DePaul University’s business school has been awarded Four Palms for being an internationally known top business school and it placed 34th in the United States category of a ranking of the 1,000 best business schools in the world issued by Eduniversal, a Paris-based educational consulting organization.

The ranking, which encompasses both the College of Commerce’s undergraduate program and the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business at DePaul, was based on an international survey of business school deans and the ratings of a 12-member independent team of education experts, according to Eduniversal, which announced the results at the Second World Convention of the Best Business Schools in Cape Town, South Africa, in late October and posted them on its Web site, http://www.eduniversal.com/business-school-ranking/.

The expert panel awarded business schools One to Five Palms—with five being the highest ranking—based on international academic reputation determined by a variety of criteria including each school’s performance in other rankings, accreditations, participation in academic associations, international networks and research reputation.

Harvard Business School placed first and earned a Five Palm rating among the 153 United States business schools in the ranking.

"This ranking shows that DePaul, which already has a stellar reputation in the Chicago area for its strong academic profile, is now gaining a reputation internationally for its high-quality educational offerings," said Ray Whittington, dean of the College of Commerce and Kellstadt Graduate School of Business.

A number of other recent rankings have recognized the academic excellence of DePaul’s business school. The school’s part-time MBA program was ranked ninth in the nation by U.S.News & World Report in its "America’s Best Graduate Schools 2010" guidebook. Entrepreneur magazine and The Princeton Review ranked DePaul’s undergraduate entrepreneurship program eighth and the graduate program ninth nationally among more than 2,300 schools surveyed for this year’s guidebook, "Best Schools for Entrepreneurs." In Business Week’s 2009 rankings, the College of Commerce’s undergraduate program had the second highest ranking among Illinois programs rated.

Offering highly respected, practical, flexible programs of business study, DePaul’s College of Commerce enrolls 4,564 undergraduate students and the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business has 2,264 students.