The Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC), which owns the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT), has launched a new interactive tool that tracks geographic trends among those taking and sending GMAT scores.
The new GMAT Trends in Student Mobility Interactive Report reveals that new sources of business school talent are emerging around the globe, from Saudi Arabia to South Africa to Vietnam. “Many of the fastest-growing countries are unlikely to be considered traditional enrollment groups for global business schools, but with their increasing representation in the GMAT pipeline, they might very well be building blocks for tomorrow’s classrooms,” Alex Chisholm, GMAC senior research analyst, author of GMAC’s Geographic Trend Reports and creator of the interactive tool, said in a statement.
Using Adobe Flash animation, the new tool serves up comprehensive five-year data for individual countries and regions about which citizen groups are sending GMAT score reports and what destinations are receiving them. For the testing years 2006-2010, the number of Saudi Arabian citizens sending GMAT scores jumped 191 percent, followed by Iranians, up 182 percent, and Vietnamese, up 151 percent.
The tool also reveals that test takers from both traditional and emerging markets are looking beyond the United States for places to study. Though the number of scores sent to U.S. schools has risen over the past five years and the U.S. is still the top GMAT score-sending destination, it is losing market share overall, according to GMAC. Of the countries analyzed, 49 citizen groups send a smaller percentage of scores to U.S. programs in 2010 than in 2006, according to Chisholm. He attributes this trend in part to the growing number of international business programs that are now using the GMAT exam, which opens access to study in more places.
The citizens of more countries are also choosing to stay closer to home for business school, GMAC reports. While the United States has long been the top GMAT score-sending destination for its own citizens, 12 other countries have now followed suit. In each South Africa, Canada, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, the Netherlands, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, Israel and Lebanon, more test takers send scores to destinations in their home countries than to other destinations.
For more key findings from the new Student Mobility Interactive Report, click here.
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