Welcome to another edition of Trivia Tuesday, our weekly look at the policies and programs that impact the student experience at the leading business schools. In past columns we’ve examined the organization of Harvard’s first-year class and the use of teams at Wharton, Tuck and Kellogg. Today we turn our attention to the Chicago GSB’s incoming class, taking a closer look at the smaller groups that help to structure that school’s first-year experience.
Chicago organizes its 550 first-year students into 10 cohorts, and within the cohorts, into 8-9 squads. New students learn their cohort and squad assignments on the first day of CORE, the two-week Chicago pre-term program. Later in the pre-term, the cohorts take a three day camping trip, during which they participate in teambuilding activities and get to know one another better before the beginning of the academic year in late September.
Cohorts
Cohorts are purposefully assembled so that each represents the diversity of the class as a whole, with an eye to varying age, gender and professional and ethnic background within the group. The GSB’s cohorts maintain their names from year to year – Rockefeller, Nobels, Phoenix, Walker, Gargoyles, Bond, Maroons, Harper, Davis and Stuart – creating connections between the students and alumni from each cohort.
Students take the required LEAD class with their cohorts, and the cohort is also the base unit from which members of the Graduate Business Council, Chicago’s student government body, are elected (two per cohort per class). Inter-cohort competitions, such as a series of poker nights with a year-end tournament, take place throughout the first year at Chicago. Despite these activities, Chicago’s cohorts do not seem to foster the strong links created in cohort systems at other schools. This is likely due to the flexibility of Chicago’s core curriculum; at Wharton and Columbia, for instance, cohorts take almost all of their first-year courses together, while Chicago first-year students follow individualized schedules.
Squads
Within each cohort, students are assigned to squads, also designed with diversity of members in mind. Squads generally consist of about 6-8 people, and serve as the primary study group during the required first-quarter LEAD class. Students work within their squad on role plays and team projects, and also compete against other squads throughout the course.
Upon completion of LEAD, however, the role of the squad dissipates as students pursue their own paths through the GSB’s core curriculum. Squad members sometimes find themselves in the same courses and reunite as study partners, but the official academic role of the squad ends with the LEAD program.
For more information on the first-year experience at Chicago or other leading business schools, be sure to talk to students or to check out the Clear Admit School Guides!
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