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Seeking Shelter in Business Schools
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Jenny Cheng, 31, a financial analyst at Booz Allen Hamilton in Northern Virginia, recently attended a Manhattan GMAT session to consider enrolling in a preparation course, but she said she is so concerned about timing that she is holding off one year.
"I feel like, because of all the job layoffs, that 2010 will be a better time," Cheng said, adding that she might apply for a part-time program so she can continue working. "I've heard a lot of Booz Allen employees say the company doesn't like people doing full-time MBA programs, but they encourage part-time so they don't lose an employee."
One night at a Manhattan GMAT session, several students gathered at the testing company's Washington office on 14th Street NW to discuss their test anxieties with Yang. James Elliott, who said he is so concerned about the increased competition that he may hire a consultant to review his application, wanted to know whether the verbal and math sections are weighted equally.
"Yes, they are officially. But the truth is that statistical distribution . . . is not even in each area," Yang said. "About a third of the people that take this test are non-U.S. citizens, and they tend to be very good at math and kinda lousy at verbal. In reality, it's a lot harder to get a very high math percentile."
It was once regarded as standard for business school applicants to have a few years of job experience before being admitted. In a downturn that could last months or years, however, more and more young people are trying to obtain an MBA as soon as possible, experts said.
Many MBA students say they feel grateful that the timing of their enrollment enabled them to bypass the job carnage in the financial sector. Among them is Stefanie Snider, a first-year Georgetown business school student admitted from a waiting list.
Snider and Munguía, who are on a small academic team together, talked recently about an upcoming class visit -- dubbed "Wall Street Week" -- to investment banking and consulting firms.
"It's going to be interesting to see what they're like now. Some of them have actually canceled," said Snider, an aspiring green developer eager to visit the investment management firm Cohen & Steers.
She turned to Munguía and asked, "You were going to go to Wall Street Week, right?"
"I prefer to go places like FINCA or the World Bank," said Munguía, a native of El Salvador who wants to specialize in microfinance and return home to help his country's struggling lower and middle classes.
For those on the outside looking in, business school, with its cachet in the job market, is an enticing reprieve. But not just any reprieve will do, according to Elliott, who said his 401(k) investments lost 20 percent of their value since the market collapsed.
A lower-tier business school, he said, may not be worth the tuition. "You have to think about the cost-benefit ratio," he said.
