USC’s business school moved up a notch in the latest rankings issued by U.S. News & World Report on March 12, closing in on UCLA’s position.

USC’s Marshall School of Business tied for the No. 17 spot on the list of the top 100 full-time MBA programs in the nation with Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business. Both were one spot behind No. 16 UCLA Anderson School of Management, which maintained its position from last year. USC last year was tied with Emory University’s Goizueta Business School for the No. 20 spot.

The only other Los Angeles County business school to make the list of the top 100 was Pepperdine University’s Graziadio School of Management, which was tied with four other schools at No. 74.

Topping the list solely for the first time was the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business; it took over the top slot from Harvard University, which topped the list for the last three years. Harvard this year tied for No. 3 with the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management. Stanford University was No. 2, while UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business was tied for No. 6.

Education, energy, engineering/construction and infrastructure reporter Howard Fine can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @howardafine.