Upholding its reputation as one of the nation’s best accounting programs, the McCombs School ranks number one across all four of the 2010 undergraduate, graduate and Ph.D. rankings of the Public Accounting Report (PAR).

Undergraduate Ranking: 1
McCombs reclaimed the top spot after finishing second last year to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. According to the PAR, McCombs “swamped its rivals, receiving nearly 35% more votes than No. 2 BYU [Brigham Young University].” For the past 18 years, McCombs has placed either first or second in this ranking.

Graduate Ranking: 1
With the exception of 2008, McCombs has held the top place in the graduate ranking every year for the past 16 years (since 1994). As with the undergraduate ranking, McCombs’ lead over second-place Illinois was notable—22 percent more votes. But McCombs’ real dominance appears in the tally of first- and second-place votes, where the school's advantage reaches 58 percent.

Doctoral Ranking (Teaching): 1 Doctoral Ranking (Research): 1
McCombs has landed in the top four doctoral programs since 1994, and has ranked first in six of the previous eight surveys. This year, for the second time, the PAR distinguished between teaching and research (previous surveys examined only teaching). McCombs once again came in No. 1 in both.

About the Public Accounting Report

The PAR is billed as “the independent newsletter of the accounting profession since 1978.” For the undergraduate and graduate rankings, professors are asked to rank programs on a 1 to 10 scale on the single question, “Which programs consistently turn out students capable of some day attaining partner status?” For the doctoral rankings, professors are asked to name the programs they most regard for turning out accounting professors in terms of teaching and research.

More than 1,700 accounting educators participated in this year’s survey, whose official release was Nov. 15, 2010, though the newsletters were only just distributed. This marks the fourth consecutive year with more than 1,000 educators participating.