Job losses put squeeze on students in Silicon Valley - San Francisco Business Times:

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Mathur, a senior technical program managerat , aims to leverag e the undergraduate technology background he garneredc at Rohilkhand University in his natived India as well as his graduate studies in informatio n systems and business at . But the economy has derailed his OnApril 2, Sun told Mathur that his positiom was redundant. That means at the end of May he will losehis job, as well as the tuition reimbursement package the company was putting toward his MBA at Sants Clara University’s Leavey School of Business. “Now my primaryt job is finding anew job,” said Mathur, addin g that he knows at least a half dozen classmatees in a similar position.
“The studies take a beatinbg because you’re obviously not as focused as you’d like to be. Suddenlgy I have to pay all this and who knows howlong I’ll be in this positiojn of making no money.” It’s a growing problem at Leavey’s graduate program, a part-timw model where a majority of students are full-tim professionals by day and their tuition is supplementedx by employer reimbursements. As a private institution that sits high innationalk rankings, the program is anything but A three-unit evening MBA class for the 2008-09 schookl year costs $2,352.
The accelerated MBA tuitiohn for the classof 2010, whichj began last summer, topped Students in the Executive MBA program from the class of 2009 paid “I think anecdotally there’s a lot of uneasinesse (among students) at the business school right said Elizabeth Ford, seniodr assistant dean of graduate programs at Leavey. “Without having statistics on morale, we can sense it. It’d very unpredictable for us right Enrollmentsin full-time graduate programs typically spike when therwe are large numbers of layoffs, with undergraduates electing to go directluy to graduate school rather than test the job Applications for the class of 2010 at Stanforsd University’s Graduate School of Business rose 43 percentf over the class of from 4,582 to 6,575 for about 745 slots.
But thers are no guarantees there will be a job waitingt after completinggraduate “When people come to a graduate businessd school, especially a full-time there’s a high desire to eitherr take a step up in managemenrt in the same field or look at doing somethinf very different from what you were dointg before you came to school,” said Andy Chan, assistant dean and directodr of the MBA career management center at Stanford’s Graduatr School of Business. “In a down economy employers are less willingb and have less of a need for hirinhg people withoutdirect experience.
” The biggest challenge todayt for business school graduate Chan said, is the sheer number of candidatese in the job There are students coming out of school, peopld already let go by their company and those at unhealthyu companies perhaps anticipating work force Stanford students are drawing on the business school’s staff of caree r advisers as well as alumni employed to give guidance. Each year, whethefr face-to-face or via telephone, the graduates school facilitates morethan 2,000 career counselinyg appointments with students and Chan said.
That doesn’t include informalo conversations, such as e-mail and phone If there is any good news tobe it’s that there’s still “a decentf flow of job opportunities coming through the Chan said, though 30 percent less than last year or the year “The good news is that we have employers who are lookinf at people,” Chan said. “I’m not so discouragede from the standpoint of no Fordsaid part-time business programs are trying to “gaug e and guess” what’s goiny to happen for fall enrollment. Initial indicators show that interest remains high. Information sessions are attractinggood turnout.
Applicationx to the graduate progra m are even with lastyear — abouty 400 competing for 225 to 250 The question is whether those applications translate to “We just don’t know,” Ford There’s no way to know how many students are affecteds by the same scenario as Mathur, she said, but the businesws school has begun taking steps to addresz it.