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Summer MBA Courses Begin

There’s been a lot of public conversation recently about getting an MBA. What’s the value of the degree these days?  And what’s its role now given the global downturn? But despite that, people are still headed back to business school in herds, both full-time and part programs, and MBAs are still coming out with high paying jobs. In fact, just last year, recruiting at a number of school was almost back to normal. Well, just this week, after a grueling year of law school, I officially had my first class ever at the Kellogg School of Management.

At long last, after a year of being in law school, just this past week I finally began the first week of summer quarter classes at Kellogg. While the traditional Kellogg students and Northwestern Law students don’t take classes over the summer, the JD-MBAs typically do take classes, as a way to lighten the load for the second and third years of the program. So, as a JD-MBA, although we will start with the class of 2012 in the fall, we officially kick off our Kellogg experience this summer at the downtown campus.

Unlike the Kellogg schedule in the fall, where much of the curriculum is determined by core classes, in the summer there is a lot more flexibility in the classes we take. And so people take accounting, finance, marketing, and operations, depending on their interests. That said, since time is more limited for JD-MBAs, most of them end up taking a mixture of law and business classes, often which will help get a few more prerequisites out of the way.

The most popular classes at the law school tend to be Small Business Opportunity Clinic, the Corporate Counsel Practicum, and Secured Transactions. And at Kellogg, many people take Accounting, Finance, and DECS, (Decision Sciences, which is a business statistics class.)  Personally, I am taking Accounting and Stats (i.e. DECS) at Kellogg and I haven’t decided on my law school courseload just yet.

It’s pretty weird being back in school after our six weeks off. But it’s also been great to see all of my classmates again and hear about how everyone’s summers have been going. But unfortunately, despite all the excitement, I can’t help but wonder how the summer will turn out. Unlike most of my JD-MBA classmates, not only am I in class but I’m also working full time at a law firm this summer. I really like the firm and want to make a good impression.  It’s definitely shaping up to be an interesting and long summer semester.  Stay tuned to hear how it turns out.

Tags: Accounting, Classes