In its inaugural ranking of online MBA programs, Poets&Quants, a leading resource for complete coverage of graduate business education, has ranked the Georgia Southern online MBA No. 18 in its list of 25 schools across the country.

To determine the MBA rankings, Poets&Quants adheres to three core facets in measuring the value of any educational undertaking: the quality of the incoming students, an assessment by graduates of the MBA experience, both academically and the extracurricular activities, and the career outcomes of a program’s graduates. Equal weight was placed on these three features in addition to gathering data from school and alumni surveys.

According to Poets&Quants, the school survey asked for a variety of statistics from admission standards to global immersion trips, while the alumni survey was sent to MBA graduates, who were asked about their impressions on a wide range of topics, from whether the program fulfilled their expectations to whether they would recommend the program to others.

Many graduates of the online MBA program recognize the benefits of its flexibility for working professionals to continue their education. One of those students, MBA graduate Antonio Gonzalez (’15), worked as a field service engineer for five years and reached the point where his technical knowledge and experience were simply not enough to advance his career.

Gonzalez was impressed with Georgia Southern’s online MBA, which allowed him to excel in his coursework while working full-time.

“The MBA [program] has given me a better understanding of corporate business practices and procedures,” Gonzalez said. “It has provided me the tools to deal with a variety of real-world business situations.”