MBAs at Peer School Debate Culture
Steve Lin
Issue date: 10/29/01 Section: Features
School culture is a sensitive topic, and one not isolated to the GSB. Every b-school has a characteristic culture that its students identify with and take enormous pride in. However, given the downturn in the economy and the tightening of the job market, culture and academics are more scrutinized than ever. There are rumors abound of recruiters demanding more data points on candidates and b-school faculties reacting strongly to student laxness in recent years.
Yet despite external pressures, MBA students at Haas and Chicago voted recently to adopt grade non-disclosure policies for the first time in their schools’ respective histories. These represent significant steps by these schools to instill a greater sense of cooperation in the culture of their student body.
In light of these developments, and the GSB’s own class norms vote, the Reporter has gone out and asked MBAs at still other schools about their feelings on grade disclosure. Many of the views they shared are consistent with those prevalent at the GSB. Others, however, are more surprising.
How do you feel that a full disclosure grade policy might impact culture at your school?
Harvard MBA: “I think full disclosure would be bad at HBS. It would make it too competitive and destroy the ‘learn from your peers’ purpose.”
Wharton MBA: “Full disclosure would dramatically increase the competitive nature of the student body. In general, the majority of students are overachievers with A-type personalities, anyway. Making grades known to recruiters would diminish the collaborative nature of the students. This, in turn, would take away from the entire learning experience. A strength of the Wharton culture is that people help each other without feeling that it takes away their chance for a better grade or a better job.
All of honors lists are published. Classmates are happy for those who get this distinction. In general, people with distinction don’t necessarily have more job offers or better jobs. It’s uncorrelated.”
How do you feel that a non-disclosure grade policy might impact culture at your school?
Kellogg MBA: ”Non-disclosure might be in better alignment with the school’s culture of having most the work performed in teams. [Having] teamwork and individual grades is a conflict. I don’t think that changing the policy [to non-disclosure] would have a major impact on the culture, though.”
Anderson MBA: “The debate…is an interesting one. Each option has obvious drawbacks and advantages. Bottom line, the question is: ‘Are grades correlated with job performance?’ My point of view is that this is a complete fallacy. Most studies show that given a solid college background and a bit of brain, the job performance mainly depends on skills (which obviously you learn more partying than doing a case study). I think one solution is to have a thorough recruitment process to select only bright and motivated students and then to maintain demanding work to pass the class without disclosing any grades. To make the system consistent, there shouldn’t be any awards based on grade performance, which poses a problem to award scholarship. There is no perfect solution. It’s more a matter of belief—I feel that by not disclosing grades the students have an incentive to develop a better school spirit.”
Fuqua MBA: “This is an issue that comes up every year. In the end, the only recruiters that asked about grades were [prominent consulting firms] and most of the banks. The discussion about grades usually focuses on other school’s policies, for example Chicago and Wharton. Non-disclosure policies are such that they are student imposed. There are no penalties for the recruiters asking or for students listing their grades on their resumes. At least as far as I can tell. Also, I think if you limit grades, you just emphasize GMAT scores, because people will list them and recruiters will ask.
Also, note that there is absolutely no overt competition here. People are curved against each other, but students never keep their info from other students or try to influence people to do poorly. There are many examples like students sharing their recruitment research with others applying for the same jobs”
Are you in favor of a full disclosure grade policy--why or why not?
Harvard MBA: “Definitely not full disclosure. The current system seems fine to me as far as disclosure.”
Wharton MBA: “No. Grade non-disclosure is important to our learning teams and classroom dynamics. There’s no need to make anyone stress out more they have to. Grade non-disclosure is based on an honor code at Wharton. Students can reveal their grades if they really want to but they are asked not to—which is a decision made by the entire students body. The only benefit to grade disclosure it to make students work harder, which most do anyway. Those that don’t run a risk of getting QC’s [Wharton’s failing grade]. Too many QC’s can result in expulsion.”
Kellogg MBA: “I could go either way here, but personally I lean towards continuing grade disclosure. As a former engineer, my undergraduate GPA is good, but not great. MBA school, for me, is a great way to improve my resume by balancing a higher “liberal-artsy” GPA with my lower engineering one. On the other hand, all the students here are very talented, and I’m not sure how valuable its is for recruiters to differentiate between us on the basis of GPA.”
Anderson MBA: “Given the discrepancies we see in the grading (as grades inflate, it becomes distinguish to skills from luck—not enough standard deviation), the current system contains certain flaws. Eliminating grades would obviously solve that problem. I like the idea of putting everybody on an equal level when it comes to business school experience. But since I didn’t have exposure to a grade non-disclosure system, I am probably underestimating the negative effect of that system. Hey, after all, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence!”
Fuqua MBA: “At Duke there is the added issue of us being a relatively young top program that is still building its brand. It is my personal opinion that we should cater to the recruiter’s demands. When we review what our competitor schools are doing, almost all of them have full disclosure.”
(Note: Responses are from individual students and do not necessarily represent the views of the entire student body).
Yet despite external pressures, MBA students at Haas and Chicago voted recently to adopt grade non-disclosure policies for the first time in their schools’ respective histories. These represent significant steps by these schools to instill a greater sense of cooperation in the culture of their student body.
In light of these developments, and the GSB’s own class norms vote, the Reporter has gone out and asked MBAs at still other schools about their feelings on grade disclosure. Many of the views they shared are consistent with those prevalent at the GSB. Others, however, are more surprising.
How do you feel that a full disclosure grade policy might impact culture at your school?
Harvard MBA: “I think full disclosure would be bad at HBS. It would make it too competitive and destroy the ‘learn from your peers’ purpose.”
Wharton MBA: “Full disclosure would dramatically increase the competitive nature of the student body. In general, the majority of students are overachievers with A-type personalities, anyway. Making grades known to recruiters would diminish the collaborative nature of the students. This, in turn, would take away from the entire learning experience. A strength of the Wharton culture is that people help each other without feeling that it takes away their chance for a better grade or a better job.
All of honors lists are published. Classmates are happy for those who get this distinction. In general, people with distinction don’t necessarily have more job offers or better jobs. It’s uncorrelated.”
How do you feel that a non-disclosure grade policy might impact culture at your school?
Kellogg MBA: ”Non-disclosure might be in better alignment with the school’s culture of having most the work performed in teams. [Having] teamwork and individual grades is a conflict. I don’t think that changing the policy [to non-disclosure] would have a major impact on the culture, though.”
Anderson MBA: “The debate…is an interesting one. Each option has obvious drawbacks and advantages. Bottom line, the question is: ‘Are grades correlated with job performance?’ My point of view is that this is a complete fallacy. Most studies show that given a solid college background and a bit of brain, the job performance mainly depends on skills (which obviously you learn more partying than doing a case study). I think one solution is to have a thorough recruitment process to select only bright and motivated students and then to maintain demanding work to pass the class without disclosing any grades. To make the system consistent, there shouldn’t be any awards based on grade performance, which poses a problem to award scholarship. There is no perfect solution. It’s more a matter of belief—I feel that by not disclosing grades the students have an incentive to develop a better school spirit.”
Fuqua MBA: “This is an issue that comes up every year. In the end, the only recruiters that asked about grades were [prominent consulting firms] and most of the banks. The discussion about grades usually focuses on other school’s policies, for example Chicago and Wharton. Non-disclosure policies are such that they are student imposed. There are no penalties for the recruiters asking or for students listing their grades on their resumes. At least as far as I can tell. Also, I think if you limit grades, you just emphasize GMAT scores, because people will list them and recruiters will ask.
Also, note that there is absolutely no overt competition here. People are curved against each other, but students never keep their info from other students or try to influence people to do poorly. There are many examples like students sharing their recruitment research with others applying for the same jobs”
Are you in favor of a full disclosure grade policy--why or why not?
Harvard MBA: “Definitely not full disclosure. The current system seems fine to me as far as disclosure.”
Wharton MBA: “No. Grade non-disclosure is important to our learning teams and classroom dynamics. There’s no need to make anyone stress out more they have to. Grade non-disclosure is based on an honor code at Wharton. Students can reveal their grades if they really want to but they are asked not to—which is a decision made by the entire students body. The only benefit to grade disclosure it to make students work harder, which most do anyway. Those that don’t run a risk of getting QC’s [Wharton’s failing grade]. Too many QC’s can result in expulsion.”
Kellogg MBA: “I could go either way here, but personally I lean towards continuing grade disclosure. As a former engineer, my undergraduate GPA is good, but not great. MBA school, for me, is a great way to improve my resume by balancing a higher “liberal-artsy” GPA with my lower engineering one. On the other hand, all the students here are very talented, and I’m not sure how valuable its is for recruiters to differentiate between us on the basis of GPA.”
Anderson MBA: “Given the discrepancies we see in the grading (as grades inflate, it becomes distinguish to skills from luck—not enough standard deviation), the current system contains certain flaws. Eliminating grades would obviously solve that problem. I like the idea of putting everybody on an equal level when it comes to business school experience. But since I didn’t have exposure to a grade non-disclosure system, I am probably underestimating the negative effect of that system. Hey, after all, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence!”
Fuqua MBA: “At Duke there is the added issue of us being a relatively young top program that is still building its brand. It is my personal opinion that we should cater to the recruiter’s demands. When we review what our competitor schools are doing, almost all of them have full disclosure.”
(Note: Responses are from individual students and do not necessarily represent the views of the entire student body).