Post By:
Meg Meyer
Meg Meyer
MBA/MPH, 2012
As a
Graduate Admissions Assistant, there are several questions that I am frequently
asked by prospective students who are interested in Boston University’s MBA
programs. Hopefully my answers to those
questions will be helpful for those of you who are considering applying and coming
to BU.
1) What
do you like most about BU’s School of Management? And why did you choose to come here?
My
most straightforward answer to this question is --- the people. Before deciding to come to BU, I visited a
class, went to an information session, and also to an open house for admitted
students. At each of these events when I met current students who were on
panels and available to answer my questions, I thought they seemed smart,
approachable, down to earth, and ambitious. They had diverse interests
and seemed like people I would be excited about being in a classroom
environment with. This proved to be true throughout my time here. I would say that I learned just as much from
my classmates as I did from professors and I made wonderful friends along the way.
2) What
is your relationship with your professors like?
I
went to a small liberal arts undergraduate school that prioritized small class
sizes, and individual attention from professors so I thought these things would probably
not be as big of a priority at a large University like BU. I was wrong.
Given that participation is part of your grade in most classes,
Professors at SMG really get to know their students by name. All professors have office hours and respond
to emails as well. While there are
teaching assistants for some classes, they do not teach in the class, professors
do. This is all to say that if you want
to develop a close relationship with your professors at BU School of Management,
you definitely can.
3) How
do you like being in Boston?
Boston
is a fantastic city to be a student in.
I am originally from Minnesota but lived in Boston for 2 years prior to
starting Grad School and knew I wanted to stay here. Given the amount of universities in this
area, there are so many opportunities for conferences, networking, case
competitions, etc. just within a 10 mile radius. Boston may not be as exciting as a bigger
city like New York but it still has a lot to offer and I appreciate that it is manageable, beautiful, historic, and very walkable.
4) Is
there a career center to help you find an internship and job?
The
Feld Career Center is a great resource on Campus. It is located right in the School of
Management building and has office hours for both full-time and part-time
students throughout the entire year.
There are career counselors available to meet with you and some are even
specialized in different areas of interest (ie. healthcare, consulting,
etc.). As a full-time student you are
required to do two things: submit your resume and do a mock interview. The rest is up to you...you can meet with
your career counselor to talk about potential career paths, do interview prep, and
even talk about salary negotiation. You
can attend seminars, career days, and information sessions that they host. They also manage a database of jobs and
internship postings available to students and sometimes bring companies to
campus for recruiting events and career fairs.
5) Is it okay if my background is not very quantitative or math-based?
MBA
students at BU come from all different kinds of backgrounds and it is totally
fine if you’re not a math whiz (in fact, I avoided math like the plague when I
was an undergrad!). A good amount of MBA
students focused on business, finance, or econ during their undergraduate
education but many others focused on humanities or the arts. It is my opinion that during the first
semester the classes are designed to get everyone on the same page about the
basic core areas of business. Many of
these are quantitative but they do
not involve overly-complex math. Also, I
found that my classmates who were strong in quantitative subjects were more
than willing to work with me on subjects that were more challenging for me
through study groups or tutoring.
6) What
would you say the culture of the school is?
In
a word – collaborative. Nishant Sharma
summarized it well in his blog post here
but I’ll explain it in my own words as well.
BU’s academic emphasis on teamwork starts on day 1 of orientation and
continues throughout the time you spend here.
Most classes bring in some kind of a team project and grades are even
shared with your teammates so everyone has a mutual incentive to work together to
produce the best product possible. I
also found that many students form study groups that meet outside class or work
on problem sets together. For the most part I would say that MBA students work very hard on class work but they also balance this out with social activities and fun and that becomes part of the school culture as well.
Meg is a recent graduate of the dual-degree MBA/MPH program in which she studied Global Health Management. Her full-time job is now to look for a job. You may find her running around Boston with a
backpack on or challenging people to
dance-offs.
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