Wharton dropped to third place in the Business Week Undergraduate Business School rankings, released last week, after commanding the top spot for three years.
The McIntire School of Commerce at the University of Virginia took first place, and the Mendoza College of Business at the University of Notre Dame took second.
For the list, Business Week uses nine factors, which include surveys of 85,000 senior business majors and 600 corporate recruiters, median starting salaries for graduates and the number of graduates each program sends to top MBA programs.
They also created an academic-quality rating system, which considers SAT scores, student-faculty ratios, class size, the percentage of students with internships and the number of hours students devote to class work.
According to Business Week, student satisfaction was down overall, and institutions that succeeded in helping students navigate the job market improved their standings the most.
Wharton administrators do not appear too concerned about dropping down on the list.
"Rankings are a snapshot in time geared to answering specific questions," explained Georgette Chapman Phillips, vice dean of the Wharton Undergraduate Division, in an e-mail. "Some questions are quantitative, others are qualitative."
The most important thing to remember, she wrote, is that from last year's ranking to this year's, Wharton "has maintained our strong curriculum as well as our research opportunities, co-curricular activities and alumni connections."
College consultants agree that the drop will not significantly impact Wharton's image.
"It might in some ways justify the situation for people who can't afford an Ivy League school," said Christel Milak-Parker, founder of College Connections, a college counseling service, "but Wharton has such a long-standing reputation that this is not going to stop people from applying."
Milak-Parker added that there is usually not very much change among the top five schools.
Susan Close, founder of Close College Consulting, said rankings should not play a significant role in the college-selection process.
"Parents certainly do look at the rankings, and it matters more to them than what is the best fit, which I think is ridiculous," she said. "It depends on what students do with the education, and that's what makes the difference."
Similarly, Phillips stressed that rank is not everything.
"Wherever a 'ranking' places us, we will continue offering the best undergraduate business program in the world," she said.
