Forbes magazine and two environmental groups recently recognized the Yale School of Management for its financial worth to alumni and its environmental consciousness.

The SOM placed fifth among major national business schools in the bi-annual Forbes Magazine Masters of Business Administration university survey, one spot above its sixth-place finish last year.

The top four schools in the Forbes rankings were, respectively, Harvard Business School, Columbia Business School, the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business and Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business. The rankings, which are based on business schools’ costs and alumni earnings, appear in the magazine’s Oct. 13 issue.

Unlike other business school rankings, Forbes asked alumni and recruiters to rank schools solely on their financial worth. Forbes sent questionnaires to 18,000 graduates who received M.B.A.s in 1998, comparing alumni earnings with tuition, salary foregone during business school and estimates of what students would have made in their pre-M.B.A. jobs.

Maria Coello SOM ’04 emphasized the importance of school rankings.

“Rankings affect the decision-making process of most people,” Coello said. “If someone has to choose between Harvard and Yale, they will probably go to Harvard because it is ranked higher. The rankings also affect the quality of people a school attracts.”

The SOM was also recently named as one of the top six M.B.A. programs for Social and Environmental Management training in a report recently released by the Aspen Institute — which seeks to foster “open-minded dialogue on contemporary issues,” according to its Web site — and the World Resources Institute, an environmental research group.

“Yale is forging a path for tomorrow’s business education that will account fo the relationship between business, society, and the environment,” World Resources Institute Business Manager Meghan Chapple said.

SOM Dean Jeffrey Garten said he was pleased by the recent rankings.

“The mission of the Yale School of Management is to educate leaders for business and society,” Garten said. “From our mission flows a commitment to prepare Yale M.B.A. students to lead in a world where social and environmental stewardship skills are just as important as management, financial or marketing skills.”

The other schools recognized in the environmentally-friendly business school report are The George Washington University School of Business and Public Management, the University of Michigan Business School, the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School, the Stanford Graduate School of Business, and York University’s Schulich School of Business.

Coello said the SOM’s reputation for promoting social and environmental management were some of the key reasons she chose Yale.

“Yale offered the private and public sector combination that I did not feel other schools offered,” said Coello. “To be a true leader, you have to be well-balanced, not only with business but also with social knowledge.”