Kellogg during the fall quarter

Fall in Evanston is signified by the glorious colours of the trees as they change hue from lush green to palish shades of yellow and finally to a fiery red before withering away in the face of winter. It’s beautiful and dramatic.

Kellogg during Fall

However, during the same time the quaint northern suburb of Chicago is seeing an even bigger transformation.

The hallowed portals of the Jacob’s Center of the Kellogg School of Management undergo a drastic makeover. The building, which is sparsely populated with the 90-odd students of the one-year programme and few professors and administrative staff during the summer, is now taken over by a thousand faces.

The second years return home with stories of victory and valour during their summer internships and the incoming batch of first years are ready having had their CIM week of induction and fun. (CIM is Kellogg’s induction programme, Complete Immersion In Management). Along with the classes the fall quarter also witnesses clubs such as High Tech, Marketing, Private Equity, Cork & Screw, Eatz and a plethora of professional and leisure groups become hyperactive. Every afternoon there are two-three conflicting club meetings and corporate presentations and one quickly learns the most important tenet of management – prioritisation.

Oh, did I forget to mention about the academics? Make no mistake, the classes, group assignments, team meetings and deadlines continue to make their consistent and frequent appearances.

However, the biggest surprise is in store a few weeks into the fall session when otherwise normal students suddenly start appearing in formal finery! Yes, this marks the beginning of the recruitment season. The air is thick with anticipation and anxiety. Smart young men and women in sharp suits and impressive resumes flitting in and out of the interview rooms, serenading their companies of choice. The stress levels run high and this is also the time when characters are built. The final offer, the interview salvaged in the last question, the support system provided by the students and staff all go a long way to making the process memorable.

A packed crowd during a school event

The fall quarter also brings with it a myriad events such as the Halloween party, the Asian food festival, the Diwali celebrations and the much anticipated Annual Kellogg Marketing Competition (AKMC). The AKMC has to be seen to be believed. The quantity and quality of hard work and creativity on display is mind boggling. Real world goods are sold in an open market using complimentary coupons for all and the team that sells its wares the most and makes the maximum profit is declared the winner.

This year saw salad dressings take on hand washes and vitamin tablets. While the optic white toothpastes put up a brave fight in the face of granola bars. At the end of the melee the popcorn sellers, a bunch of super salespeople from the 1Y batch of 2012 were declared the winners.

Finally for those of you reading my posts since June know by now about my yearning for snow, which I haven’t seen so far. Well, that’s not true anymore as the past Thursday saw the first snow day in the Chicago area! There was an air of good cheer and joy, mixed with some apprehension about what is supposedly going to be one of the harshest winter’s in Chicago’s history. Watch out this space for more!

MBA blog