Bentley University

It was great to get back to Bentley University, founded in 1917 in Boston as an accounting school for men, but now co-ed and located in Waltham, Massachusetts. Bentley’s focus is business education with all the usual majors plus interesting ones like Artificial Intelligence for Innovation, Finance and Technology, Information Technology in Accounting, Professional Sales, Quantitative Economics, Creative Industries, Business Law, and Experience Design. Minors include Business Risk Insurance, Cybersecurity, Entrepreneurial Studies, Actuarial Science, Managing Digital Technologies, Ethics and Compliance, and Sports Business Management. All students take general business courses in their first year, which gives them exposure to accounting, finance, marketing, and more, before deciding on a major sophomore year. And all students gain a business administration minor just by taking those gen-eds. Accolades include #1 for Undergraduate Career Services by Princeton Review (ranked in the top 5 for the past 13 consecutive years); Wall Street Journal #12 Best College in the US, and for USNWR, #2 Most Innovative, and #1 Best Regional University, North.

Here are some nuggets from my visit: Bentley was the first university to implement a business ethics center. It also has the largest university trading room – with Bloomberg terminals – in the country. The median starting salary for graduates is $72K.  About 20% of students are involved in Greek life, including business fraternities, and sports are D2. Bentley is located 9 miles from downtown Boston and 5 miles from Harvard Square, and there’s a free Bentley shuttle every half hour, 7 days a week to Harvard Square. From there, students can jump on the T to get into Boston. A lot of colleges are outside of Boston. Not many of them have this kind of access.

Regarding admissions, they fill about a third of the class in early decision. In the high school class of 2025, 18% of admitted students had all A’s, and 72% had A’s and B’s. They’re looking for completion of pre-calculus at a minimum. About 25% of admitted students submitted test scores, and merit scholarships ranging from $10-30K were awarded to about 70% of students. About 10% of the applicant pool is invited into the honors program, which includes freshman orientation with other honors students, optional honors housing, priority registration, and a Deloitte mentorship program with Bentley alumni. Beware: after applying, there are 3 sneak-attack essays in the portal with one week to complete them after the application deadline. These are designed to find out who’s interested enough to go the extra mile – demonstrated interest at its finest!

With 4500 undergraduate students (60% of them male), no classes with more than 35 students, and huge job fairs every semester, Bentley is a true gem that I think should be on the national scene.