Are there any other innovative elements to Yale's approach in addition to the new curriculum?
The new curriculum certainly is the main thing, but there are a lot of aspects as you drill down into it that are really interesting. For example, one of the classes is a problem-framing class.
That's a specific response to feedback from recruiters, alumni, and other business leaders who said that one of the problems with MBA graduates
– not just at Yale, but everywhere – is that they really don't know how to frame a problem properly, and that that's really the biggest part of being able to solve a problem. So we have a class in the first-year core curriculum that's specifically focused on learning how to frame problems, with the thinking being exactly that – if you can frame a problem properly, then you're more than half of the way to solving it.
Another aspect of the new curriculum is that it's more case-based than in the past. In a lot of schools, cases are these ready-made packets that you read. The problem is already set up for you and you know where things are going. With the SOM curriculum, there's a lot more primary data, a lot more raw data, that's being presented to students, and they're asked to make sense of it. The idea, again, is that when you're in the real world, you're not presented with a marketing, finance, or operations problem.
You're simply presented with a problem and you have to solve that problem.
Part of the issue is identifying what that problem is and how best to approach it.
By working with the primary source data, the students have to really identify the problem for themselves and be able to figure out the best way to solve it, rather than having something that is already set up for them and they just have to go through the steps of finishing off the solution.
Yale has a reputation for being more open-minded about applicants with non-traditional backgrounds. Is that an accurate description?
I think that's probably right. I can't speak about other programs in terms of
how open-minded they are, but I think, relative to other top 20 schools, we have
a higher percentage of students with what one would consider non-traditional
backgrounds. I think that's one of the strengths of the school – that we actually have a very diverse student body. Everyone is not coming from the same place and not focused on going to the same places.
There is a real diversity in the student makeup. That's something that we like and something that we want to continue.
How do "purpose, passion, and accountability" come into play in a student's everyday life?
We want people who are driven toward a goal and who are passionate about that goal, and
who are doing things to move forward in achieving it, regardless of what it is. We want people who are active and engaged, think for themselves, and really get involved. That's where the purpose and the passion come in, and certainly accountability. We always want people who think about not just what they want to do but how they want to do it, and that they're not just doing the right things but doing them in the right way.
I think there's a real culture on campus that's very collegial, very collaborative, and that fosters a strong sense of accountability on the part of all the students in the sense that their colleagues rely on them. Whether it's in a club, study group, group project, or presentation, students are working together and they need to rely on each other and also hold up their end of the bargain in terms of how they handle themselves and how they interact with other students.
What benefits can students derive from access to the broader university?
Tremendous benefits. I think Yale is unique among business schools in that it has the resources of such a first-rate university at its disposal. For example, in the second year, students take all electives and they can take their electives anywhere at the university, not just at SOM. So if they are interested in real estate, for example, they can take a real-estate law class at Yale Law School. Or they can take a class on the environment or sustainable development at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. If they're interested in health care, they can take classes at
the Yale School of Medicine or the Yale School of Public Health. It's tremendous to have those types of opportunities open to students to take basically whatever classes they want at the university and to tailor their education to suit their interests.
Beyond that, there are obviously a lot of extracurricular activities at the university that they can tap into. In addition, the alumni networks of the broader university and SOM are very tightly integrated.
When graduates go to alumni events, often they're jointly run with the Association of Yale Alumni, which is the undergraduate alumni association, in conjunction with the SOM Alumni Association. So they're really able to tap into the broader university community both while they're here and also after they've graduated and are moving through their careers.
Your program requires the students to have two years of full-time study in residence, correct?
Right – there are no exchange programs.
What international opportunities are available to them?
With the new curriculum there's one very prominent international opportunity. The International Experience is a ten-day, mandatory trip that's part of the first-year curriculum that all first-year students take. It happens in early January between the semesters.
In January 2007, the entire first-year class went to one of eight different locations throughout the world: China, Japan, Costa Rica, a combined trip to England and Poland, India, Singapore, and another combined trip to South Africa and Tanzania. This is an opportunity for them to learn about a different business environment, one other than the U.S., that will broaden their perspective and give them a better insight into how they do business.
Page
1
2
3
4
