Posts filed under 'News'
We continue with our series called “Wait It Out,” where we address many of the issues facing people thinking about business school in the current climate. Check back often as you contemplate your own business school choice!
We have talked a bit in previous posts about the effect of the economy on business school. But it looks like the Wall Street refugees aren’t the only folks contributing to the increase in b-school applications; we now have an increase in international students seeking out spots in MBA programs here in the US.
The reason for the increase? In a blog post this week, our friends at MBA Mission highlighted this other interesting factor affecting business school applications: the weakened US dollar. They noted an article from the Financial Times – “Falling Dollar Draws Students” – which discusses how the low US dollar is making American business school programs more attractive and affordable for international students. The article sites the fact that the GMAC has seen a 21% increase in international students registering for the GMAT test, with some MBA programs seeing the international applicant pool increasing by as much as 50% this year.
July 11th, 2008
If you haven’t heard by now, the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) – the body that administers the GMAT – is planning to revoke the GMAT scores of test-takers it feels cheated on the test or otherwise violated the rules. The cheaters, who were users of the ScoreTop VIP service, are alleged to have actively traded and distributed test questions still in use on the test (so called ‘live’ questions). ScoreTop users who have their scores revoked will be barred from attending business school. Those who have already graduated could lose their degrees.
The ScoreTop scandal raises a number of questions for GMAT test-takers, even if you haven’t previously thought about cheating. Below, the answers to a few:
What did ScoreTop users do wrong, exactly?
It seems pretty obvious that people who cheat on the GMAT should have their scores revoked. It could be difficult to say who those people were, because what constitutes cheating in this case is open to some interpretation. More troublingly, many ScoreTop users probably didn’t intend to cheat (or know they were cheating). The ‘live’ questions were presented as original questions written by ScoreTop. The ScoreTop VIP section included legitimate content in addition to ‘live’ content. It could have been hard to distinguish the good from the bad.
Potentially, any user of the ‘live’ questions is at risk. GMAC’s rules for GMAT test takers, now posted on ScoreTop’s website, state clearly: You are responsible for making sure your preparation materials don’t violate our intellectual property rights (emphasis theirs). The good news is that GMAC has said that it will revoke the scores of only those users who ‘knowingly’ cheated. GMAC’s main targets are users who posted ‘live’ questions on the site or elsewhere. Others, who commented on questions being ‘live’ (or referred to them as ‘Jungle Juice,’ in the site’s lingo) also have cause to be concerned. Casual users of the site, including all those who were unaware of the ‘live’ questions, should have nothing to worry about.
Is it wrong to use ‘live’ questions to study?
No, seriously. The stakes are high. The ‘live’ questions are out there. Other test-takers are using them. Should you
Eventually, every business school student is presented with a question very much like this one in the mandatory ethics class. The class will weigh the pros – little discernable harm to others, low probability of getting caught, greater likelihood of you becoming rich and donating millions to charity – against the cons – poorly prepared B-school students, a real (if discreet) harm to society, and the fact that it’s just plain wrong.
Save the argument for B-school. The answer on this one is: don’t cheat. It is wrong, but if you needed another reason, the truth is, cheaters don’t get much of a leg up. There are thousands of ‘live’ questions in use by GMAC at any time, and a cheater could realistically find and memorize only a handful. Most of the questions will be new to you, and even memorizing just tough questions won’t help you much (see below). If that isn’t enough to sway you, think about business school as the first step in a new, successful, and most likely challenging career. You want to get off on the right foot. You don’t want to run the risk of getting caught and seeing it disappear. And you do want to sleep soundly now - there will be plenty of ethical dilemmas down the road.
How will this effect test scores?
A few bloggers and readers have posited the interesting theory that, by virtue of cheating, the Scoretop VIP test-takers impacted others’ scores dramatically. With a few cheaters scoring highly and answering difficult questions missed by other, non-cheating test-takers, it’s suggested that the average score would be increased and normally high-value questions diminished in importance.
It’s an interesting theory. The GMAT is scored to maintain a bell curve distribution, with roughly two-thirds of testers scoring between 400 and 600. Scoring is based upon a test-taker’s overall performance (both number of questions answered correctly and the difficulty of those questions) and adjusted to maintain the target distribution. Cheaters who repeatedly answered questions correctly, especially high-value ones, and achieved high total scores could wreak havoc on GMAT scoring.
It seems unlikely to me, though. This is mainly because of the small pool of potential cheaters, the large pool of potential questions, and the adaptive nature of the test. With only 6,000 or so Scoretop VIP members (and likely no more than a small fraction actively cheating) out of a test pool of over 200,000, the cheaters’ impact is necessarily limited. Perhaps more important is the likelihood that even active cheaters would see only a handful of familiar questions, as discussed above. Putting aside the relative values of the different questions, the large number of questions not previously seen would carry much more weight in the cheaters’ final scores. Even the value of cheating on high-value questions would be limited; with an adaptive test like the GMAT the only reward for answering tough questions correctly is…more tough questions. On those occasions when a high-value question was answered correctly by a cheater, the next question would be similarly difficult (or even harder) and likely previously unseen. Incorrect answers would, over time, correct for the cheating. The total impact on non-cheaters scores would be very slight.
This isn’t the first cheating scandal to hit the GMAT, and it won’t be the last. The key to staying the clear remains the same; you should actively try to use only legitimate test prep services and tools, like Integrated Learning and the materials published by the GMAC, that we have always recommended - the Official Guide for GMAT Review, etc.
By the way, be sure to check out the “IL700: Weekly GMAT Challenge” where we offer a new GMAT practice problem each week. (We make every effort to maintain the look, feel, and complexity of the real exam with our challenge questions, while respecting all copyright laws and the policies of GMAC.)
July 9th, 2008
To give you even more GMAT practice, every Monday the About.com Business School Blog will feature a new exclusive Integrated Learning GMAT practice question. The answer will be posted the following Tuesday. So, check it out and see how you do! And while you are there, click around on the rest of the Business School pages on About.com for lots of other great resources including b-school profiles, career advice, admissions tips, etc
And, don’t forget about the IL700: Weekly GMAT Challenge here on our blog. The road to 700 starts one question at a time!
April 28th, 2008
Although we usually shy away from writing about our competition - we’d rather you figure out why we’re better than us going negative on them - we want to take a rare moment out to congratulate Zeke Vanderhoek, founder of ManhattanGMAT. We love good entrepreneurial ideas, even when they come from our competitors.
Recently covered in the New York Times, Zeke has founded a new charter school in Manhattan, differentiating itself with extremely high teacher salaries. Teachers do amazing things and have enormous responsibility: they have responsibility to educate our sons and daughters. Yet they are often paid wages that no one could survive on and are certainly out of sync with their importance in our society. Offering a decent salary is a good thing to do, and we definitely support it.
We have never had any beef with ManhattanGMAT - their philosophy is sound and we know that they, like us, have extremely rigid standards for hiring and teaching the GMAT. When students ask us to compare ourselves against the competition, we have plenty to say about the other guys, but the truth is that we are more closely aligned to ManhattanGMAT than we are against them. Just about the only difference is that we offer the same high quality lessons and philosophies at about half the price.
And so we salute Zeek for his continued ingenuity. ManhattanGMAT keeps us on our toes, ensuring that we are providing the best product out there. Good business ideas beget good business ideas, and we’re happy to acknowledge this one.
March 8th, 2008
America has been exporting jobs for years, now they are exporting business school degrees too. Well, not exactly. The New York Times reports in this article that the Anderson School of Business at UCLA, among other programs, has teamed up with a university in another country, in this case the National University of Singapore to offer students joint degrees from both institutions.
The concept is that globalization has created a niche for business leaders with international experience and intimate knowledge of how other countries function. It’s a symbiotic relationship for American and International students to learn in and about other countries.
“In our global access courses, we challenge teams, in a language that is not that of the United States, to drop an egg from two stories without breaking it,” said Andrew Policano, dean of the Merage School. “One must learn to innovate with other cultures.”
Judy Olian, dean of the Anderson School at U.C.L.A., agreed. “It is critical to learn other cultures,” she said. “We are taking entrepreneurial leaders to operate in Palestine and Israel, in India and China…That has not been thought of as the mission of business schools, but it is in the emerging world of today. If we did not do this, we could be accused of staring at our own navel.”
Other relationships include University of Southern California’s The Marshall School of Business and Jiao Tong University in Shanghai, the University of California, Irvine and Indian Institute of Technology, Peking University Beijing, and City University of Hong Kong.
February 25th, 2008
With talk of a recession and a declining job market, we continue with our series called “Wait It Out,” where we address many of the issues facing people thinking about business school in the current climate. Check back often as you contemplate your own business school choice!
In our previous post, we discussed some basic reasons for why people would want to go to school during a slow-down in the economy, particularly if they’ve been laid off. Jobs are tougher to find, and even if a job is out there, getting paid the salary you expect is still a tough thing to do. If you are carrying student loans from college or you’re not sure if you’re competitive enough in the market, b-school may be a good place to hide out, bolster your resume, and emerge ready to take on the world.
Of course, the downside to that thinking is that if you’re thinking it, chances are other people are thinking it, too. When the economy goes south, lots of people hide out in school, increasing competition for space in the country’s business schools.
What can you expect in 2008/2009? We took a look at previous economic downturns and to show that, yes, in fact, people will go back to school, in droves.
From these two tables it is pretty clear that more people take GMAT tests and send in applications when the economy goes south. And whether or not Mr. Bernanke defines this time as a recession, the signs of a downward economy are everywhere.
What’s the lesson from all this? Should you stay out of business school? The right way to answer that question is to decide if you are, in fact, ready for b-school. Does your resume show solid experience, and do you have a specific goal in mind for what to do with your MBA? Will you be contributing member to your class? Going to b-school should always be for the right personal reasons, and not because it feels like the right thing to do.
That said, if it is the right time for you, then there is no reason to shy away from it just because of increased competition. Applying for school forces you to evaluate yourself and your capabilities, and put pen to paper about who you are and what you want out of your career. Increased competition is an opportunity to look deeply into yourself and present the best picture of yourself to the admissions committees.
February 22nd, 2008
With talk of a recession and a declining job market, we begin a series of monthly posts called “Wait It Out,” where we will address many of the issues facing people thinking about business school in the current climate. Check back often as you contemplate your own business school choice!
With the economy sagging, you may wonder whether now is a good time to enroll in a business school. While I cannot answer for you personally, I can say that many find it an appealing option.
“If things are not necessarily going well, especially in the financial market, it might be a good time to take a year or two out, especially if you’re intending to get an MBA,” says John Roeder, director of admissions at Vanderbilt’s Owen Graduate School of Management.
College graduates hoping to gain a few years of work experience under their belt before heading off for an advanced degree may discover that it is hard to find job come May. Unemployment is at a two year high of 5 percent and the number of new jobs being created is at its lowest since the weeks following Hurricane Katrina. So if the goal is to attend business school at some point in one’s career, why not do it now and get it out of the way? Two years down the line the economy may be in better shape. If it’s not, then at least one would be better qualified for a seemingly more palatable job. That’s the logic that propels some graduates to apply while the economy lags.
If you have some work experience under your belt, the timing may be even better. As was reported in this New York Times article during the last recession, Eric Landry was laid off from his Texas software job along with 350 co-workers. He seized the opportunity to earn a masters in software engineering at the University of Texas in Austin. ‘’I have always wanted to go back to school and get the software training that I need to go to the next level,'’ Mr. Landry said. ‘’But it was never the right time.'’ Prior to being laid off, he was not ready to forgo his earnings to undertake a new debt. But without a job and a weak economy (he is not likely to find a new position offering the same salary) and with government loans, the entire graduate school package was appealing.
“We’ve seen trends that indicate that when there’s a downturn in the economy—especially if people are laid off—that people always consider that a good time to go back for more education,” says Debbie Berechman, executive director of the MBA program at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, as quoted in this Business Week article. “But it’s not clear exactly what that means now, and it depends on how much of a downturn there is.”
February 4th, 2008