Northwestern Kellogg Hits MBA Gender Parity
Credit: Chicago Tribune / Contributor / Tribune News Service / Getty Images- The Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management announced that 50% of students in its 2026 MBA class are women.
- That makes Northwestern the second M7 MBA program to achieve gender parity after the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
- The Olin Business School at Washington University in St. Louis also achieved gender parity in its MBA program this year.
- Women have been making gains in enrollment at business schools over the last decade, according to the Forté Foundation.
Women continue to make gains in top master of business administration (MBA) programs, with another major business school hitting gender parity in its 2026 class.
The Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management achieved gender parity in its 2026 class, meaning at least half of the students are women.
“A record high 50% of these students are women, making this class the first in the Two-Year MBA program’s history to reach that milestone,” Emily Haydon, Kellogg’s assistant dean of admissions and financial aid, wrote in a press release.
“As they join the community of women at Kellogg, they will find advocates, programming, resources, and a supportive network, all dedicated to helping them grow into impactful leaders, both as students and long after graduation.”
Kellogg is the second magic or magnificent seven (M7) school — a group of seven high-power American business schools — to achieve gender parity. The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania previously achieved that mark, although women made up 46% of its 2026 class.
Kellogg isn’t the only major U.S. business school to achieve gender parity in its 2026 MBA class. The Washington University in St. Louis Olin Business School recently announced that 53% of students in its latest MBA class are women.
Evan Bouffides, senior associate dean of graduate programs at Olin, told BestColleges that a major rise in overall MBA applications helped Olin hit that milestone.
“More applications means more of everything,” Bouffides said in a previous interview. “And while we did increase our class size, we didn’t increase it by double. We increased it by 25%, so that creates a fair amount of flexibility, too.”
Kellogg’s and Olin’s gender parity reflects better gender representation across business education.
The Forté Foundation found last year that women made up an historic 42% of enrollment at its 58 member institutions, which include some of the globe’s foremost business schools.
That number has grown over the past decade, up from 34% in 2013.
“Our efforts over the past two decades, along with our member schools and companies, have significantly impacted the increase in women interested in business careers and advancing to leadership,” Forté Foundation CEO Elissa Sangster said in a press release at the time.
“Every year, we see about a percentage point gain in women’s enrollment, and, trust me, it’s not easy to achieve.”
Sangster described getting to gender parity as “an uphill climb,” and added that it will translate to more women in C-suites and owning businesses.