And so Term 1 Begins

Term 1 has begun. If you're confused, wondering what my post on the last 2 official weeks was, that was pre-term. What that means is that the school is now more crowded with not just MBAs and MiFs, but also the MiMs, MFAs and EMBAs.

It also means that more of the "real" classes are starting. While my schedule doesn't look as full as it was say 2 weeks ago, it's deceptive. There's now more time needed to allocate to doing pre-class preparations, assignments etc. In between that, there are tons of events from Careers. Most of these are currently exploratory events so you can find out more about the various industries. If you're not sure what you want to do post-MBA, I definitely recommend signing up for all these Working In... workshops.

Then there're all the club kick-offs happening. These are where you find out about the various clubs, their activities and what leadership positions are opened. Here your prioritisation skills are definitely put to the test because you'll have several clubs kicking off concurently. Since you can't be at two places at once, you need to decide which one you would actually be interested in playing an active role in.

Elections for various leadership positions have also begun. Stream rep voting ended last week and elections and applications have opened for the Student Association and several clubs. If you think about it, it was only about 4 weeks ago that we began the program so it's really early. I'm finding that things happen very fast here - life as an LBS MBA student might even be faster than working in FMCG ;)

LBS Language Requirements & Waiver

London Business School requires you to have 2 languages to graduate from the MBA program. They don't provide much information however on how the language fulfillment criteria works. So it was great to have a chance to find out more during the Admits Weekend. Here's how it works and how you can get a waiver for it if you have a second language already:

• After registration, right at the start of the program you have the opportunity to get the waiver. It's a limited time deal though.
• You can either get a waiver from taking a language course through showing certification that you have working knowledge of a second language, or by sitting for a diagnostic test.
• If you don't pass the diagnostic test or if you don't have a second language then you must take one of the offered second language courses
• The language course will be counted as a core course and there are 2 levels. You have to achieve Level 2 to graduate
• For mandarin, Level 2 corresponds to HSK Level 4.
• You'll have several opportunities throughout the MBA program to take the test to pass the language requirement - there's at least one opportunity each term.
• If you do already have a second language or you've passed the diagnostic test, you have the option of still taking a language course. However, this will be counted as one of the electives you're allowed to take (you can take only 12 max).

Speaking to alumni and current students, you really want to try and get that waiver right at the start. The first year core courses are so intensive that adding another language core course on top will make things pretty tough for you. For total beginners the commitment involved is 2x 3 hour classes a week and for advanced beginners, you'll need to do one 3 hour class a week. That's 3-6 hours that could be used doing something else.

As for taking a third language as an elective, my opinion is....really? Is that wise? You've only got 12 electives max that you can take and LBS has a large menu of really cool electives. You can learn another language after you graduate from somewhere else. You don't need to pay top dollar to attend a top business school to learn another language. But that's just me :)