Harvard Business School (HBS) has earned a prestigious place among the best business schools in the nation. It had its foundation in the year 1908. Every year, the B-school is sought by one of the most of the qualified MBA applicants who find HBS as a top choice for shaping up their career aspirations. However, only a few selective candidates get to be admitted in the prestigious Harvard School. These lucky candidates can look forward to participating in exciting case-focused classes led by some of the brightest minds. This is coupled with the advantage of incredible employment prospects not only across the nation but also throughout the world. For highly qualified MBA applicants, applying to HBS should be a given and attending the school if admitted should, in most cases, be a decision solely between Stanford and Harvard Business School. It is just like having another feather on the cap, albeit at an extravagant cost.
Admissions and Tuition:
Akin to its peers, Harvard Business School is remarkably exclusive B-school. The institution places stringent selection criteria on students and takes care in admitting only the deserving quality students. Statistics well testify the figures. Out of the total 9000 applicants, only about 15% of the applicants are admitted each year, placing the school among the most selective business schools in the country and thus its students the most qualified once. .
Compared to yield rates (yield rate is known as the rate of return) of other top MBA programs like those of Stanford and Wharton, HBS enjoys a yield rate of 90% which is higher and more impressive. This signifies HBS offers the most sought-after MBA degree in the country. Without a doubt, this makes applying to Harvard an intimidating experience for many applicants, and the “opaque and mysterious” nature of this process, as described by one applicant, certainly does not help matters.
While admission into the institute is a task in itself, the institute has taken efforts in helping students by making the HBS website user friendly. The site offers students all the aid and advice is to prepare for their applications and helping them to attain a peace of mind and assurance throughout the admission process that soon they will have the stamp of “the” Harvard institute on their resume which will ease out their lives forever.
It would then be quiet an acceptable fact that a well known B-school like HBS would require their students to shell out a bit extra then its peers.
Unsurprisingly, the yearly tuition fee for academic year 2008-2009 at HBS was amongst the highest in the country, at $43,800 for the 2008-2009. According to data compiled in part by Business Week, the total program cost, including foregone salary, of an HBS MBA is over $300,000 for an average student. Further according to the institute, this is a relatively small price to pay for an MBA from Harvard, demonstrated by the fact that students of the school experience a 29% increase in average salary when they leave the school, Now, anyone would be wanting to go in for such an extravagant institute when he or she is sure that they are going to get a bombshell increment in your pay package.
Academics and Curriculum:
Professors at HBS are known to rely on the case method in their classrooms, as this case method approach was established by the Harvard Business School faculty themselves and is now adapted by other institutes as well. The beauty of this school lies in the teaching style itself. In this teaching method, the professor shifts his role from lecturer into discussion leader thereby helping students to learn by debating and exploring various topics related in and around business, instead of one sided listening method where students give their hear to the subjects but not their heart.. The case study method approach is so well built that it is capable of offering a communication and interaction platform to the shyest students room with their bright professors as well as their fellow classmates thus improving their interpersonal skills which will help them in their career paths, no matter which field they desire to go to or whatever company they wish to select.
During their first year at HBS, students enroll in required courses in 90-student sections, and will likely experience their most demanding and rigorous academic year. If successful, these demanding years will make their lives easy and .In the second and final year at the business school, students can opt from as many as 100 electives from various subjects, and are by and large proficient in securing a seat in most of their preferred classes at some point throughout the year.
The current curriculum of HBS is framed in such a way that students have a non-competitive approach during their course. It however remains to be seen how the school’s change in policy, which sets rolls for the class of 2008 and successive classes to publish GPAs on their resumes thus introducing an air of competitiveness in the students at the business school..
Based on the fact that HBS students arguably have the best and most reliable employment prospects in the country, one can predict that levels of competition will remain reasonable, since there will likely always be plenty of jobs to go around for HBS students, given the fact of the institute of course!
Quality of Life:
Most of the students reside at the residential campus of Harvard Business School, thus gaining an exceptional benefit by helping them to form close relationships with fellow classmates, creating a friendly environment among the quite large HBS student body. During cold Massachusetts winters, students who reside on campus are spared lengthy commutes and can avoid the elements altogether by walking to class through underground tunnels that connect campus buildings. Among these buildings, the HBS library is probably the most remarkable, and is regarded by many as the finest business library in the world. When not spending time in this impressive library and the rest of the magnificent HBS campus, students can enjoy the many restaurants and bars throughout Cambridge, and can access Boston easily through public transportation. To obtain this extravagant experience and envy their friends and relatives, HBS students often shouldn’t mind the huge cost involved in experiencing such a lifestyle. After all, you are one amongst the very few who are admitted to ‘the’ Harvard institute.
Employment Prospects:
In nearly all fields, job opportunities for Harvard Business School students are matchless. The brand name HBS for MBA is highly respected world over as any resume on which the HBS name is placed immediately rises to the top of the pile. Students of HBS have everlasting opportunities throughout business school to meet the school’s alumni, who help them with referrals that help them bag a dream jobs in every corner of the world. The opportunities range from various specialization areas with the core ones being Finance, Marketing amongst others.
There is no reason to exaggerate the remarkable value of HBS’s alumni network as a resource to students, and one could not deny the fact that access to this network may in itself defend the high cost of attending HBS. Most students have multiple options for both summer employment and post-graduation employment, as more than 400 employers come to the HBS campus annually to conduct interviews for summer jobs, while twice that number make the trip to conduct interviews for post-graduation positions. Further, the career services office of the school is dedicated and greatly resourceful, even though many students find jobs early in their search and do not need to rely greatly on this office. Altogether, about 94% of HBS students have bagged jobs by graduation in a typical year.
In Sum:
In a nutshell, Harvard Business School is in general considered one of the finest business schools around the globe giving their students the required cutting edge in every required way possible to shape up their demanding lives in a better way. Entering the institute might be a tough ball game, however once you get an entry, your life changes and takes on a different form all together. A stamp of “Harvard” on candidates not only brings a pride but guaranteed job opportunities from all around the world, as seen from the above statistics. Alongside, the different kind of job opportunity and salary hike which one gets is surely going to attract student eyeball towards an HBS seat.
Extremely qualified applicants should not miss the golden opportunity to be a part of this well-known institution, as no three words attach status to an MBA degree than “Harvard Business School”.
Contact Information:
Dillon House
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
617.495.6128 end_of_the_skype_highlighting
http://www.hbs.edu/mba/admissions
Quick Reference:
2009 U.S. News Ranking: 1st (tie with Stanford)
Average GMAT score: 713
Average undergraduate GPA: 3.63
Application fee: $235
Entering class size: 900
Yearly Tuition: $43,800 (2008-2009)
Percent of graduates employed 3 months after graduation: 94%
Average starting salary and bonus: $135,630