As a Hult Boston alumni I can simply say...Hult is a cancer on your resume and will leave you bitter and scarred. I will state this as constructively as I can by section.
Recruitment:
Hult's recruitment techniques are on par with cold calling health insurance policy sellers. Intrusive, badgered with emails. The GMAT score acceptance is just 500, which is pathetic even for a B school. Scholarships were given in our class to people who did not even take the GMAT simply because they worked for parent organization EF. I saw resumes of students who were failed Berkley music musicians who hitting 30 wanted to become businessmen so fabricated resumes with clearly unverifiable experience and work credentials that were allowed in.
Academic standard:
Hult has an unofficial policy of kicking out around 6 students within the first semester via flunking, beyond that point NO ONE is failed. They deliberately recycle the prior years exams with little to mostly no change in questions and answers and allow cheat sheets that simply have the answers from the prior years exams. Thus, you can complete a 90 minute exam in 30 minutes. I saw one students exam paper that was completely blank with 5 minutes on the clock and he was passed, no joke.
Teaching standard:
By varying degrees but its important to understand that Hult does not teach 'education', they teach 'techniques and practices in business'. There is a big difference. I did my last semester at Harvard summer school and transferred the credit, the teaching standard at Harvard was VASTLY better because they teach you how to think, something Hult does not endorse.
At Hult, the term 'Professor' is just thrown around. Hardly any of them are actually professors or have PhD's. Most are just consultants who come into the class with a bunch of bragging rights. Teachers there have personal vendettas against students also. Rob Bogosian and Eliot Sherman are two to name. Bogosian deliberately marked my grade down with fabricated lies about non-attendance and poor work standard which was pure nonsense simply because I stood up to him in class one day. When you complain to faculty they say they will take care of it but never take the students side. Once situation involved a statistics 'teacher' who did nothing but whittle on with jokes and anecdotes and taught no practical skills. With 2 weeks before the exam, and a very worried and under-skilled class of students, I had to organize tutors to come into the school myself to ensure people would pass. His punishment? He was given professor of the year award.
Classmate standards:
The worst I have ever encountered. Its an international school so its very cliquey with each nationality mostly sticking to their own I found and a lot of backstabbing and bitchiness going on. Lots of arguments. You find yourself mostly keeping to yourself as a result.
Student welfare:
Now this is a particular area I wish to strongly comment on. Dan Denoncourt who was responsible for student welfare at the time gave a speech at our induction that student safety and welfare is the school's number one concern. By the end of the first semester (which is by far the hardest) I was so exhausted that I actually blacked out and collapsed in the lobby of the EF building and was rushed to hospital in an ambulance. What was Hult's reaction? ZERO. Not a visit to the hospital, not a text, not an email and not even a phone call. They simply just avoided me all because they were worried about a law suit. When I returned to school every member of faculty would avoid eye contact and look down. When I got to my locker, I had a letter from Rob Anthony the deputy dean putting me on 6 month academic probation and threatened with expulsion for 'unexpected behavior'. I am not kidding.
Hult does not give a single DAMN about student health and welfare, only that you can pay the fees.
Another thing is Hult hires people who have no idea what they are doing in supporting students. One particular member who took over from Dan Denoncourt gave students advice about leaving and re-entering the country. However, he neglected to tell one student that he needed an offer of employment letter to get back into the country and was a sheer miracle they were not refused entry back into the US. Just typical idiocy of the people working there.
Career Services:
Now this was a joke and a half. The services are simply diabolical. The provide you with an absolute sleeper of a resume template to complete and use to market yourself that any employer would throw in the trash. While there Robin who was a former employee (trust me they are always fired) brought the over 30 something students together to say "dont bother applying for next level jobs after graduation, just stick to the jobs you were doing before to apply for". This translated as "we are not hitting our student recruitment targets and so the most experienced students are the safest bet to protect our jobs". So we paid around $50k for an MBA to progress in life and then were asked to sacrifice our future and that investment to safeguard faculty jobs who were not hitting their targets. This is absolutely true and happened.
Since then I have worked with Hult San Francisco with the unnamed 'Executive Director - Corporate Relations North America' who works with placing students in jobs. This person provides little to no help, lies about feedback and provides nothing but avoidance tactics and excesses when asked to do anything. When I contacted the head honcho he simply said "Im not sure what else we can do", to date they had contacted a whopping 3 companies.
Also, if a 'teacher' takes a personal dislike to you they will not provide any contacts or assistance at all and that is accepted amongst faculty.
Public Perception:
Hult is the laughing stock of the MBA marketplace, there are others sure, but those are a lot cheaper. Paying for a Hult MBA is like buying a career with a new coat of paint but when you come to use it you realize the engine is missing and you cant resell it.
At career fairs such as NSHMBA I used the Hult resume format and interviewing techniques and did not get a single interview but plenty of "what school is that?" and frowns and sighs when you say "Hult". The next year I created my own resume and interviewed on my own approach and got hired. When you apply for a job on a website, Hult even now does not apply on the drop down list of schools. Its looked at like some Mexican backstreet business school.
Success since graduation:
I was lucky and got into a Fortune 50 giant after graduation within a few months. Why did I receive the offer? Firstly, I interviewed very well but also because I had 'completed MBA at Harvard University' on my resume which was technically true as my last semester was at Harvard Summer School with credit transfer to complete the MBA. When my boss came into my office a few months later to ask if my MBA was a Harvard or Hult one I was honest and said "Hult but completed my last semester at Harvard". His response was eye rolling, a deep sigh and walking off saying nothing but knowing the embarrassment that one of his team was a Hult graduate.
The biggest problem with Hult is that it sinks its money into expansion and profiling, expelling students and allowing cheating on exams to hit the requisite KPIs to boost its ranking and NOT on student education and welfare. Its a 'business' and run like one. Very cold and very cut throat. If they actually focused on improving just one locations focus and standard, then it would improve its ranking. But I think they will never get that.
So pros and cons:
Pros:
* International experience
* Can meet some good people, there are always some
* Use Hult MBA as a stepping stone to another qualification
* Can attend Harvard to apply transfer credits, looks great on your resume.
Cons:
* School that is ever sinking down the ranking for a reason - Hult does not care about students, Hult cares about Hult.
* You will not get an education, just facts and processes.
* Quality of teaching is variable and inconsistent, usually poor.
* No real attention to student welfare, just want the money.
* Career services is an atrocity. Use them, you will never get hired.
* Hult is an ugly stain on your resume.
* Run as a business not an institution of learning. Students are treated as customers.
There are other B schools to go to that are cheaper and better with a much happier experience ahead. A trained monkey could get into Hult, but after graduation, who wants to hire a trained monkey?
