Stanford GSB Has Updated Its Financial Aid Policy
Six weeks into a process to revamp financial aid protocol at Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB), the school has shared the most recent updates in an ongoing review and re-imagining of how financial aid is awarded.
The decision to reassess the process, which Clear Admit covered two weeks ago, came not long after a data breach exposed that Stanford misrepresenting how it distributed financial aid. Data analysis revealed that the school had not been been awarding scholarships exclusively on the basis of need, but rather disproportionately based on other criteria including gender, immigration status, and work experience.
Dean Jonathan Levin clarified the Stanford financial aid policy in a public letter and pledged greater transparency moving forward:
“Stanford GSB’s communications over the years have explained the base level award process, but have not discussed the incremental fellowship awards,” he wrote. “I believe that a preferable approach, going forward, is to be significantly more transparent about the principles and objectives being applied in making financial aid awards, and about how different awards are made. We are committed to working on this for the current admissions cycle.”
In a letter to the Stanford GSB community on April 10, Assistant Dean for MBA Admissions and Financial Aid Kirsten Moss shared some of the progress the school has made in recent months, praising the student leaders who have guided much of the process.
“In February, the Student Association conducted several focus groups to learn about our students’ experience with financial aid at the GSB,” Moss wrote, adding that in March many of the focus group participants attended a co-design workshop to prototype new financial aid models. “We will be using these prototypes as the building blocks for the design of a new financial aid process,” she added. This month, the school will conduct additional focus groups with alumni and meet with faculty members from core academic areas.
The school has also established an advisory group made up of faculty, staff, and alumni to counsel its senior leadership and has hired a new financial aid project manager. Christi Opitz, a former Cambridge Associates investment consultant and HP finance department member, will “fully focus on supporting this initiative in the coming months.”
This article has been edited and republished with permissions from our sister site, Clear Admit.
A Recommendation Revolution Is Underway in MBA Admissions: What You Need to Know
I’m busy, you’re busy, your boss is most definitely busy. Indeed, publications ranging from Men’s Health to the Atlantic, the Washington Post to Forbes are all reporting that “busyness“ has become the new status symbol for our times. Which is part of what makes asking someone to write you a letter of recommendation for business school so daunting. Now, try telling that person that you actually need five different letters for five different schools. Oy vey.
As uncomfortable a spot as it puts applicants in—it’s no better for recommenders. Even your most vociferous supporter is going to wonder what in the world she’s gotten herself into when she realizes that helping you in your pursuit of acceptance to business school means taking time away from work or play or family or whatever else to labor over leadership assessment grids, each a little different from the one before, and write 10 slightly different answers to 10 slightly different questions. Here’s hoping that your top-choice school doesn’t happen to be the last one she gets around to…
Good news. The graduate management education industry recognizes the strain that letters of recommendation put on applicants and recommenders alike and has been wrestling with ways to make the process easier for everyone involved. To this end, the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) established a committee made up of admissions representatives from dozens of leading business schools to brainstorm about ways to lessen the burden while still collecting the third-party assessments of candidates that are so critical to the MBA application process.
GMAC Pilots Common MBA Letter of Recommendation
As an outgrowth of that committee’s work, GMAC last year piloted a common MBA letter of recommendation (LOR) that schools can choose to incorporate into their applications to reduce the burden placed on applicants and recommenders alike.
“The Common Letter of Recommendation (LOR) effort is intended to save you and recommenders valuable time by providing a single set of recommendation questions for each participating school,” reads the GMAC website. “This allows your recommenders to use the same answers for multiple letter submissions, alleviating the workload of having to answer different questions for each school multiple times. You benefit because it makes the ask for several different letters to be written on your behalf much easier.”
Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management, NYU Stern School of Business, and Michigan’s Ross School of Business were among the first schools to pilot the Common LOR last year. In addition to a single set of open-ended essay questions, the pilot Common LOR also included a leadership assessment grid inviting recommenders to rate applicants on 16 “competencies and character traits” grouped into four main categories of achievement, influence, personal qualities and academic ability.
“At Johnson, we saw the Common LoR as a clear opportunity to improve the admissions process for candidates and their recommenders in a way that would also add value to our own assessment of applicants,” Judi Byers, Johnson executive director of admissions & financial aid, told Clear Admit. “A thorough and consistent review is important to us and the grid provides a straightforward base of insights that can be assessed and compared reliably while the accompanying letter adds meaningful detail and context,” she added.
Soojin Kwon, managing director of full-time MBA admissions and program at Ross, sees applicants and recommenders as the main beneficiaries of the Common LOR and is pleased that more schools are coming on board. “As more schools adopt it, applicants won’t have to feel like they’re burdening their recommender with completing multiple rec letters with different questions and ratings grids,” she told Clear Admit. “This year, more than a dozen of the top 20 schools are using it.”
Ross was also among the schools to first pilot the Common LOR last year, and Kwon served as part of the GMAC committee that helped craft it.
Common Questions Easy to Agree on, Common Leadership Grid Not
“What we found in using the Common LOR this year past year was that the questions gave us helpful insights into applicants, particularly on the important area of constructive feedback. The questions, however, were fairly similar to what we and other schools were using before, so it was easy for the AdCom to use it,” she notes.
Those questions are as follow:
- Please provide a brief description of your interaction with the applicant and, if applicable, the applicant’s role in your organization. (50 words)
- How does the performance of the applicant compare to that of other well-qualified individuals in similar roles? (E.g. what are the applicant’s principal strengths?) (500 words)
- Describe the most important piece of constructive feedback you have given the applicant. Please detail the circumstances and the applicant’s response. (500 words)
- Is there anything else we should know? (Optional)
“The rating grid was quite different from what we’d used in the past,” Kwon continued. “It was also the most difficult part for the GMAC advisory group to develop and get agreement upon. The group worked this past year to revise and simplify the grid so that AdComs could get more meaningful insights from it.”
This year, the 16 competencies and character traits from the original grid have been distilled to 12, with specific questions about analytical thinking and information seeking omitted. Johnson and Ross have both incorporated the revised leadership grid into the LOR distributed to applicants as part of their applications, as have most other schools that have this year decided to incorporate both the grid and open-ended essay question portions of the form. UT’s McCombs School of Business and Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Business, notably, still seem to feature the earlier version of the leadership grid in their application, the one that calls on recommenders to assesses applicants on 16 competencies and traits.
After Extensive Search, Stanford GSB Names New Assistant Dean of Admissions
The void created last August when long-time Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) MBA admissions czar Derrick Bolton left has been filled. The school announced today that Kirsten Moss has been named the new assistant dean and director of MBA admissions and financial aid.
Moss is no stranger to Stanford’s admissions office, having served as part of the team from 2004 to 2010, first as a consultant, then as associate director of evaluation and finally as director of MBA admissions. During her time with the Palo Alto school, she managed the evaluation, marketing and operations teams while also developing a new approach to assessing leadership capability. Prior to joining Stanford, she led admissions and financial aid at her alma mater, Harvard Business School (HBS), from 1995 to 2001. She immediately preceded Deirdre Leopold, who would go on to hold HBS’s key admissions director role for the next decade and a half.
Moss left Stanford in 2010 to work as a consultant for global executive search firm Egon Zehnder before launching her own consulting firm in 2012, which she has run for the past five years. Over the same span of time she also obtained her doctorate in psychology—with a focus in organizational behavior—from William James College, which boasts the largest graduate psychology program in New England.
“Kirsten has a strong understanding of our school’s vision and immediately impressed us with her ideas for connecting with the next generation of students making a positive, measurable difference in the world,” Stanford GSB Dean Jonathan Levin said in a statement announcing her appointment. “Kirsten brings a wealth of knowledge and experience—from top-tier MBA admissions programs to business consulting—and will provide fresh insight as we achieve new levels of excellence.”
Moss’s appointment concludes an extensive search chaired by Stanford Senior Academic Dean Yossi Feinberg that included interviews with faculty, staff, students and alumni. She will assume the new role on June 1 and will report to Feinberg. “Kirsten has deep experience in admissions and leadership talent evaluation both inside and outside Stanford GSB,” Feinberg said in a statement.
Moss, who holds both MBA and bachelor’s degrees from Harvard, is excited to return to Stanford, where she will manage the admissions and financial team and have responsibility for shaping the school’s vision for how to continue to reach and recruit the world’s most highly qualified MBA candidates. Stanford has long held the claim as the most selective business school in the world. Last year, it admitted just 6.1 percent of the more than 8,000 hopefuls who applied.
“Stanford GSB has a rich legacy of equipping students with the tools necessary to create change—individually, within organizations and throughout the world,” Moss said in a statement. “I’m thrilled to join the team in this new capacity as we work together to cultivate the next generation of leaders poised to make an impact.”
Learn more about Stanford GSB’s new assistant dean and director of MBA admissions here.
This article has been edited and republished with permissions from Clear Admit.
