QS is pleased to offer over a million dollars in scholarship funding in 2011

The World MBA Tour has just started: what are the opportunities in the MBA market?
MBA graduates can look forward to a significant increase in job opportunities within the financial and consulting sectors in 2011. We have seen an increase in MBA applicants set on pursuing careers in these sectors, attending both our New York and London fairs, but the message does not seem to have reached young professionals in Frankfurt, where MBA applicant numbers are down on previous years.
Schools attending QS World MBA Tour are actively looking for the right caliber of MBA applicants seeking to work in these high paying sectors - young professionals with excellent academics from any industry background, who are interested in working for top consultancies and banks, paying base salaries of 80.000 to 100.000 Euro plus sign on bonuses of 20.000 to 40.000 towards tuition reimbursement, and end of year bonuses of up to 100 per cent of salary.

So banks and consultancies are definitely on the rebound as employers?
The "QS Top MBA Jobs and Salary Trends Report 2010/11", which surveyed over 2.200 companies around the world on their MBA recruitment plans predicts the finance sector will hire eleven per cent more MBAs in 2011, and predicts MBA hiring in the consulting sector will increase by a massive 37 per cent during 2011. That is what we hear from the schools, too.

What do they say exactly?
Bernard Garrette, associate dean for the MBA program at HEC Paris said to us: ‘The finance sector‘s hiring is expected to return to pre-crisis levels.' And Jacqueline Wilbur, senior director of the MBA Career Development Office at the Sloan School of Management says: ‘Management consultancies and investment banks are again in a war for talent in most markets.'
Diane Morgan, director of London Business School's Career Service believes that banks are even changing their hiring patterns, and are now ‘taking a longer-term view of their MBA hiring. Several of them made the mistake of cutting back in 2002 and were left with a big gap in talent when the markets picked up.'
Young executives find it harder and harder to get their employer to sponsor an EMBA.
In the past employers sponsored roughly 70 per cent of all EMBA students, but during the recession, this has dropped to less than 50 per cent. Employers still see an Executive MBA as an excellent way to retain high flyers and lock them in for a few years once they finish their studies. However, many companies have had their training budgets cut and are simply not able to provide this funding. Yet despite the reduction in corporate sponsorship, EMBA programs have been growing student numbers steadily for the last five years. Candidates are using personal savings and bank loans to pay for their tuition, in the knowledge that salaries post EMBA tend to jump significantly as employers recognise the greater potential of the individual.

For some business schools scholarships seem to be the marketing flavour of the month. What is on offer and who are eligible?
As part of our mission to provide information and access to business schools and Masters and PhD programs, QS is pleased to offer over 1.2 million US-Dollar in scholarship funding in 2011 for selected applicants from around the world who attend the QS World MBA Tour or QS World Grad School Tour.
With the QS Community Scholarship for Germany QS is pleased to offer a new scholarship for one successful candidate from Germany who demonstrates strong socially responsible leadership and ability to motivate others. The successful candidate must attend a QS fair and will have been actively engaged in a community, charitable or welfare related project in which he or she made a tangible difference.
The QS Leadership Scholarships for MBA and Postgraduate Studies is designed to identify a QS World MBA Tour or QS World Grad School Tour participant who demonstrates exceptionally strong leadership potential and innovative thinking. Successful candidates must have excellent academic records as well as demonstration of success in the workplace and be accepted by one of the QS Global 200 Top Business Schools.
QS Education also partners with: IE Business School, Vlerick Leuven Gent, Melbourne Business School, Sydney Business School, Ashridge Business School, EM Lyon, ESMT, University of Southern California, University of Chicago amongst others to provide merit based scholarships to QS World MBA Tour attendees. Several of these scholarships specifically target women candidates others are industry or geography specific.

http://www.topmba.com/

Find itinerary for the QS World MBA Tour which is currently touring Europe, Africa, India and China at http://www.topmba.com/mba-tour

Find the QS Top MBA Jobs and Salary Trends Report 2010/11 at http://www.topmba.com/sites/default/files/Top%20MBA%20Jobs%20%20Salary%20Trends%202010.pdf