I know, I know. Kelley is ranked much higher. Please hear me out on this one and let me know your thoughts.
I currently live in Minneapolis and work for a large company as an analyst. My goal is to go to school part time and online. I want to spread the degree out over several years to get tuition re-imbursement and keep my debt load as low as possible.
My goals for going back to school are not to become CEO, go into consulting, etc. My goal is to build out my resume, get professional business knowledge, and hopefully gain some job security. My undergrad is in a liberal arts major. Jobs with low stress and good work life balance are important to me so i'm not hung up on necessarily getting the highest possible paying job I can. Equally important is financial freedom. I definitely don't want to be a slave to my job just so that I can afford my monthly payment for loans.
My wife and I are both originally from Ohio and plan on relocating back in a few years to the Cincinnati area. Thankfully, both of our experience and skillsets make us pretty portable and I think there will be several good employment options in that area for me based on my experience and having an MBA.
With that said, which school should I attend? Both are part time online programs. The University of Cincinnati's online program is very new and i'm not expecting it to be of the same quality of Kelley's, but I could graduate with a well respected degree in the area I plan to establish roots in long term. With tuition reimbursement from my current employer I would only need to take out about $15k in loans (total cost of program is ~$30k). With Kelley, they have a well established and respected online MBA but the cost is much higher. With tuition reimbursement i'd wind up around ~$45k in loans (total cost of program is $60k).
Thoughts?