MBA Apps Drop in United States: Could More of an IP Law Focus Help Some Schools?

In an article titled, “MBA Apps Take a Shocking Plunge” published at Poets & Quants,  John A. Byrne discusses how the number of MBA applications in the United States has dropped substantially.  The amount of the drop depends on the particular school; however, even top schools are experiencing a substantial decrease.  The article states:

At Rice University’s Jones Graduate School, for example, candidates to the school’s full-time programs plummeted by 27.7% to just 587 applications from 813 a year earlier.  At the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas-Austin, applications fell 19.6%. At the Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, applicants declined by 18.3%. Applications dipped 16.2% at Georgetown University McDonough School of Business, while they fell 13.2% at Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business. 

The article provides several reasons for the decline in applications: difficulty for international students to obtain visas; some international students choosing MBA schools outside the U.S., such as in Canada; a booming economy; and high cost.  While I do not think it is a cause of the decline in applications, I do wonder if the business schools who have suffered a decline have adapted their curriculum to include intellectual property law related subjects.  I have not reviewed their course offerings, but I wonder if a school that did emphasize intellectual property would have a competitive edge.  Others have made this point, but I am not sure if there has been much change.  This may be a good time for innovation for some schools.