MAP is almost done

I can't believe that the year is almost over. We have 11 days until the end of MAP which is ultimately the end of school. I can't believe it!

GBR was this past weekend, and despite a small weather scare the few days leading up to it (read: snow), the admits had decent weather. The sun even came out and the sky was actually blue one day! Wow. I had a lot of fun at GBR - and not just because I got free food most of the weekend. It was great to meet the incoming class, they seemed really cool, and I'm hoping they decide to come! It was very strange to be seen as "knowledgable"...I still sort of feel like I just got here.

I also enjoyed actually getting to see the rest of my classmates. Most of us have been all over the country and/or world, and have really spent most of our time with our MAP teams - so it was awesome! A lot of us are back, and we spent some of the GBR "down time" (read: when admits were in events) to hang out, recap about MAP, and just catch up. It was great!

GBR was also a bit of a MAP break. People pretty much didn't do any MAP work all weekend. Now I have to finish this presentation and paper. Wish me luck!

11 days - yikes! I still don't have a summer place to live.

MAP is Halfway Done

OK, it's been a couple of weeks...MAP has really taken over my life. I remember some second years saying that MAP is a really great experience, but they're glad to be done with it. I now realize what they meant.

We're a little more than halfway done, which is good on one hand but not-so-good on the other because we have a lot to do between now and 4/26 (which is when our report is due). If you were in one of the "lucky" teams to have a midpoint presentation to the sponsor, that means that either this week or last week were spent doing a lot of analysis, powerpoint, excel, etc. That also means those teams are going to have less to do in the next couple of weeks. My team is moving along but we've still got some MAJOR items that we need to tackle that we've kind of been putting off.

At this point, i'm seeing a shift in the dynamics of my team as well as the other teams. Basically, the natural leaders of each team (and the natural pain-in-the-neck people) are starting to emerge. This is partially since teams are done with "research" about the industry and getting ready to figure out what needs to be analyzed, and if you're lucky, what recommendations can come out of that analysis. In other words, the "meat" of the project is actually happening now. I'm still really glad I'm learning how to do this stuff. It's basically the same type of stuff most summer interns will do - except in a 7 week instead of 10 week timeframe.

In other news, I'm trying to find a place to live over the summer. That's a royal pain but I've got a few leads on places. Thank goodness a lot of people's internship packages had some sort of housing allowance. The vast majority of MBA's around here don't stay for the summer. People are going everywhere, but the big clusters seem to be in New York/New Jersey, Chicago, San Francisco, some L.A., some southeast, Minneapolis, Texas, and other smaller cities that CPG's love to call home.

Next weekend is GBR. It'll be awesome! If you're an admit and undecided, it'll be great to check out what you could potentially be turning down. If you're 100% coming here, it'll be great to meet your future classmates. Oh, and look for a place to live.