ASU/W.P. Carey Chat - Dec. 8

From the ASU/W.P. Carey Online Program homepage - as before, I'll try and be there, at least for a bit.

Chat with us!

Get your questions answered by Admission Representatives in our December 8th Chat Session. Simply log into the chat session on Thursday, December 8, 2005 from 11:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. MST (1:30 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. EST).

Anyone is welcome to participate at anytime during the two-hour session.

Business 2.0: A Degree of Respect for Online MBAs

Business 2.0 (December 2005): A Degree of Respect for Online MBAs

I won't spend a ton of time looking at this one, perhaps for obvious reasons. In short, I think it sums up my stance: Don't expect Harvard-level cachet or commensurate salaries/jobs, but do expect a quality education (if you've done your homework on the program!), and a degree that is widely accepted by many, and will be moreso by all as time goes on.

Pros:
Generally positive of online MBAs. Lists a wide variety of schools, which I think is good. Offers several profiles of different students, which offers a good feel of the different programs and reasons for choosing online out there. One quote was offered up by an HR manager at Intel that I also gave, just about verbatim, and I think really makes an excellent case for online MBAs:

“I work with people all the time whom I rarely meet face-to-face,” says Intel’s Fisher. “That is the real world of business today, and anybody who says online MBAs don’t work is just fooling themselves.”

Like it or not - in a knowledge-based economy, distributed teams is the name of the game.

Cons:
I do wish they had spent more time detailing the for profit vs. traditional institutions and the role of AACSB accreditation, and how to choose a program in general - I tried to impress that in my interviews, but so it goes. :-)

Overall:
A well-written, informative article - for anyone thinking about an online MBA or anyone thinking about hiring an online MBA - and I know that Krysten put a good bit of time into it. Give it a read!

Thanksgiving Update

No rest for the weary!

Whereas other schools are letting off for Thanksgiving (my buddy at Vanderbilt full-time is off an entire week!), we are ploughing on through! Ouch! We're currently in week 4 of Financial Accounting. This is all-new stuff for me, so it's been a good bit of work so far. I'm really appreciating what I'm getting out of the class - I feel that I've got a pretty solid fundamental understanding of accounting concepts, how to analyze financial statements, and the like. I don't appreciate the reading - not exactly the most entertaining stuff to read! But, it must be done .... back to it!

Google Analytics

Sorry for the mass re-publish, to those of you reading via RSS - I just added Google Analytics. Still working on that Econ post - Financial Accounting's new stuff for me, so it's keeping me quite busy!

Econ Final

Okay, I'm very delinquent in my overall post summarizing the Managerial Economics course - working on it, I swear - but I just had to break in on the final.

WOW, what a final! The course was, overall, a very valuable one - I really enjoyed it. It was also one that took a lot of work. The final, however... MAN, did they stick it to us! Okay, it may not have been the worst final I've ever taken, but it was definitely harder than I anticipated, and I think I go along with the rest of the class in that regard.

It was two parts - multiple choice and short answer/free response.

I just thought I'd pull out some "summary statistics", based on the class averages for the final - bear in mind, that if your GPA falls below a 3.0 (B average), you're on academic probation (I believe this is typical of most master's programs). This course's letter grade cut-offs were A=90, B=81, C=70.

• Final was worth 53% of the total grade(!)
• Average score on the Short Answer was 71.25%
• Average total score was 76.85%
  

	Final Pts	Course Wt.	Final Pct	Avg Pts	Avg Pct	Avg Pct - Wt.
MC	30	23.85%	45%	25.11	83.70%	37.67%
SA/FR	40	29.15%	55%	28.5	71.25%	39.19%
Total	70	53.00%	100%	53.61		76.85%

So anyway - the masochistic side of me really appreciates the fact that they stuck it to us - I appreciate the rigor. But then the other side of me just hurts! ;-) That means the average score on the final - comprising over half of the grade of the course - was a C. And not even a very high C, at that.

The overall course grade distribution was 46% A/A-, 36% B+/B, and 18% B-/C.

Anyway - hopefully this demonstrates that we are being held to a reasonably strict standard, I think. Not quite 50% A/A-'s may seem pretty lax at first glance, but where you're essentially limited to A's and B's to be in good academic standing... that nearly 20% of B-/C really jumps out. I mean, it's clearly not statistically significant evidence - we could just all be dumb, on average - but you'll have to take my word for the fact that those in my cohort are, by and large, very sharp people. ;-)