Harvard Business School - Note - 06-03-2020

June 3, 2020 1:19am ET

Note about Harvard Business School

Round: Round 2

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Note:

https://poetsandquants.com/2020/06/02/harvard-business-schools-next-mba-class-will-be-more-than-200-students-short/?pq-category=business-school-news

What are peoples' thoughts on this, seems like it is pretty unexpected and may disappoint a lot of people on waitlists across M7 and other schools. My thoughts below:

1. Harvard set out with this deferral offer expecting a very small number would take them up on it. Receiving more than 200 deferral requests was unplanned and 'backfired' on them

2. PR is key here. I don't think they will only accept 20 students off the waitlist, though I don't think the number will be 200 either. For all we know the "about 700" students enrolling could be closer to 650 and about 720 could end up being closer to 750. Maybe that is wishful thinking on my part

3. Really surprised to see HBS build up an oversized waitlist and then decide not to enroll a full class and having trouble seeing the logic in it from their perspective. They are also leaving money on the table, which is ironic since they were quick to jump on the opportunity for government money back in April (I realize they have since returned it)

4. If you have 200+ deferrals now spread across the next 2 classes, they will either reduce the intake of new acceptances in those years, or have to expand those classes. So you'll have a 2022 class of 720 and potentially a 2023 class of 1120?

Anyways, curious to get the view of others on this situation, HBS's motivation to not enroll a full class while building up a huge waitlist and how this will impact movement of waitlists across other schools.

Like (4)

Show Comments (14) Last: June 3, 2020

anon37829 Likes Earned: 61 Sorry, didn't come in a list format like I was hoping for! (1)

grichmond Verified User. Likes Earned: 1152 Roughly 22% decline in the class size...very surprising. It’s odd that they didn’t feel they could add more folks from the waitlist (or so it seems)...is the drop in quality that steep? This could be great for the 720 or so folks in the Class of 2022, who may have a more intimate close-knit experience, especially if COVID19 ends up fading and classes can resume with limited impact on the program. As to all those deferrals, I think we clearly see an impact on class sizes (larger) and acceptance rates (lower). Interesting outcome from their ‘open deferral’ experiment for sure... (3)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1581 I'd think that's a pretty steep drop in income for HBS? Now to think what the impact of this move is on other leading MBA programs. Will they need to bring in smaller classes, too? Will they be relieved HBS isn't going more aggressively to its wait list? (2)

anon37829 Likes Earned: 61 I guess Wharton is the other from the M7 that has been quite generous on deferrals, wonder if they will take the same policy or keep a full class. As you both said quite interesting, and a significant decline in revenue for them, which I would think they would have avoided. They said they were able to maintain the same class composition and diversity which doesn’t seem feasible, as I would imagine the vast majority of deferrals are internationals? (3)

anon77576 Likes Earned: 43 I have to admit, I don't know much about the HBS waitlist process but why is everybody assuming that HBS won't be admitting anyone from their waitlist between now and august??? (0)

anon70571 Likes Earned: 4 I think they've already admitted the ~20 spots left based on how they worded it. "the composition of the students who are joining us is similar to those who chose to defer" (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1581 I assume they will take more folks from the wait list, much as they would during a normal season, at this time of year. But those numbers should be relatively few, replacing those who had planned to attend and hadn't requested a deferral, but had to pull out later for whatever reasons. (1)

anon39902 Likes Earned: 31 Us poor WL folks just received an email which confirms about 20 more will be accepted from the WL end of next week. And then some may be kept through August just in case of additional melt (1)

anon14188 Likes Earned: 27 @anon70571 they haven't yet admitted the remainder of the class per their latest email to those on the WL (0)

anon20153 Likes Earned: 17 Seems like the sort of thing that may be part PR-stunt as well. Projecting their uncompromising high quality standards for applicants while also leaving the door open to accept more off the WL. A much more preferable scenario than announcing they will accept 200 off the WL only to have those WL applicants (who already planned to go to Wharton Stanford etc) reject and all of a sudden they have a shortfall they did not anticipate, or have a much lower quality class than then anticipated (2)

anon39902 Likes Earned: 31 I feel they could also be planning for 720 right now, and if covid subsides, they can easily increase class size (0)

grichmond Verified User. Likes Earned: 1152 More on this topic here: https://www.clearadmit.com/2020/06/hbs-reduces-class-size-for-fall-2020/ (0)

anon20153 Likes Earned: 17 True that they could accept more if covid subsides, but those additional people accepted would come off the WL, correct? Or do you think some people that already chose to defer might be able to change their mind if covid subsides? If they were going to accept more off the WL I think they would do it regardless of whether covid subsides, although I recognize the need for social distancing makes it harder to have a full class. (2)

anon39902 Likes Earned: 31 It could be a ploy to see if any of the deferrals changes their mind and come back asking for a spot this year. Or maybe they just really think that the people on the WL suck. Hard to tell lmao (0)

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