BusinessWeek has ranked Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lally School of Management & Technology 36th in the nation, according to the magazine’s 2009 list of top 50 undergraduate business programs. The Lally School also came in at number 21 on the list of institutions ranked for academic quality.

In 2007, the Lally School was one of nine new schools to be named to the BusinessWeek’s list, making its debut at number 40.

“The Lally School is proud of its continued ranking among the elite 50 universities in the nation for the past three years,” said David Gautschi, dean of the Lally School. “As the fourth smallest program among the top 50 schools, the Lally School continues to win high marks for the academic profiles of its students and faculty, as well as for its excellent facilities. This recognition demonstrates that the Lally School competes with the very best business schools in the world.”

To identify the best undergraduate business programs, BusinessWeek used nine distinctive measures, including surveys of more than 85,000 graduating seniors at 101 schools and more than nearly 580 corporate recruiters. The BusinessWeek rankings measure schools in several areas, including teaching quality, career services, alumni network, recreational facilities, student services, recruitment of graduates, salary offers, number of graduates each program sends onto the pre-eminent MBA programs, and quality of academic programs, among others.

“We’re a small program with small school attributes and big school ambitions and connections. The Lally School is being discovered for the gem that it has become,” Gautschi said. “Our students and graduates really do subscribe to the Rensselaer motto: why not change the world? In economic times like these, a Lally School grad is a great investment for just about any enterprise managing through the trials of the present and positioning itself for the future.”

More than 400 undergraduate students are enrolled in the Lally School. Students in the undergraduate program study finance, marketing, human behavior, information technology, innovation and entrepreneurship, operations management, and organizational analysis and development. Also, two new tracks of study in technology commercialization and entrepreneurship (TC&E) and in financial engineering and risk analytics (FERA) bridge the undergraduate and graduate programs of the school, allowing students to earn a minor in such technical fields as biomedical engineering, materials science, computer science, or cognitive science.

In an effort to enhance the overall student experience, a quarter of Lally School students who qualify study overseas at some point during their undergraduate program. The Lally School offers a plethora of international exchanges opportunities for its students based on connections with 19 academic partners in Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia.

Additionally, the Lally School engages the world of practice through its Severino Center for Technological Entrepreneurship with the formation of the Severino Interest Group (SIG), a university-community collaborative. The SIG serves as a nexus for young innovators and researchers to engage with business leaders and seasoned entrepreneurs to exchange ideas, discuss emerging research, and stay informed of current strategic and global trends. The group membership includes more than 1,000 alumni and friends in three locations including the Capital Region, Silicon Valley, and Hartford, Conn.

Gautschi noted that as Rensselaer’s business school, the Lally School collaborates closely with the other four schools of the Institute. Students are encouraged to take courses from Rensselaer’s other schools in areas of cognitive science, humanities and social sciences, architecture, and computer science, among others.   

“The school has also distinguished itself as a leader in innovation in terms of what it teaches, how it teaches, and in what areas the faculty engages in research,” Gautschi added. “With our undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral programs, the main areas of emphasis are on technology innovation and entrepreneurship, finance, and global business and political economy.”

To view the 2009 BusinessWeek undergraduate rankings, go to: http://www.businessweek.com/bschools/