The Graduate Management Admission Council's 2009 survey of full-time master of business administration programs reported a 64 percent increase in applications from 2008, compared to the 80 percent increase seen from 2007 to 2008, said Sam Silverstein, manager of media and public affairs at GMAC.\nAlthough the raw number of applications increased, the percentage increase declined, he said. Silverstein noted that the flattening trend is most likely linked to the recession.\n"When you continue to go through a recession, it is probably logical for people to think to lay low and keep a job and work hard," he said.\nHe also said many MBA program applicants tend to be international students applying to schools in the United States, and that it has become more difficult for international applicants to study here now.\n"These restrictions are making it tougher to both come here and it is harder to get U.S. government permission to stay in the U.S. and work," he said, also citing the high cost of studying abroad.\n"People who may have been able to afford to go to business school a year ago see it is now not affordable," Silverstein said.\nThough application increases on average fell short of previous years', Darden School Admissions Director Sara Neher said Darden's full-time MBA program enrollment remained mostly static, decreasing slightly to adjust for the current student body's size. She also said the size of Darden's incoming class did not shrink because of the economy.\n"We were purposeful in attracting a smaller class" to prevent the overflow problem the MBA program experienced the previous year, she said, referring to 2008, when 333 students were enrolled, three more than the desired maximum. The larger-than-usual size of last year's class meant that admissions officials had to carefully plan how many offers to extend in 2009. This year, Neher said her office reduced the number of students to 309 to make sure the school had room for both first- and second-year MBA students.\nMeanwhile, both Virginia Tech and the College of William & Mary experienced increases in applications received. Melanie Johnston, associate director of marketing and recruiting MBA Program at Virginia Tech, said Virginia Tech's full time MBA program saw a 40 percent increase in applications from 2008. She explained that "in the past three years, Virginia Tech has become slightly more aggressive in recruiting."\nAt the same time, though, enrollment figures at the Blacksburg school dropped from 65 students enrolled last year to 54 this year.\nPriscilla Case, William & Mary's director of MBA admissions, said her school experienced a 10 percent enrollment increase from the previous year, admitting 121 students in 2009 compared to 102 in 2008. Case, however, attributed the increase to a newly constructed business school building, which may have helped the school dodge the flattening trend seen elsewhere across the country.\nDespite these differences, all three schools reported an increase in the quality of their incoming classes. Neher noted that this year's first-year class possessed higher grade point averages compared to previous years', as well as Graduate Management Admission Test scores that averaged about 701 - eight points higher than 2008's.
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