MBA News
A collection of news items from MBA programs and about the business school admissions process.
Published: February 17, 2015
USC Marshall School of Business Draws Google, Amazon Studios to Annual Evolution of Entertainment Conference
A student-led club at the University of Southern California (USC) Marshall School of Business will draw executives from Google, Amazon Studios, Electronic Arts and others to its 7th annual Evolution of Entertainment (E2) Conference later this month, the school announced.
The conference, hosted by MBA student group Business of Entertainment Association, will take place on Friday, February 27th. This year’s topic, “Convergence: Mobile, Media and Technology,” will focus on the overlap of media, technology and entertainment across all platforms. Corporate sponsors this year include Entertainment Arts, OnPrem, Warner Bros., SanDisk and Deloitte Digital.
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Published: February 16, 2015
UPenn’s Wharton School Debuts New Online Business Foundations Series, Associated MBA Scholarship
The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School has expanded its online offerings of foundational MBA courses to now include a Business Foundations Specialization series that adds a capstone project in which participants can apply what they learn to help solve real-world business issues, the school announced last week. And in another new twist, Wharton will invite top performers in the online series to apply to one of the school’s graduate programs, waiving the application fee, and will award up to five $20,000 scholarships to applicants who are admitted.
As with the initial four courses in Wharton’s Foundation Series – Accounting, Finance, Marketing and Operations Management – the new Capstone Project component is available through online education platform Coursera. Wharton was one of the first leading business schools to present the building blocks of its MBA curriculum in online form to a world audience.
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Published: February 15, 2015
Prodigy Finance Offers No Co-Signer Loans, Helping Solve Funding Challenges Facing MBAs Studying Abroad
Studying outside of the country of your nationality or residence can present many benefits to prospective MBA applicants. See the world, improve language skills, expand horizons, learn first-hand how increasingly global the business world has become. And yet, one major hurdle can sometimes prevent ambitious, talented prospective MBA applicants from pursuing their education abroad. That pesky little detail of funding.
Traditional banks are reluctant to lend across borders because tracking and enforcement of those loans suddenly becomes more difficult. Many U.S. banks, for example, won’t lend to foreign students without a U.S. co-signer, someone local the banks can go after to recoup their debt if the borrower fails to repay.
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Published: February 9, 2015
Wharton Round 2 Applicants Await Interview Invitations
Tomorrow’s the day. If you applied to the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School as part of Round 2, you will very likely be checking your email repeatedly in hopes that an invitation to interview lands in your inbox. Good luck!
Wharton uses the Team-Based Discussion (TBD) format for interviews, as it has for the past few years. In terms of logistics, those invited to interview tomorrow can choose from a range of locations around the globe, including Wharton’s campus in Philadelphia, as well as San Francisco, London, Dubai, Mumbai, Shanghai, Sao Paulo, Seoul, Singapore and Tokyo. Each TBD will include five or six applicants grouped by the order in which they sign up for various locations. And interviews will take place beginning in late February.
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Published: February 8, 2015
Johnson Graduate School of Management Upends Its Curriculum
As some leading business schools prepare to welcome new deans – Darden and Tuck spring to mind – others are choosing to revamp their MBA curriculum. The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, Harvard Business School and Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management have all recast their core course offerings in recent years, and now the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University is getting in on the curriculum overhaul action.
Johnson recently went public with its redesigned curriculum, providing an overview of its main features as part of a press release earlier this month. Now in full roll-out mode to the Class of 2016, the changes are designed to place greater emphasis on collaboration, leadership and analytical skills, which the school hopes will better prepare students for today’s technology-driven global business world.
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Published: February 8, 2015
Take the 2015 MBA Applicant Survey For Your Chance to Win $500!
The Association of International Graduate Admissions Consultants (AIGAC), of which Clear Admit is a member, has just released the 2015 MBA Applicant Survey. If you respond by the end of February, you will be eligible to enter a drawing for a $500 cash reward. The cash prize will be sent by PayPal. The survey takes 10 to 15 minutes to complete, and your responses will be kept confidential.
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Published: February 4, 2015
NYU Stern School of Business Woos Top College Seniors with Generous MBA Scholarship
Though many leading business schools prefer MBA applicants who have acquired at least a few years of work experience after college, NYU Stern School of Business features a special scholarship designed specifically for exceptional college seniors who seek to pursue a full-time MBA immediately after graduation.
The William R. Berkley Scholarship Program, established in 2013, covers the full two-year tuition and fees for NYU Stern’s full-time MBA program. It also provides a housing stipend of $18,000/year and an additional $10,000/year stipend for books and other expenses. Successful entrepreneur William R. Berkley (BS 1966) created the program that bears his name with a $10 million donation. He pursued his MBA at Harvard Business School immediately after graduating from Stern and wanted to provide similar opportunities for other aspiring young students like himself.
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Published: February 1, 2015
Kellogg School of Management Releases Super Bowl Advertising Review Results
With a game that was competitive until the final 20 seconds of play, last night’s Super Bowl kept football fans on the edge of their seats. But MBA students at Kellogg’s School of Management were focused on competition of another sort: the battle for best Super Bowl ad. With almost 70 Kellogg MBA students reviewing all of the spots, McDonald’s emerged the victor, the school reports.
McDonald’s spot, “Lovin’ Pays,” announced a new promotion the fast food chain will feature from now through Valentine’s Day, in which select customers will be invited to pay for their order not with money but with “lovin,’” including happy dances, calls to tell their mom they love her, etc. McDonald’s Super Bowl strategy also extended to Twitter, where the company gave away prizes to people who re-tweeted flattering messages it tweeted about fellow Super Bowl advertisers.
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Published: January 28, 2015
Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business Names New Dean to Succeed Paul Danos
Photo by Laura DeCapua
In case you missed it, Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business last week named an insider to become its 10th dean, replacing outgoing Dean Paul Danos, who steps down in June. Tuck Professor of Management and Associate Dean for Faculty Matthew Slaughter will step into the role vacated by Danos, who announced in March that he would not seek reappointment at the end of his fifth term as the school’s dean.
An expert in globalization and a scholar of international economics,Slaughter joined the Tuck faculty in 2002 and has held several key leadership roles since then. In addition to his current role as associate dean for faculty, Slaughter was also the founding faculty director of Tuck’s Center for Global Business and Government and previouly served as associate dean for the MBA program. He also served on the Council of Economic Advisers in the Executive Office of the President of the United States from 2005 to 2007.
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Published: January 27, 2015
Columbia Business School Launches New Center for Social Enterprise
The big news out of Columbia Business School (CBS) today is the creation of a new center devoted to social enterprise. A generous endowment gift from Sandra and Tony Tamer will establish the Tamer Center for Social Enterprise, which will be devoted to developing leaders focused on impacting society and the environment through management. The new center will also serve as a hub for all future social entrepreneurship activities at Columbia.
The Tamers’ gift expands CBS’s existing Social Enterprise Program, establishing the Tamer Fund for Social Ventures, which will provide seed grants of up to $25,000 to select nonprofit, for-profit or hybrid early-stage social ventures centered on social innovation and impact. It also allows for expansion of the existing Loan Assistance program, which helps alleviate the burden of repaying educational loans for MBA graduates who pursue careers in the public, nonprofit and social entrepreneurial sectors. The Tamers’ gift will expand this program, increasing the number of alumni it helps as well as the duration of the loan assistance from a maximum of five years to 10 years.
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Published: January 26, 2015
Harvard Business School to Send Out Round 2 Interview Invitations Beginning Tomorrow
As applicants to Harvard Business School (HBS) are probably well aware, Admissions Director Dee Leopold and her team are scheduled to send out the first of its Round 2 interview invitations tomorrow, Wednesday, January 28th. What about the blizzard that’s blanketing the northeastern portion of the United States, you wonder? As of yesterday, Leopold expected that invites will still go out as planned, at noon Boston time. “If we need to delay, we will let you know via this blog, a general announcement on the admissions website and also with a voicemail recording on our general phone line,” she wrote in a post to her Director’s Blog, but as of this writing, no updates.
So, some details about HBS interview invites. They will go out in two waves, one tomorrow, and a second on February 4th. Historically, HBS has sent out the bulk of its invites in the first wave. Leopold offered that her best guess is that roughly 600 applicants will receive invitations tomorrow, with another 200 or so receiving invitations next week. “I've said this before, but please don't speculate or develop theories or algorithms about first vs. second,” she urged. “It doesn't work that way. And it has nothing to do with when you submitted, where you live, or the first letter of your last name.”
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Published: January 22, 2015
MBA Entrepreneurial Grads Report Significant Payoffs
MBA entrepreneurial grads—specifically those who launched startups during or soon after business school— can expect to make as much as their peers who follow more traditional career paths not long out of school, according to survey data collected as part of the Financial Times’ 2015 business school rankings research.
Of the 7,800 MBA graduates from the world’s top 100 business schools who responded to the FT, 22 percent had launched a start-up. Within three years of graduation, the average annual income of these entrepreneurs was $134,000, compared to $132,000 across the entire sample, the FT reports.
A mere 5 percent of startup founders reported an annual salary of zero three years out, though the FT points out that survey respondents did have an option to not reveal their income level, so the data may not fully reflect the financial risk taking faced by entrepreneurial grads. That said, of the companies launched by survey participants, 84 percent did report still operating a full three years later.
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Published: January 21, 2015
Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business Innovates Its Approach to Admissions
Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business wants applicants to the school to walk away feeling good about their experience, regardless of whether they gain acceptance or ultimately enroll. To this end, the school’s admissions team, led by Associate Dean of MBA Admissions Shari Hubert, launched an innovative initiative last spring to understand the applicant’s entire journey through the admissions process—from the moment they begin to research schools right up to their arrival on campus (for those who are admitted and enroll). Their findings have already begun to reshape the Georgetown McDonough admissions process—for the better, Hubert hopes.
Hubert joined Georgetown McDonough in December 2012, coming from a career in campus recruiting for the Peace Corps, Citigroup and General Electric. “I saw a need for us as an admissions office to be more connected to our customers—prospective applicants—to understand what they were going through and how they experience us as they apply to business school,” Hubert says. An MBA applicant herself once (she holds a degree from Harvard Business School), she remembers how daunting the experience can be. “I wanted to engender goodwill no matter what the outcome,” she says. “I wanted them to walk away saying Georgetown is a wonderful institution that lives its [Jesuit] values.” Of course, she also hoped that by creating a more positive experience for applicants, the school would increase its yield.
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Published: January 20, 2015
ESADE Business School Partners with Finnish University to Offer Innovation and Entrepreneurship Programs
Spain’s ESADE Business School has formed a new international alliance with Finland’s Aalto University, a leader in the field of innovation, to expand its offerings for entrepreneurs, ESADE announced today. Aalto University President Tuula Teeri and ESADE Director General Eugenia Bieto signed an agreement outlining the new partnership this morning at ESADECREAPOLIS, the innovation center located on ESADE’s Barcelona campus.
One of Europe’s newest universities, Aalto was created in 2010 by the merger of Helsinki School of Economics, Helsinki University of Technology and the University of Art and Design Helsinki and has received widespread attention for its innovative blend of management, technology and design.
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Published: January 19, 2015
Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management Enhances Focus on Family Business
The Johnson Graduate School of Management is now home to the new Smith Family Business Initiative, which was endowed earlier this year by at $10 million gift from alumnus John Smith, MBA’ 74, and his wife, Dyan Smith. In September, Daniel Garrett Van Der Vliet joined as the new initiative’s director. Van Der Vliet seems the ideal person for the job, coming to Johnson from the University of Vermont, where he spent 14 years building a highly regarded family business program from the ground up.
The Small Family Business Initiative at Johnson will combine family business-focused courses, case competitions for both MBA and undergraduate students across Cornell and executive education non-degree courses and workshops for those involved in running family enterprises.
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Published: January 18, 2015
Global Network for Advanced Management to Offer Three Courses This Semester
The Global Network for Advanced Management (GNAM), an organization of member schools from around the world devoted to facilitating interaction and collaboration in the study of graduate management education, will offer three courses this semester to students throughout its member schools, GNAM announced. This year’s Global Network courses include two new offerings, one on disruption for leaders working in humanitarian crisis, and another on international management. A third course, on the risks and opportunities in global resource systems, originally taught last year, will be offered again this coming semester.
Global Network courses take advantage of web-based technology to connect students from schools around the globe for both class sessions and team-based project work. The set-up allows students to access the expertise of faculty while also developing key cross-cultural collaboration skills as part of their work in virtual teams. Unlike MOOCs—massive open online courses—the Global Network classes are based on a SNOC—small network online course—model and are therefore only open to students from the top business schools that are members of the GNAM.
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Published: January 13, 2015
London Business School Partners with AQR to Launch Asset Management Institute
London Business School (LBS) has partnered with global investment management firm AQR to launch a new institute to advance research surrounding global asset management, the school announced today. Called the AQR Institute of Asset Management, it will fund and generate research in asset management to help individuals and organizations preserve and generate long-term wealth.
Four LBS academic members will lead the AQR Institute: Professors of Finance Francisco Gomes, Ralph Koijen, and Narayan Naik and Professor of Economics Hélène Rey. An advisory council made up of leaders in academia and the asset management industry will also contribute to the institute’s initiatives and growth.
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Published: January 12, 2015
University of Chicago Booth School of Business Welcomes New Associate Director of Admissions
Last month, the University of Chicago Booth School of Business welcomed a new associate director of admissions. Megan Stiphany now leads MBA recruitment and evaluation. She also will oversee Booth’s many on-campus events, including the Campus Visit Program, Booth Live, First Day and the Summer Business Scholars Program.
Stiphany comes to Booth from the University of Notre Dame, where she served for five years as the director of student services for graduate business programs. In this role, she was responsible for Notre Dame’s full-time MBA program, as well as its Master of Science in Accountancy and Master of Science in Management.
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Published: January 11, 2015
UVA’s Darden School of Business Appoints New Dean
A senior partner who leads learning and leadership development for consulting firm McKinsey & Company will serve as the next dean of the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business, the school announced last week. Scott C. Beardsley will assume the role as the business school’s ninth dean beginning August 1st and will also hold the Charles C. Abbott Professorship in Business Administration, as is tradition for the dean.
Beardsley has advised some of the world’s leading companies in his 26 years with McKinsey. From 2011 to 2014, he was an elected member of the firm’s global board of directors, and he has been based for most of his career in McKinsey’s Brussels, Belgium office.
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Published: January 8, 2015
IE Business School’s Global Corporation Center Outlines Future Research Focus
The Global Corporation Center, launched last spring by Spain’s IE Business School and EY (formerly Ernst & Young), will focus its research on three main issues: the valuation of intangible assets, corporate diplomacy and digital transformation, IE announced last month.
IE and EY partnered to launch the new center last April, which will offer workshops, publish research reports and look at challenges, key trends and strategies for 21st century business organizations. “Globalization is influencing countries as well as people and businesses,” said Francisco Navarro, vice dean of IE Business School, who serves as the center’s director. “The Global Corporation Center will examine the impact of this new scenario on corporate strategy.”
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Published: January 5, 2015
GMAC Employers’ Poll Projects Strong 2015 Hiring for MBAs
Nine out of 10 employers planning to hire business school graduates in 2015 expect to hire as many or more than they did in 2014, according to a year-end survey of employers by the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC). GMAC’s 2014 Year-End Poll of Employers, released today, also revealed that more than half of all employers polled plan to increase starting salaries for MBAs in 2015, and the majority (55 percent) will offer internship opportunities to graduate management students.
“The solid job prospects for b-school talent seen over the past several years and again reflected in this poll, gives prospective students good reason to consider pursuing these degrees as part of a strategy to drive their career goals,” Rebecca Estrada Worthington, GMAC’s Survey Research Manager, told India’s Business Standard.
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Published: January 4, 2015
MIT Sloan School of Management Announces New LGBT MBA Fellowship
As part of its commitment to fostering a diverse MBA class, MIT Sloan School of Management will award a new fellowship for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students to one or more members of the class of 2017, the school announced last week. The new Reaching Out LGBT MBA Fellowship will be worth at least $10,000 per year.
“This is the first year that MIT Sloan will award this specific fellowship,” Jeff Carbone, associate director of admissions, said in an article on the MIT Sloan website. He added that the decision to offer the fellowship was a simple one, “because we look for diversity in all forms.”
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Published: January 1, 2015
Columbia Business School Welcomes New Assistant Dean and Dean of Students
On Monday, January 5th, Zelon Crawford will become the new assistant dean and dean of students for the full-time MBA program at Columbia Business School, the school announced last month. Crawford comes to CBS from Villanova School of Business, where she served as director of graduate business programs and recruitment.
At Villanova, Crawford led the MBA and MS program review of academic content, student services, admissions standards and communication and processes to enhance the student experience. She also worked extensively with academic and corporate partners to deliver programs on Villanova’s two campuses and online. In all, she brings more than 15 years of experience at top business schools and companies, having also worked at Temple University’s Fox School of Business, New York University’s Stern School of Business, American Express and Accenture.
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Published: December 30, 2014
Business Schools Adapt to Digital World
With all industries now requiring not only finance and corporate strategy skills, but also digital prowess, business schools are adapting their course offerings to help train MBA students in skills like rapid prototyping and data-driven decision making, according to a recent article in the New York Times.
Cornell Tech in New York City has launched an innovative one-year program bringing MBA candidates and computer science grad students together. The school hopes to enroll 2,000 graduate students by 2034, but in this, the inaugural year for the MBA program, 39 business graduate students share a third of their curriculum with 34 graduate students in computer science, according to the Times. They work together on projects, frequently designing and writing software programs for businesses ranging from banks an hedge funds to technology companies and startups.
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Published: December 29, 2014
Yale SOM Student Semiconductor Startup Wins $150,000 Government Grant
A startup founded by a group of MBA students and faculty from the Yale School of Management (SOM) and based on research by a Yale engineering professor was recently awarded a $150,000 grant from the federal government. Founded by James Lin MBA’15, Alacrity Semiconductors used research by Professor T.P. Ma to develop a product that enables electronic devices to be smaller, run faster and use less power. Specifically, Alacrity is designing a superior dynamic random access memory (DRAM) architecture. “We want people to enjoy the benefits of smaller, faster, cheaper and ultra-low power storage,” Lin said in an article
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