GMAC on MBA Equality of Access Concerns and other MBA News Snippets

GMAC head worries about equality of access to the MBA degree

The MBA degree stands out as one the most expensive postgraduate qualifications money can buy, but the returns (ROI) are often there for all to see in terms of career advancement and professional development.

However, for those trying to turn a desire to pursue an MBA degree into the reality of securing a place at a top school, should we be worried about equality of access?

GMAC’s chief executive since the turn of the year, Sangeet Chowfla, certainly thinks it’s a concern and told the Times Higher Education that he wants financial aid programs to be more far-reaching.

“Unless we have financial aid programs that are accessible to all, or loans that are accessible to all, we get into a situation where the only way I can get into this high-income track is because I have family or other resources to pay my tuition. And that’s not fair. That doesn’t lead to an egalitarian society,” the GMAC president said.

How are today’s MBA applicants intending to fund their MBA degree? Global, as well as regional, overviews of the most common paths to overcoming the obstacle of finance can be found in the QS TopMBA.com Applicant Survey 2014, released this week.  

NYU Stern wins innovation award

NYU Stern has been rewarded for its efforts in trying to improve students’ orientation experience with a Campus Technology Innovators award.

New MBA students to NYU Stern are no longer met with a passive wave of introductory presentations to the school, but with an immersive and interactive two days at the Langone Lab – a place where students work with wearable technology and applications to explore where their journey at NYU Stern might take them.

INSEAD’s new market entry into India program

INSEAD has announced the launch of a new, six-day executive education program for small and medium-sized enterprises hoping to expand into India and who need to plan their market entry strategy accordingly.

‘Market Entry Strategy for India’ takes the rich potential of India’s economy firmly in hand with the challenges of a country where a fast-growing middle class of consumers is still vastly outnumbered by its low-income rural population. And that’s before you consider India’s unique culture and often byzantine regulatory processes.

INSEAD’s market entry course will fall under the guidance of marketing professor, Amitava Chattopadhyay, an IIM Ahmedabad graduate who completed his PhD at the University of Florida.

UCLA Anderson dean on gender inequality

Dean at UCLA Anderson School of Management, Judy Olian, has outlined her recommendations to help business schools improve on the gender inequality that persists among their faculty. 

“We are trying mightily to close the gap, but we are falling short.” Olian wrote for Businessweek.

Olian outlined how her efforts in addressing gender inequality over eight years as UCLA Anderson dean have not achieved the results she had hoped for:

“We have doubled the number of female faculty members and tripled the number of women who are full professors since 2006. Yet women still account for less than 20 percent of our faculty,” she admitted.

Her recommendations for combatting gender inequality include increasing awareness among men about how even academic language can contain traces of harmful gender bias, if only at a subconscious level, and for business schools to reassess how their PhD programs can improve on their current number of female students.

UCLA Anderson recently announced that its full-time MBA would no longer be subject to public funding, meaning it no longer has to answer to state regulations over its tuition rates.