Getting a Harvard MBA: Wiggle room on admissions criteria

I just read "From Bush league to Ivy League: Harvard biz school takes Jenna’s dropout ex-beau", by Jenna Wolf of the Boston Herald. The subject of the article is Blake Gottesman, a Texan who was admitted to the Harvard Business School's MBA program, even though he only attended college for one year. The Herald gleefully dives into Gottesman's association with the Bush family. Besides dating Jenna, he also was George Bush's (MBA '75) personal aide, a job which he got without any formal interview, reports the Herald. The newspaper is clearly questioning how one of the most rigourous MBA programs in the country can accept someone with limited academic experience. The tone of the article strongly suggests that Gottesman's Bush connections helped get him in.

If this student was accepted to the MBA program mainly because of his political connections, it would indeed be very unfair, and unfortunate.

Even if political connections had nothing to do with the Business School's decision, it still reflects quite badly on the Business School. After all, the B-school should only admit the brightest students, with superior business and management abilities, a drive to succeed, and solid undergraduate backgrounds, right?

Wrong. While being smart and having business and management talents should be criteria for the Business School, I do not believe the lack of a college degree should automatically disqualify someone from entering the MBA program. There are some brilliant entrepreneurs and managers who either didn't attend college, or couldn't complete their degree. Bill Gates is one example (although he did complete three years of college as a Harvard undergraduate in the 1970s), and there are others who couldn't attend or finish college because of military service or family issues. They are the types of people who should be given a special look. If they excel in other areas, and their admissions essays and GMAT scores pass muster, why shouldn't they be considered for admissions into Harvard's MBA program?

Related Posts:

The value of an MBA, con't

When education trumps experience

Part-time vs. Full-time, Online, and my Harvard whine

You know it's a slow news day when ...

One of the top five news items on the front page of Yahoo news is "Venezuela expands its influence in Bolivia"

What's up with HESA's Asian Business & Technology Club?

I received an email from HESA two months ago, announcing the creation of the Harvard Extension Asian Business and Technology Club (HEABTC). The email described the group's purpose:

HEABTC's mission is to provide the Extension school community with an access to share ideas and knowledge about Asian business and technology as well as to foster long-term relations among its members, alumni, and Asian business and technology leaders.

This sounded like a good fit for me, so I visited HEABTC's website, and used the online form to sign up for the mailing list. But in two months, I haven't heard a peep from the club, or even an acknowledgement that my submission was received.

I am not sure of HESA's role in overseeing student clubs, but I would suggest to incoming officers that any initiative to launch a new club needs regular follow-up action and publicity to help get it established.

Update: As of May 12, 2010, the club website is still up and running, but no dated events are listed and it's not clear if HESA or anyone else is paying attention (the copyright says 2005. Let's see how long it takes for a HESA administration to notice and do something about it).

(Note: HEABTC shouldn't be confused with another Asian-themed club, the Harvard Extension African-Asian Programs Initiative, which is oriented toward cultural events.)

Advance viewing: Preparing for Summer School film class

It's going to be a busy summer. Besides working on my thesis, I also plan on taking a class at the summer school (Film and History in Postwar Japan and Post-Mao China). As this will potentially lead to a time crunch in July and August, I have been trying to get some of the class readings and outside film viewings out of the way.

The first thing I did was purchase, via Amazon, some of the required books. In April I read Red Sorghum, and halfway finished Inventing Japan.

Additionally, I opened up a basic Netflix account to rent the films required for outside view. Even though most are obscure Chinese and Japanese films that few have ever heard of in this country, I was pleasantly surprised to see that Netflix had almost every single DVD in stock.

Thus far, my wife and I have watched two since signing up for Netflix: Ju Dou (菊豆) by Zhang Yimou (张艺谋) and The Blue Kite (藍風箏), directed by Tian Zhuangzhuang (田壯壯).

I have seen a few of Zhang's films before, and Ju Dou was very recognizable, thanks to Gong Li's (巩俐) role, as well as Zhang's stylistic use of color and the inevitable tragedies that befall the characters. It occured to me that this film must have been very interesting to many Chinese viewers when it first came out in 1989. Set in the 1920s, there is no obvious reference to the party, and while traditional Chinese culture and society are portrayed in a negative way, the heroes of the film -- if you can call them that -- suffer mainly because of their passionate love for each other, rather than the injustices of pre-Communist society. In a way, they can be viewed as cursed because they flaunt the rules of Chinese society of this time. I won't give any more away; see the DVD on your own and make your own judgements.

I enjoyed The Blue Kite far more than Ju Dou. This is partially because it appeals to my academic interest in the policies of the Chinese Communist Party, but also because it is beautifully evocative of China in a way that the carefully staged and shot Ju Dou isn't. Ju Dou looks like it was shot in a movie studio; The Blue Kite often looks like it was shot in a real hutong (胡同), with steam, dust, and dirt always present. Even the indoor shots use lots of natural light. It's sometimes hard to keep track of all the characters and their relationships with each other, but director Tian does a great job of bringing to life 1950s and 1960s China and the CCP policies that turned society upside-down.

I believe Tian's The Blue Kite gives a few symbolic nods to Orson Welles' Citizen Kane. The most obvious is the blue kite itself, which represents (in my view) Tietou's brief moment of childhood happiness and love amidst a series of family tragedies and social upheavals, much in the way rosebud symbolized Kane's childhood joy before his life was upended by forces beyond his control.

The Blue Kite also has some similarities with a short story I wrote for my first Harvard Extension School class, and was selected for publication in the 2002 Harvard Summer Review: Black Classes . The title refers to the "five black classes" (黑五类), elements of society which the Chinese Communist Party once identified as undermining the revolution. Like the latter part of The Blue Kite, my short story Black Classes examines the policies of the Chinese Communist Party during the Cultural Revolution (文化大革命) and how it impacts the life of a young boy.

HESA election results

Just got this message from the Harvard Extension Student Association:

The HESA Election Committee would like to announce the following results of the past weeks election:

Candidates for President / Votes

Lorena Corona / 93
Cristina Monfasani / 84
Charles Mulvey / 78

Candidates for Vice President / Votes

Kristin Sarkisian / 95
John Barrett / 58
Mark Edwards / 56
Rob Steinnagel / 17

Congratulations to Lorena Corona, the incoming HESA President and Kristin Sarkisian, the incoming Vice President. Lorena and Kristin will take office on June 2, 2006. A ceremony to welcome the new leadership will be announced soon.

Thesis Update: Faculty Director Found!

I haven't blogged about the status of my thesis or my research since February. It's not because I've reached a dead end, or have writer's block. My thesis proposal (embryonic version here) was approved in February, and since then, the Extension School and myself have been shopping it around to Harvard faculty who may be interested in serving as my thesis director.

It took a few months, but as of this month, an FAS professor (my first choice, no less!) has tentatively agreed to be my thesis director. After the spring exams are over we'll have a meeting to discuss my research and the thesis-writing process. I'll post updates and perhaps some draft material over the summer and into the fall.

Google Trends and Lexis/Nexis' missed opportunity

In case you haven't heard, there's a new automated content analysis tool (more specifically, computer-assisted text analysis, or CATA, as discussed here) on the Web called Google Trends. Type a term into the box, and you get two charts, one showing how often that term has been searched for in Google, and one showing how often that term has appeared in Google News. Enter two terms, and you get a side-by-side comparison, like this one, charting Harvard and Yale:
Harvard is on top, Yale on bottom (unfortunately, the colors are reversed). The letters point to events that might explain spikes, as described here. Unfortunately, the data only goes back two years, which probably coincides with the date some bright light at Google dreamed up this project.

After playing with Google Trends for a few minutes, I couldn't help but wonder why Reed Elsevier (owner of Lexis/Nexis) didn't create something like this five or ten years ago. A simple charting engine could really help academics, government users, and statisticians make sense out of all the data stored in its archives, and identify important trends. It could have also put Lexis/Nexis in a stronger position to compete against the likes of Google News and other aggregators which are surely eating Lexis/Nexis' lunch right now.

Instead, users have to deal with an interface that is barely an improvement over a command-line prompt. If they want charts, they need to manually enter the data themselves into Excel and use the chart wizard.

If I sound bitter, it's because I am! I spent the better part of the winter doing just that to analyze news content from the New China News Agency. Grrrr.

Silber's golden parachute from Boston University

Just when I thought that Boston University had finally cut all of its loyalties to former President and Chancellor John Silber, I spot this article in the NYT which says he collected collected $6.1 million last year from the University, two years after he officially stepped down! From the article:

The money includes $3.3 million in deferred compensation from the 32 years that Dr. Silber worked at the university and a house in the Chestnut Hill neighborhood of Boston that university trustees agreed he could live in for the rest of his life. Living in the house was valued at $305,000 a year. The package also includes $770,000 from an unusual arrangement in which the university rewarded Dr. Silber with an extra year's salary for every five years worked.

Boston University has some of the highest tuition rates in the country, effectively shutting out thousands of lower-income kids. The idea that Silber gets lifetime housing and six extra salary payments (for 30+ years of service) is ridiculous. Imagine Larry Summers being able to stay in the mansion on Brattle Street, or collecting an extra year's salary upon leaving Harvard this July 1, while librarians and other staff barely make enough money to live on! Thankfully that won't be happening (although I am sure he wouldn't mind -- the Brattle Street house is really nice!).

However, I am not sure I can dispute Silber's "deferred compensation," as it seems that this was an arrangement based on yearly contributions based on his contract with the University, and it's conceivable that the money could have accrued millions in investment returns and interest.