By Mike K., MBA 09′ Candidate

…in the last 3 weeks – Intent to Graduate Form. One of my peers in Strategy just sent out an email with the form attached along with a little pep talk for the rest of the tri, and in her own words, “the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter!”

I also recently attended a welcome reception for new students that was put together by Faye Porche, the Advisor to students at the West LA Campus. It was an initimate gathering of “OB” students from another class, and my Global Capital Markets class which is made up of primarily 4th-6th trimester students. Everyone had numbered name tags so that there was mix of 1st year OB students with the 2nd year finance students at each table. It was nice trying to help the new students with their questions about the program… Who to take classes from, who not to take classes from, how did I choose an emphasis, what emphasis, etc… On top of sharing my experience with others, it really was a chance to reflect on the last 2 years. Amazing how quickly it all goes by, though it’s not over yet…

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to get back to my job so I can finish my case write up after work tonight (exciting Friday night!) for my 8:00am Saturday class tomorrow, do a second case write up for Strategy later Saturday after class while preparing for my Strategy group meeting Sunday morning, and read about 150 pages on Monday night because I’m not going to miss the Seahawks’ beatdown of the 4 & 9′ers Sunday afternoon.

By Angela Chung, MBA 2011

So here I am, at the start of Fall Trimester and I am incredibly excited.  I decided to ease the load a bit this trimester and only take one class – Marketing.  It certainly is a far cry from my Econ and Accounting classes last trimester (it’s safe to say I survived and even aced my finals!  Thought I was in trouble for a bit there).  I can say with confidence that Marketing is definitely more my forte than number crunching, so that myth you hear about MBA-ers being all math-minded?  False!

I know people who choose to lighten their load or take an entire trimester off for various reasons, but my reason is because I’m getting married this coming November, and I wanted to be able to enjoy this next life stage without the worries of school weighing on me.  My wedding date actually falls around midterms and the week after my honeymoon happens to be finals week!  I just wasn’t willing to sacrifice my sanity to get through this program as fast as possible.  We all have different capacities though, you just have to know what’s best for you and understand how much you can (or are willing to) handle. (more…)