As we put winter break behind us and classes resume at many business school campuses, so, too, do opportunities for prospective applicants to sit in and observe the real-life classroom experience.
“What better way to start the new year than to pay a visit to the Stanford MBA Program?” asks admissions counselor Brad Lindeberg in a post on the Stanford Admissions Blog. The Palo Alto school will again begin offering class visits, lunch with current students and tours of the school on Monday, January 12th.
Visits to Stanford GSB are by no means required, Lindeberg assures. “Please know that visiting campus truly has no effect on your candidacy,” he says. Rather, campus visits and related events are intended to allow prospective applicants to experience a typical day in the MBA program.
The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania also will resume class visits next week, starting on Wednesday, January 14th. Prospective applicants interested in scheduling a visit are encouraged to consult the Visit Wharton section of the Wharton MBA website. Please also note that Wharton will be closed on Monday, January 19th, in observance of the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday, and no information sessions or programs for visiting students will be held that day.
Not to be left out, Harvard Business School (HBS) also will resume class visits soon, though not until the week after next. At the Cambridge school, class visits will again be available beginning January 21st. At HBS, class visits can be scheduled between two and 30 days in advance using the Online Class Visit Scheduler.
Group information sessions, self-guided campus tours, and a lunch program, in which first-year HBS MBA students meet for a casual lunch with prospective applicants, are also available. Advance registration is not required for these activities. More information about times and locations is available on the HBS Admissions website.
Of course, these are just a few of the campuses where students are returning to class, giving prospective applicants a chance to see them in action. Detailed information about scheduling campus visits is generally available on the admissions websites of most MBA programs.
If you are considering heading to campus in the near future, you might also want to consult the Clear Admit Interview Guides, which provide useful information on planning a campus visit, including transportation information, places to stay, and more. (Of course, the guides also offer school-specific insight and strategic advice to help applicants ace their admissions interviews.)
