Admitted to Columbia Business School: Class of 2013

They might give you a hard time, but I highly doubt they will take back your admission offer.

Mary explicitly said that "every year" she has to deny matriculation to someone who either didn't do it or failed it. Maybe she's bluffing, but she seemed pretty convincing to me.

My guess is that these courses aren't terribly challenging, but they have to set a certain standard for base knowledge that folks have before starting the program. As long as people do it right, it's probably not THAT hard to pass these tests, you just gotta put in the effort.

And I agree with Moss, Mary meant business. At one point she said, "Spouses come and go, but CBS is forever." And she was dead serious.

Well Mary sounds like a lovely person doesn't she? Maybe you have to get a tattoo of Alma Mater on your calf as part of the pre-matriculation tests.

Somehow I think this is a combination of kool aid and scare tactics.

That's kind of insulting... I have a feeling she has a chip on her shoulder from her personal experiences. A better phrase would've been "jobs come and go" because the MBA degree is directly related to your career anyway.

Mary took me and my wife out to lunch, and she was extremely pleasant. This sounds like she had to be joking about the spouses thing. CBS is great, but an MBA doesn't define you, how you lead your life does.

As far as the difficulty of these classes go, I was told that you have forever to complete it, so its is just a matter of effort. I have a feeling doing all that Fin Aid paperwork was the worst hurdle.

Look what I found with a google search: https://ci.columbia.edu/ci/premba_test/c0332/

Don't get me wrong, I think Mary is wonderful person and frankly I admire her passion in the work that she does for Columbia.

While I joke about what she said in her closing remarks at Connect, I definitely see that the root of her message was more to say simply -- the next two years that we have with Columbia has the potential to change our lives forever. Each person is different on how they will take advantage of what the school has to offer, but overall, this experience can shape our futures in a very profound way, both professionally and personally.

Yup, I drank the kool aid big time and I'm not afraid to admit it

I thought that was Dean Ziv rather than Mary that said the thing about spouses "coming and going." It was a part of a broader discussion in trying to pitch people on coming to CBS over other schools. He was illustrating that the choice of business school we make puts us into a lifetime network we can't change or leave -- where we get our MBA is set in stone. I think he used the marriage analogy as something that appears permanent but is actually not necessarily more "forever" than your choice of MBA in order to articulate the gravity of the decision. The point of the analogy was "choose wisely."

I had a few discussions with Mary that weekend and she's great. It was almost a let-down that we'll probably have dramatically less contact with her post-matriculation.

How ironic considering part of the reason I chose CBS over Booth was because it made life easier for my spouse...

Guys,

Anyone know when we have access to pre-MBA courses? I believe I saw mid-May somewhere...I also think I saw it takes 40 hrs to complete, on average. Don't stress, I'm sure given even a bit of effort everyone passes. The guy that failed probably tried clicking through at the airport on the way to NYC for orientation.

Posted from my mobile device

Admitted site says that we will receive an email approximately three to four months before on-campus Orientation indicating that we have been enrolled in the Program. So yea, I guess that's April or May.

Not so much of a problem for people that are going to be stateside/working for most of the time before school, but might be more of a challenge for those who are going to be traveling from April through till right before orientation. Though, the idea of being in Thailand or Barcelona working on statistics or finance online courses is actually a lot cooler than the lame little coffee shop I'll be at in Seattle....

It was a very tongue in cheek remark. Mary's very warm and friendly. She simply meant that our two years at Columbia will remain with us forever and help shape who we are, and our future actions and achievements will also reflect upon and be associated with Columbia.

Relax guys. Your spouses are forever too

Oh, so Mary means it is like that hot girl I dated for a couple of years that turned psycho after a while. I have never forgotten her, or her frequent friending (and apparent unfriending) on facebook over the following five years.

I think this is a really bad choice of comparison. Maybe you can tell.

I am scared of Mary...she is nice but could ruin my life with the click of a mouse.

Laptop question - I own a Macbook Pro and I was wondering if it's better to get a PC for school? Thoughts? I am thinking maybe it's better compatible and maybe it's better that I get used to using Excel on the PC and not Mac....

great questions!

Did you see this post?
using-a-mac-for-b-school-44553.html
2010-laptop-discussion-91450.html

and also check this:
https://virtualpeeradvisor.wikispaces.com/Mac+vs.+PC

What I know is that we are going to use a lot the excel and it runs better under windows
although there some people saying that the new excel for mac is very good, I think that still there are some add-in that only run for windows

and of course that you can always install windows and boot with the two os