MBA at U of Manitoba !!! Advise!

[Arry27]

Hi,

I have just received an offer from the University of Manitoba, Canada for their MBA program for fall 2011 batch. I also have an offer from Saint Mary's University (Sobey Business School) as well.
Which should be a better decision in terms of placement and future prospects within Canada. I intend to specialize in Finance and am flexible to settle in any region.

Also I have heard mixed reviews about MBA from Manitoba, that beyond the said province it is a dampener!! I sincerely wish to make an informed decision , so would be really grateful for any kind of help!!

Thanks !

[sch]

Hi, I know Asper graduates both MBA and undergraduate. Also, I'm University of Manitoba graduate myself. So I guess I can contribute here.

Asper school of business has some ambition. Their dean has made it clear that he wants to see the school compete against schools like Rotman Queens and UBC. He proposed tuition hikes, which were partially curbed by the provincial government. Despite this major hurdle, the school continues to make some progress. They are opening executive centre in downtown Winnipeg and aim to compete for executive students which are being currently educated by out of province institutions like Schulich.

The program itself is relatively easy to get in to, but really hard to graduate from. Program's academic load is intense, and many drop-out. Quality of education and instructors is very good as well. Even though the admission standards are not the highest, somehow, the quality of students is very high apparently. All major banks recruit from Asper, including recruitment for I-Banking positions. The school is very well connected to Winnipeg business community, which is rather small. However, the school also attracts applicants from Alberta, as a result, Asper has alumni presence in Alberta; so you are not stuck in Manitoba after graduation.

University of Manitoba, is the only major university in the province. It has many faculties including quite substantial law and medical schools. The atmosphere at the UofM is much like at any other Manitoba university I found. Its faculty + students vs university administration. The administration always trying to increase tuition and freeze faculty compensation, while faculty and students jointly fight it.

I don't know anything about St. Mary's program, only that its small, in the middle of nowhere. While I can assure you, Asper MBA is quite worth the investment.

[Arry27]

Hi!

Thanks for the wonderful reply ! It settles quite a lot of things for me then. Yes, cost was a major factor in deciding my MBA school hence I welcome Manitoba's decision to plug it for the time. However I doubt if a high fee could raise the reputation of a school, it just makes it unaccessible to a lot many.(sic!)

However,if I may ask, why is Winnipeg's business community considered small? Will it affect the placements, especially for finance majors?

[sch]

The tuition hikes were intended to mainly do four things: (1) Send Asper MBA teams to national and international competitions (2) begin recruiting cessions from abroad (3) Expand career service centre (4) Offer more electives. Once this was under way, they planned to expand MBA program. I'm not sure what their plan is now, since they did not get all the funding they wanted. I know that they introduced two new concentrations: Public Administration and Accounting-CMA joint designation.

Manitoba's economy is small. There are virtually no head offices here. It doesnt mean that you wount get a finance job though. Its just that majority of opennings are for retail banking. I dont know exact placement stats but it seems decent, since most of the people I know ended up getting managerial positions in various branches here. If you are eager to do I-banking, you will have to head out west to Calgary after graduation.

[Maxi-123-now]

Dear all,

I am from Jakarta, Indonesia and about to apply for Asper Full Time MBA for Fall-2015 admission.

I just want to find out if GRE can be submitted in lieu of GMAT as I am already more familiar with GRE and have taken twice for its exams.

Thank you in advance for all your upcoming feedback.