mbaMission - Boutique MBA Admissions Consulting » Friday Factoids

Friday Factoid: Tuck Students Go From Hanover to the World

mbaMission — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 16:29:41 +0000

The Amos Tuck School of Business Administration at Dartmouth—aka Tuck—is located in the quaint town of Hanover, New Hampshire. Hanover has a population of only approximately 20,000 and is thus considered a small college town, but “Tuckies,” as the school’s students are known, have no shortage of access to global learning opportunities. Students gain hands-on international experience through the “Tuck Global Consultancy” course, which gives second-year students the chance to put their education into practice worldwide. Since 1997, students in this course have consulted with more than 90 global organizations on more than 135 projects in more than 45 countries. On-site consulting projects are led by small teams of students working under the supervision of Tuck professors with extensive consulting backgrounds. A high percentage of the second-year class participates in this elective, and at the end of the program, students present their findings to their clients from around the globe.

Friday Factoid: Chicago Booth’s Harper Center

mbaMission — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 17:46:44 +0000

Designed by world-renowned architect Rafael Vinoly and completed in 2004 at a cost of $125M, the Charles M. Harper Center houses Chicago Booth’s full-time MBA program. The Harper Center’s Winter Garden—a towering atrium with six-story, glass Gothic arches—is at the heart of the building and serves as a central place where students can study, socialize and hold club meetings. With over 400,000 square feet of space, 12 classrooms (on the downstairs “classroom level”), offices for the entire administration and faculty (on the third, fourth and fifth floors, known as the “faculty floors”), 31 group study rooms, a 3,500 square foot student lounge and a 150-person café, the Harper Center helps shape Chicago Booth’s community and is part of the school’s bold new identity.

For more information on the defining characteristics of the MBA program at Chicago Booth or one of 15 other top business schools, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: Recruiting While Tailgating at Ross

mbaMission — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 16:30:09 +0000

At the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, two seemingly unrelated activities—recruiting and tailgating—come together in a mutually beneficial way. Well-known for “Big Blue” spirit, the Ross School takes advantage of the University of Michigan’s football powerhouse to show off its MBA talent. At each Michigan home game, 200 to 300 MBA students attend tailgates hosted by the Ross Student Association (RSA). The tailgates are sponsored by companies that recruit at Ross and provide a fun way for students to network with prospective employers. At the same time, recruiters and company representatives—who are often Ross alumni—can get to know many students in a casual social setting. Regardless of who wins the football game, RSA tailgates are a win-win for students who mingle with highly sought-after employers and alumni, who in turn love any reason to return to campus!

For more information on Ross or 15 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: Consulting Opportunities at Wharton

mbaMission — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 15:58:59 +0000

Perennially ranked among the top business schools in the world, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania—as its original name, the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce, indicates—is best known for its reputation in finance, which is still the school’s largest department. However, if you are interested in a career in consulting but believe that Wharton is the program of choice for future investment bankers only…well, think again!

Check out these five facts about consulting at Wharton:

Every year since 2005, more Wharton graduates have accepted positions in consulting than in investment banking.
Wharton’s Consulting Club is one of its largest, with more than 800 members—that’s approximately half the students in the MBA program.
One of Wharton’s most popular electives is “Strategy and Competitive Advantage.” Professor Nicolaj Siggelkow, a protégé of strategy guru Michael Porter, is notorious for pushing students to clarify their answers, but if they use trite buzzwords like “adding value” and “frameworks,” they may find themselves in the hot seat for 30 minutes of additional questioning!
The 2010 Consulting Conference was the largest student-run consulting event ever held at Wharton, featuring keynote speeches by the managing director of strategy of Accenture and the vice president of Bain & Company (Los Angeles), as well as panels on topics ranging from new media solutions to sustainable social impact.
In recent years, Wharton’s Consulting Club has hosted an annual case competition for first-year students; winners have been offered summer internships with Boston Consulting Group.

For more information on Wharton or 15 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: Managing $5M at UVA Darden

mbaMission — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 15:52:47 +0000

Many think that because UVA’s Darden School of Business casts itself as a general management program, the school has no specialties. General management, however, is a philosophy that suggests that no business problem can viewed in isolation—for example, a finance problem relates to marketing, a marketing problem relates to operations and so on. In the student club Darden Capital Management (DCM), Darden students can apply general management principles in evaluating equities to understand the entire firm while also specializing in asset management to further their careers in this finance-industry niche.

Through DCM, first-year students pitch long and short investment ideas to second-year student fund managers who oversee $5M of Darden’s endowment, which is divided among five funds, each with its own focal area. Approximately 20 first-year students ultimately “graduate” and run these funds themselves for credit as second-year students, reporting on their investment decisions and performance to Darden’s finance board. Students who manage these funds report that they have had an advantage breaking into asset management, because this hands-on experience gives them plenty to discuss in interviews. Managing $5M will do that…

For more information on UVA’s Darden School or 15 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: Entertainment and Media at NYU Stern

mbaMission — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 17:45:52 +0000

The annual ProMotion Pictures Film Competition at New York University (NYU) Stern is a joint effort by Stern and NYU’s Maurice Kanbar Institute of Film and Television and sponsored by a different corporation each year. In this competition, Stern and Kanbar students develop short films based on the sponsor’s specifications regarding content, length and brand message. The films are judged by a panel of advertising and marketing executives, and the winning teams are given access to the resources of partnering media, entertainment and communications companies to assist in screenplay production. The finished films—which are debuted at New York’s Tribeca Film Center—may be used by the sponsoring brand as part of the parent company’s advertising campaign. Past competition sponsors have included Heineken and Verizon. Winners can receive cash payouts, including $5,000 for “The Brand Prize” and $10,000 for “The People’s Choice Prize.” In 2010, ProMotion created films for ILOVENY, the New York State tourism brand. These films can be seen on JetBlue flights.

This competition is just one part of Stern’s Entertainment, Media, and Technology (EMT) specialization. The school also supports students interested in Entertainment and Media careers with the Media, Entertainment and Sports Association (which sponsors a three-day career trek to Los Angeles) and an annual trip to the Cannes Film Festival (part of the “Craft and Commerce of Cinema” class), and those interested in EMT will find much that caters to their needs.

For more information on NYU Stern or 15 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: The Stanford GSB Student Experience

mbaMission — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 17:11:14 +0000

The Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) is well known for its intimacy, and the school’s small class size allows it to provide students with a unique program of individualized coaching. First-year students at the GSB are assigned a dedicated Faculty Advisor who helps them create a customized plan for fulfilling their General Management Foundations (core) requirements based on their strengths, weaknesses, experiences and interests. Each Faculty Advisor also teaches his/her own small seminar, which meets during the autumn quarter of the first year. These required “Critical Analytical Thinking” (CAT) seminars involve 14–16 students who learn to argue their perspectives on various management issues and develop their written and oral communication skills. This small seminar also helps the advisors and students get to know each other better before they collaborate on the students’ customized curriculum plans. The GSB is also unique in that first-year students are assigned writing coaches in the first quarter to help with CAT’s significant writing assignments. Lastly, students are paired with both a Career Advisor and a Student Life Advisor to help them identify and pursue appropriate leadership opportunities. Needless to write, if you get into the Stanford GSB, you certainly should not worry about falling between the cracks!

For more information on the Stanford GSB or 15 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: UCLA Anderson Student Investment Fund

mbaMission — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 15:28:10 +0000

Many acknowledge UCLA Anderson’s unique connections to the media and entertainment industry. However, far fewer MBA aspirants are aware of the tremendous opportunities Anderson provides to students interested in investment management. Established in 1987, the Anderson Student Investment Fund (SIF) offers a limited-enrollment course that provides students with a hands-on opportunity to apply what they have learned about investment theory. Students must apply for the opportunity to manage this portfolio, valued at more than $2M, as one of 10–12 SIF Fellows by submitting an essay and participating in two rounds of panel interviews. Then, those selected—now in the role of SIF Fellows—engage in investment strategy, asset allocation and security analysis for more than 18 months and explore both value and growth approaches to equity investments, as well as fixed income investments. SIF Fellows get together weekly during the academic year, meet once a month with the Faculty Oversight Committee and visit more than 30 investment professionals throughout the course of their tenure to learn about different investment philosophies. Fellows also receive assistance in securing summer internships in the investment management industry. Those interested in a career in investment management should give Anderson a closer look.

For more information on UCLA Anderson or 15 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: Professor Excellence and Improvement at HBS

mbaMission — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 16:09:54 +0000

Harvard Business School (HBS) is well known for using the case method, through which virtually all of the school’s classes are taught. Rather than resting on their laurels with regard to teaching the case method, however, HBS faculty members work hard to stay at the top of their respective games. Complementing the school’s tradition of faculty-to-faculty mentoring, in 2004, HBS established the C. Roland Christensen Center for Teaching and Learning (named for the late HBS professor) to promote and support teaching excellence and innovation. The center conducts research on pedagogical innovation and teaching effectiveness related to gender and diversity issues, and helps faculty members refine their teaching styles and techniques. The center also offers professors classroom observations and the opportunity to do pre-class planning, receive within-term troubleshooting/post-term feedback and conduct case and course development.

For more information on Harvard Business School or 14 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

Friday Factoid: How MIT Sloan Reviews MBA Applications

mbaMission — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 16:53:23 +0000

How does MIT-Sloan review applications? True to the rigorous analytic nature of its curriculum—in a rigorous analytic fashion! When the admissions office receives an application, the candidate’s information is loaded into a database and the application is printed. Rod Garcia, who has been admissions director for MIT-Sloan for the past decade, first reviews every application online, then distributes applications randomly among readers, all of whom are either internal admissions staff members or contract readers. After picking up a batch of applications, readers review, score and then return them one week later. The scores are entered into the database, where Garcia reviews them to determine which candidates will be interviewed.

After the selected candidates have been interviewed, their applications are scored again, and the committee then decides which ones to admit. Application scoring is based on nine attributes, which Sloan divides into two major groups: demonstrated success (e.g., GPA, GMAT, work accomplishments) and leadership (e.g., high competency in creativity, relationship building, goal setting, influencing). Each attribute group is scored separately, and the two scores are added together. At mbaMission, we always tell candidates that MBA admissions is not a science—yet at MIT Sloan, there is some after all…

For more information on MIT-Sloan or 14 other leading MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.