton Programs for Working Professionals (WPWP), for example, are not offered anymore. However, graduates of these programs are still qualified for "Alumni, Non-Degreed" status by Penn. In addition to a large portfolio of open-enrollment programs for individuals, Wharton Executive Education also offers customized programs for organizations. Custom program topic areas include Finance and Value Creation, Leadership Development, Marketing and Sales, and Strategy and Innovation. Industry areas of expertise include Consumer Products, Retail, Energy, Transportation, Financial Services, Health Care, Pharmaceuticals, Manufacturing and Industrials, Professional Services, Technology and Communications.

Wharton Online

Through its online division, Wharton offers

massive open online course A massive open online course (MOOC ) or an open online course is an online course aimed at unlimited participation and open access via the World Wide Web, Web. In addition to traditional course materials, such as filmed lectures, readings, and p ...

s on

Coursera Coursera Inc. () is an American global massive open online course provider. It was founded in 2012 by Stanford University computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller. Coursera works with universities and other organizations to offe ...

with specializations in business and financial modeling, business analytics, entrepreneurship, FinTech and business foundations. Wharton Online also offers a Leadership and Management Certificate and a Business Analytics Certificate. The division is accredited by the International Association for Continuing Education and Training (IACET); it was the first online business school to be accredited by this organization. The

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

meant a rapid shift towards online teaching, transforming some of the classroom courses into online courses. For years there has been a strong investment in online education, so the school has been able to adapt well to the new circumstances, according to the ''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and also published digitally that focuses on business and economic Current affairs (news format), current affairs. Based in London, the paper is owned by a Jap ...

'' analysis on the adaptation of business schools to COVID-19.

Notable people

Alumni

Wharton School alumni Wharton may refer to: Education * Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States * Wharton County Junior College, in Wharton, Texas, United States * Paul R. Wharton High School, in Tampa, Florida, U ...

include Tesla/

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp., commonly referred to as SpaceX, is an America, American space technology company headquartered at the SpaceX Starbase, Starbase development site in Starbase, Texas. Since its founding in 2002, the compa ...

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

CEO

Elon Musk Elon Reeve Musk ( ; born June 28, 1971) is a businessman. He is known for his leadership of Tesla, SpaceX, X (formerly Twitter), and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Musk has been considered the wealthiest person in th ...

, U.S. president

and investor

Warren Buffett Warren Edward Buffett ( ; born August 30, 1930) is an American investor and philanthropist who currently serves as the chairman and CEO of the conglomerate holding company Berkshire Hathaway. As a result of his investment success, Buffett is ...

. Other alumni include the current and former

CEOs Kea (), also known as Tzia () and in antiquity Keos (, ), is a Greek island in the Cyclades archipelago in the Aegean Sea. Kea is part of the Kea-Kythnos regional unit. Geography It is the island of the Cyclades complex that is closest to Att ...

Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune (magazine), Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States Joint-stock company#Closely held corporations and publicly traded corporations, corporations by ...

Alphabet Inc. Alphabet Inc. is an American multinational technology conglomerate holding company headquartered in Mountain View, California. Alphabet is the world's third-largest technology company by revenue, after Amazon and Apple, the largest techno ...

Boeing The Boeing Company, or simply Boeing (), is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product support s ...

Comcast Comcast Corporation, formerly known as Comcast Holdings,Before the AT&T Broadband, AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corporation, not th ...

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) was an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in 1892, incorporated in the New York (state), state of New York and headquartered in Boston. Over the year ...

H-E-B H-E-B Grocery Company, LP, is an American privately held company, privately held supermarket chain based in San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, with more than 435 stores throughout Texas and Mexico. The company also operates Central Market (Texas) ...

Johnson & Johnson Johnson & Johnson (J&J) is an American multinational pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical technologies corporation headquartered in New Brunswick, New Jersey, and publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Its common stock is a c ...

Oracle An oracle is a person or thing considered to provide insight, wise counsel or prophetic predictions, most notably including precognition of the future, inspired by deities. If done through occultic means, it is a form of divination. Descript ...

Pfizer Pfizer Inc. ( ) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Pharmaceutical industry, pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation headquartered at The Spiral (New York City), The Spiral in Manhattan, New York City. Founded in 184 ...

PepsiCo PepsiCo, Inc. is an American multinational corporation, multinational food, snack, and beverage corporation headquartered in Harrison, New York, in the hamlet of Purchase, New York, Purchase. PepsiCo's business encompasses all aspects of the f ...

, and other companies.

Faculty

Notes

References

External links

* {{authority control 1881 establishments in Pennsylvania Business schools in Pennsylvania Ivy League business schools Universities and colleges established in 1881 University of Pennsylvania schools M7 business schools