College of Business

-I think the Illinois MBA is unique because of it's size and the opportunities to expand leadership skills in and outside of the College of Business. In addition to a great curriculum that allowed me flexibility to focus in two areas, I was also able to hone my business leadership skills. As an MBA student, I was able to serve on two College of Business committees and lead a group of 50 undergraduate students in facilitating a class for 650 freshmen. These two opportunities were key in my growth over the past two years and I consider them to be what makes the Illinois MBA stand apart from other programs that I am familiar with.

-Domestic student selection should be improved and it should require a minimum of 1 or 2 years of work experience.

-The global consulting program is very unique. It offers students a chance to work on a consulting project for a company in another country. You then get to travel and visit that company to make your midpoint presentation. Also, the school is very team oriented. There are many opportunities to participate in different clubs and sports and I believe one thing that makes Illinois unique is the level of diversity in the program. There are people from many different countries and it offers a great chance to learn about how business is conducted in other countries.

-Since the fall of Arthur Anderson, the Illinois MBA program has had a large hole to fill. Arthur Anderson was a major supporter of the program. I believe that the school would be made stronger by drawing more companies into the program, and making them partners in the education process. This would allow the students to have more contact with large firms and aid in the conversion to more experiential learning in the program.

-The international prestige of Illinois is something that is very unique. Until I came her I did not fully understand how global the name is. Especially in Asia (China, India, Japan, Taiwan, Korea). The prestige of U of I brought some of the top international candidates from Asia to this MBA program. This provided me an amazing opportunity (as an American) to learn about how Asia conducts business, and to find how to interact with these types of business people when I am working abroad for GE. This is very valuable for American business people. This unique strength is also being built upon with the requirement of students to go abroad and complete a consulting project in a foreign country to graduate. This is great because America will not always be the biggest economy, and we need to know how to conduct business in other places.

-The business Career Services are limited to basic tasks such as resume critiques and mock interviews. The advisors do not have any connections and don't even plan to work on that. The connection with our alumni are WEAK.

-The admission team is truly a rock star here. They put in a lot of effort in choosing the right candidates. Some of them end up having close to three rounds of interview. The program is highly selective, had great value for money and has some amazing facilities - like collaboration with UIUC alums, research park, entrepreneurship cell. It was a wonderful learning experience, and I look forward to help my business school to reach greater heights in the coming years.

-The administration is stretched too thin and as such either ignores student input or is lackadaisical in their implementation.