S

tepping into the Boca Raton campus’s College of Business is almost like stepping into a whole new university, with the strong aroma of coffee beans from the Outtakes in the lobby and the neon tickers flashing from the “trading room,” which replicates a real-world trading experience for students.

According to the college’s website, the ticker board displays market data for a variety of stocks, indices, bonds and commodities.

The College of Business has recently received recognition for being one of the top-ranked programs by two major news news sources — Bloomberg Businessweek and U.S News & World Report.

Bloomberg Businessweek’s ranking is based on feedback from alumni and how their MBAs shaped their careers, graduates’ starting salaries and their job placement rate within three months of graduation, according to its website.

So what makes the College of Business so successful? Carl Schachter, a professional MBA graduate, believes it’s the quality of the professors.

“FAU brought a lot of educators to the program last year, I think (with) less professors being tenured in, the quality of professors has definitely gotten a lot better,” Schachter said.

According to the college’s dean, Daniel M. Gropper, Ph.D., the answer to the school’s success is “providing quality programs to their MBA students” which could be a factor in how much money is given to the college.

“FAU has a long history of creating and delivering high-quality programs that are focused on working professionals and helping build the economy in Florida, in part because we focus on bringing the business world into our curriculum,” said Gropper in a news release about the recent rankings.

In 2014, FAU’s low rankings put the school at risk of losing $6.9 million, according to the Sun-Sentinel. The article says that the state allowed FAU to recoup that money by following an improvement plan, which involved hiring more than two dozen advisers and buying a new software program that enables advisers and faculty to identify students at risk of dropping out.

Universities ranked in the U.S News and World report are ranked on a 50-point scale, and according to the same article, FAU jumped from 24 to 37 points, which was made possible by the improvement plan.

The business college has been spending a share of money to maintain its credibility and continue to be more successful, which in turn benefits its students.

Valentina Jaramillo, a sophomore economics major, said she would continue her business education at FAU because of the college’s recent ranking.

“I would attend FAU’s MBA program, I already started at this school, and I like to finish my education here and from what I’ve been hearing about FAU’s graduate program, why would I go anywhere else,” Jaramillo said.

Nicole Pujazon is a contributing writer with the University Press. For information regarding this or other stories, email [email protected] or tweet her @NicolePujazon.