Top U.S. Supply Chain Undergraduate University Programs, 2014

Intended to support chief supply chain officers (CSCOs), heads of supply chain strategy and supply chain HR partners in building a strong portfolio of university recruiting and internship partners, Gartner’s supply chain university research is back for its third iteration.

U.S. undergraduate supply chain programs have made impressive progress since we formally began this research in 2008, efforts which have helped grow and improve the supply of supply chain talent.

There are four impressive areas of growth, three of which should be welcome news to industry:

• The broadening of supply chain curricula to reflect the reality of today’s supply chain organizations.
• The exposure of more students to internships and co-ops, and more applied project work - often for sponsoring companies - in the classroom.
• Dramatic increases in enrollment across the board, and new supply chain degree programs being established.

The fourth area of growth, while perhaps not so welcome for the hiring companies, is great news for supply chain professionals as a community: salaries are up roughly 10% over 2011.

Top students from top programs can command a 50% premium over the average and, in many programs, new supply chain graduates handily outearn finance and accounting majors.

Forty institutions participated in the third edition of our report on U.S. university undergraduate supply chain programs. Here we identify program strengths and gaps as well as overall progress made in the past three years.