International higher education institutions have met mixed results expanding into the Middle East, but interest in graduate business study in the region has risen during the Great Recession. For the testing year ending June 30, 2009, schools in the Middle East received nearly 10,000 GMAT score reports (9,949 scores), up 17 percent from just two years before. Although Israel remains the market leader, with 6,789 score reports (68 percent), the number and proportion of score reports sent to other Middle Eastern countries is increasing. Notably, the number of score reports sent to the United Arab Emirates was up nearly 400 percent to 1,129 in 2009, from 266 two years before.

GMAC is sponsoring an EFMD conference on “Creating International Impact with Programmes: Management Education in the MENA Region,” November 28-30, 2010, in Dubai. For more, visit www.efmd.org/conferences.

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