Fuqua: Going outside your comfort zone

Experience during the program

The Duke MBA will push you outside your comfort zone, help you grow personally and professionally, and give you experiences you never thought you’d have. When looking at schools don’t just look at academics – the top schools will all be relatively similar – make sure the culture and environment are the right fit for you and your development. Fuqua fits those standards in the following ways:
- Team Fuqua isn’t just lip service when it comes to a supportive environment and culture. I experienced multiple cases where my classmates put my needs above theirs to help with academics (1:1 and group tutoring), recruiting (mock interviews, insights into interviews they’d had for the same position), and my personal life (stepping up for projects when family matters took me away from school).
- You’re able to gain a broad perspective on the world through the diversity of the student body and the students’ backgrounds, both culturally and professionally. Your classmates genuinely want to share their experiences with you and learn from your experiences. Something that sets Fuqua apart is that it is a place where you help lift each other up so everyone is successful instead of climbing over each other to get to the top. Everyone there truly realizes that we’re better when we work together and are open to learning from each other.
- Fuqua has access to the top professors in their field, but what’s even more important is how they all make themselves available to students outside of office hours. They truly want to see their students succeed and be able to apply learnings, not just recite them. Additionally, having small teams for each class helps broaden the learning experience by bringing in multiple opinions from differing backgrounds, simulating the business world where you’ll constantly be working with diverse teams with different opinions, experiences, and personalities.

Fuqua wasn’t just a place for me to get my MBA; I’ve formed life-long bonds and changed in ways I never would have if I had gone somewhere else. Be cognizant in your business school search of what a transformational experience should be, and look for the qualities in a program that are going to help you achieve that.

Overall BSchool experience (5.0)
Schools contribution (4.0)
Classmates rating (5.0)

Strengths of the program:

Curriculum, Classes, Professors
Student body, diversity
Culture & Student Support

Best fit at this program:

Consulting
Finance
Marketing
Investment Banking
Entrepreneurship
Management

Can be improved:

Facilities