Booth Overhauls Its Highly Ranked EMBA

Before the changes, Booth Executive MBA students spent four weeks of class sessions studying with students from the school’s other campuses, with all students spending time in Singapore, London and downtown Chicago. Beginning next year, students will spend five weeks studying with students from the other campuses.

“What we have really added is an additional week for students to study in different parts of the world,” explains Keegan. Students based in Singapore and London will spend three, rather than two weeks, at the main Chicago campus—the first residential week of the program and two consecutive weeks during which electives will be offered at the school’s Harper Center. Previously, those sessions had been held in downtown Chicago.

MORE LEADERSHIP EXERCISES ALSO WILL BE A PART OF THE CHANGE

The school will also roll out its so-called LEAD (Leadership Exploration and Development) program, first introduced in the full-time MBA curriculum in 1994 and later added to Booth’s part-time MBA program. “One of the outcomes of the faculty committee review was that we wanted EMBA students to have the same experience we required of full- and part-time MBA students,” says Keegan. “We wanted to reaffirm the parity of the EMBA degree.”

To make room for the added courses, classes in strategic leadership and quantitative marketing have been shortened and some offerings such as technology strategy have been reorganized and will now be part of the elective offerings.

“We also moved up the sequencing of some courses and moved up the travel piece,” adds Keegan. “In the first quarter, students will be with their global counterparts for the kickoff week in Chicago and then later in the summer go to London and Singapore to work on their courses. We moved those weeks from the second summer to the very first quarter. Instead of coming to a program and getting to know 90 people from the North American campus, it is now very clear that they will be working and studying with people from all around the world.”

Poets&Quants currently ranks the Booth EMBA program as the second best in the U.S., behind No. 1 Wharton and just ahead of No. 3 Kellogg.

Keegan said the overall EMBA market remains strong for Booth. “We are right in the middle of recruiting for the next class,” she says. “Things continue to lag a little bit. It is still difficult to get financial support from employers so we just continue to work with potential students for a longer period of time.” In some cases, she says, an ongoing relationship with students can now last between one and two years by the time they actually attend the program.

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