Harbus

Issue date: 12/8/08 Section: News

As 2008 comes to a close, it seems like an appropriate time to reflect on some of the controversy the Harbus has chronicled in the first half of this academic year. From the Japan trek fiasco to Ahead of the Curve, these pages have brought some less-than-palatable topics to light over the past several months. As a result, many of us have been forced to take a closer look at the HBS community to which we belong and ask ourselves, how have these incidents affected our view of HBS?

Prior to coming to HBS, we were all aware of the school's impressive reputation for accepting only the highest caliber applicants and helping graduates reach the apex of professional success. The fact that 90% of people accept the offer of admission to HBS is yet another sign of the school's prestige. However, many of the students who are currently on campus chose to attend HBS despite some significant reservations about what their experience would be like.

One of the most common concerns among students was that their fellow classmates would be elitist or "a little stuck up." This fear is probably grounded in the anti-HBS biases to which many of us were exposed before coming here. As described in When the Glory Fades (published in the September 29th issue of the Harbus), co-workers and friends often issued warnings not to "become one of them" or "come back 'different'" after attending HBS.

Many people also worried that HBS "would be an isolated experience" where people were fiercely competitive. During the application process, an HBS grad told me that HBS "can be harsh," and if I wanted a place where everyone would "be friendly and hug each other," I should go to Kellogg. (Luckily, despite my strong preference for friendly places over harsh ones, I ignored his warning and applied anyway.)

Although I'm sure exceptions do exist, literally everyone I talked to who was concerned about being in an ultra-competitive environment has found HBS to be a warm, welcoming, and collaborative place. Those who feared their classmates would be "snobby" have realized that HBS "is filled with incredibly smart, driven, but down-to-earth people." Many feel that, by and large, "the vast majority of people are humble and level-headed." (Cue kumbaya singing.)

It is not terribly surprising that our perceptions of HBS changed as we transitioned from applicants to students. Not only have we gotten to know our classmates, our professors, and all the other people who are a part of this community, but many of us have also realized that we are not the outliers among our fellow students that we thought we would be. We knew we would be in a very diverse environment, but perhaps what we didn't realize was that even with this diversity, HBS is, in many ways, a reflection of ourselves. Each of our classmates, no matter what their background, shares some components of our personalities in varying degrees, so on the whole, the image of HBS that we see isn't very different from our own reflection.

Continued...

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