School of Business Videos

Jeremiah Stevens:
Alright. Hello everyone, and welcome to the KU School of Business online MBA webinar. We're excited, we have two students here, current students for the program that are ready to share their experiences. What we'll do is we will first speak to them. We'll do introductions first off, and then we'll speak to each of them, get their ideas on what their thoughts on the program's like, what it's doing for them, and then we will move into Q&A. There is a Q&A tab down at the bottom. If anyone has any questions to ask, feel free to utilize that. I would say it's easier to use the Q&A tab than the chat tab. So please, please utilize that. But to kind of get us started here, Bryson, would you like to introduce yourself?

Bryson Brownlee:
Sure, sure, yeah. My name is Bryson Brownlee. I'm an admissions advisor here. I've been here for a little over four months now, since February, so I'm a little new, but I thoroughly enjoyed my time. I definitely look forward to getting to know some of the students that are on the webinar now, and some of the ones that are going forward to help you with their future, so excited for this webinar as well.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect. And my name is Jeremiah Stevens. I'm an advisor on the program. I've been working it for almost two years now. It is my favorite program to work with just because of the value added to students' lives, big fan of students using education in order to change their day-to-day. I'm really excited to meet our two guests today. I know they have great things to say about the program, and, well, why don't we get to meet them. Alright, Maura, would you like to introduce yourself?

Maura Durkin:
Sure. Perfect. Hi everybody. My name is Maura Durkin. I'm from Chicago, Illinois. I actually went to college out in California at Pepperdine, moved back home to Chicago in 2015, started my role in the commodities futures, OTC Swaps world, and currently I am working for a renewable energy company, which is like the cool fad, I guess, right now with everything going on with green, it's called Ørsted, it's based out of Denmark, but they just opened an office here in Chicago, so I'm their compliance manager, and it's been an absolute blast being a part of this online MBA program. I'm gonna be finishing in 2022, so spring of 2022, which makes me kind of sad 'cause I met so many great people through this program, but I'm really hoping today will give you guys an insight to both Sienna's and my stories. Thank you.

Jeremiah Stevens:
And Sienna.

Sienna Wagnon:
Hey, good morning everyone. My name is Sienna Wagnon. I live in Phoenix, Arizona. I am also, like Maura, in the finishing stages, I suppose, of the MBA program. I am currently working as a territory manager in medical sales for Philips Respironics, and we are out of Netherlands, which is interesting 'cause Maura said she's in Denmark as well. Really love the MBA program, I've met a lot of really great people as well, totally would recommend this and looking forward to the webinar.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect. Alright, so I guess we'll start... We'll start with Maura since she went first the first time, and we'll go with the most basic question of all, which is... We'll go with both of them. So, why did you choose KU, and why specifically were you looking for an online program?

Maura Durkin:
If I had a dollar every time this question was asked to me, I would be retired on a beach somewhere right now. But no, this is great. So as I said, I graduated in 2015, started my career, I was working for about three years and I was thinking... It was in the back of my head, I've always wanted to get my MBA and something I wanted to do, higher education is something that my family values, and I was the last of my parents' daughters to not have one, and I was like, "Oh, I gotta get through this, I gotta do it." So I actually had a really close mentor from Pepperdine University, his name is Professor Duane Myer, and he's actually the marketing professor for the KU online MBA program, and I started talking and bouncing off ideas like, "Oh, I might apply to some schools here in Chicago," which I did so I had your more brick and mortar programs as well, and then I applied to KU and then Pepperdine's online program.

And what stuck out to KU about me was immediately from the get-go, when I was going through the admissions process, I had a counselor assigned to me and she was absolutely amazing, we talked through every single step of the application program, I actually sent her my essays beforehand too, just to kinda get her general feedback on what makes me stand out as a potential candidate for this program, and it was also nice that I was in the process of studying through the GMAT and taking it from my brick and mortar programs, and that's something because of my experience, I was working for about four years at that point in time when I applied.

KU said I didn't have to take the GMAT, they were going based off of my undergraduate performance and then my actual real life experience, which to me is what I think most programs should value is who we are as individuals and the experiences that we can bring to the table. So that definitely drove my decision of feeling at home at KU. The reason I chose an online program over a brick and mortar was because at that point in time, I was in my previous role and I was traveling a ton for work. This was pre-COVID before the world was shutting down, and I wanted to still maintain a good stride in my MBA program, not worrying I have to miss classes, being behind on work if I happened to be out of town for something work-related. That's why online definitely was in my path, and KU is one of the top programs in the nation for online, so it was a no-brainer to wanna be a part of the Jayhawk family, and that's why I'm here today.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect. Top 20 currently too, in case anyone was taking notes, which I assume everyone is. Alright. Sienna, same questions for you, why did you choose KU and why did you choose an online program?

Sienna Wagnon:
So this is an easy one for me. KU was my undergrad and I love the programs that I was in. I really had a great experience just overall, I love the basketball team, obviously a lot of really great things about the school. So when I was looking to do my MBA, similarly, family pushing me and something that I always had like a personal goal to have an MBA. I love business, I think it's very interesting strategies. Awesome, so wanted to definitely get that accreditation, so when I was looking, there were really only two choices, living in Arizona, there's a University of Phoenix option, and then KU being the alma mater, pretty loyal there, so I just made the decision. I chose online because of the flexibility, I loved how there were options on when you decided to graduate, if you wanted to take a summer in between if you had other options or things that you had going on, it was easy to pick and choose your classes and kind of build your own program, so that's why I picked the online program. It's been awesome, super flexible, counselors are great. I've had such a good experience just overall.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect, and also quickly to touch on, I know Maura had mentioned the waiver for any type of testing, there's no longer a GMAT requirement, we use something called an essential skills assessment, but there's a chance that we may be able to help you with a waiver for that as well, the best idea for that is to get a hold of Bryson and I, we'll give you our contact information at the end here, and we would certainly be happy to talk to you about it. That may be an option for you.

Bryson Brownlee:
Alright, well Maura, you touched on this a bit already, but what was your experience like during the application and enrollment process?

Maura Durkin:
Sure, as I said in my previous answer, so the application process was actually extremely easy, which I was very happy to know that, 'cause some of these programs require so much of you when completing an application, and what I really enjoyed about KU is I had my papers I had to write, I spoke with a recruiter from the program and talked about my whole entire experience, and then from there it was in, as I like to say, the power's at these hands to decide if I was a candidate for the program, and thank God I was. So the actual application process was super easy. There is one point I wanted to point out about my student success coordinators, they are your best friends throughout the whole entire program. When I was waiting to hear back from KU about my acceptance, I actually, I still vividly remember the phone call, I was driving up to Michigan for a bachelorette party, and I was at a gas station, randomly got the call. And my coordinator called me and goes, "Maura, I just wanna tell you I have really good news for you, I wanted to tell you before the letter was sent out, you can now...

I was talking about how I've always wanted to get my KU sweatshirt 'cause I grew up being a KU basketball fan, and I was like, "Oh, I just really hope I can actually wear it and be a student," and she goes, "You should probably go get that sweatshirt of yours right now," and I just burst out in tears because I was so excited and happy to know I was part of the program, and another thing was, later on when I was starting and scheduling my classes, there was actually a phone call with my student success coordinator to kind of talk about what to expect in the program, what to expect when registering, ordering books, kind of just a general overview of what a new student should expect being brought into this program, and my dad was actually going through a major heart surgery at the time, I was literally at the hospital, and my coordinator called me and she goes, "Wait, hold on a second, we're gonna put all this other stuff to the side, how are you? How are you doing? How's your family doing?" And that really made me feel like I had someone standing in my corner, not only for my professional advancement, for my personal advancement as well, and she kept checking in with me through the latter weeks after my dad's surgery, and that's something I'll never forget.

She's never met my father, but she made me feel like she was a part of my family and she cared about me, and that really helped me get through the tough first few weeks of my program, and I couldn't be happier or prouder to have my students success coordinator, I think she'll be a lifelong friend of mine.

Bryson Brownlee:
Excellent, thank you for that. And Sienna, same for you, what was your experience like, and any examples of how a student success coordinator helped you?

Sienna Wagnon:
Excuse me, I have like the driest throat. So my student success coordinator and the application process, it was streamlined, it was very easy. I think not having to take the GMAT was a great... I don't know, a great ability to just sign in and kinda get going without having to stop your life, study for the test and then cross your fingers and hope that you make it. At that time, I was actually working in accounting for the Royals in Kansas City, and so I kind of had this quirky career change during the same time that I applied for the NBA, going from an accountant and to then going into medical sales. So the process was so easy for me and streamlined that it didn't add a lot of stress to my life, it was really quick and simple, and the student success coordinators... I have a great one too, I think her name is Holly, and she's just been phenomenal and checking in, "Hey, just so you know, classes starting today or two... Anything you need, anything I can help you with." Any time I have a question, she's always available, so it was very easy.

Jeremiah Stevens:
And Maura, just so you know, when that sweatshirt conversation was had, that was when I... My early days here, so I actually remember that. She was... Maya was sitting right next to me, so I remember that in my early days.

Maura Durkin:
I still have her thank you note too, and I passed on my dad's, but that just shows you the personal touch that this program has, 'cause I look at it every day and I'm like, "Wow, I just remember that, just happy moment."

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect. Alright. So this one is another one you guys can answer both of these at the same time, they're fairly similar. For Maura first, do you interact with the faculty and what are your professors like and what's your experience with them been like?

Maura Durkin:
Of course, yeah. I was absolutely mind-blown by how much interaction we have with our professors. I think the interesting part for Sienna and I was, our programs are always online, but I know a lot of programs that were more like the brick and mortar ones, for example, my husband, he was getting his MBA during the same time as me, he was going to an actual school program, I felt like I had more interaction with my professors than he did, which was absolutely crazy. I talked to my professors at least once or twice a week, they always came up with announcements, they were always open for office hours or questions, just a few people right off the bat that kind of stand out to me were obviously Professor Duane Myer 'cause he was my mentor at Pepperdine, so we stayed in close contact when I was in marketing, my professor Claire Rosenfeld fell to finance, we actually became super close after I finished up my finance class, and I ended up speaking to the women in finance group for the undergraduate connecting with a few students that were looking for internships here in Chicago or elsewhere, and she's been helping me as well with just getting...

I'm in an organization for women in derivatives of getting that kind of recognition made to the undergraduate students and the graduate students, so it was interesting just to know I could just hop on a zoom call with any one of my professors, they were flexible to meet with me and everyone was just so nice and kind. I can honestly say I didn't have a, what they would say, a bad professor throughout my program, everyone was so relatable, so understanding, just human nature was definitely there, which I thought would be something that'd be missing from an online program, but no, I got it 100 times harder here. Everyone was just good people, and I was very, very blessed to get to know all my professors, every single one, I've talked to each one of them so far instead of just being another number in the classroom, so that's something I definitely think this program brings to the table.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect, and it does seem like we've lost Sienna because it's 2020 and the... 2021 rather, and these things happen.

Maura Durkin:
Of course.

Jeremiah Stevens:
[chuckle] So it looks like Maura you now get top billing...

Maura Durkin:
Okay.

Jeremiah Stevens:
And are the star of the show moving forward. Well, hopefully Sienna can get back in obviously. But... Alright.

Bryson Brownlee:
We're going to the next slide?

Jeremiah Stevens:
Yep.

Bryson Brownlee:
Okay, sure. Well, Maura, [chuckle] would your... This is a great one too, because I always try to touch on this with students when I'm talking to... But everybody has their personal touches with that, but what was your favorite class and why? And then as far as group projects, how many were involved?

Maura Durkin:
So I'd have to say my favorite class was... It's called managing people, and it's with Professor Don Isaac, who is probably just the sweetest man ever to be created. What I enjoyed about this class was, yes, it was very heavily on reading and writing journals and case studies and essays, but I really enjoyed... We had discussions, like a discussion board as part of the canvas tool that we use for our online classes, and some of the classes you had to post in there, put your perspective on the week's readings or what we were learning. Don always made it a point to respond to the students and then send the message about what he thought was interesting about our analysis, or just wanted to get to know us more on a personal level, which was great. I really enjoyed just... He's just someone who's like a life-long pen pal, we actually still exchange emails to this day, which is great, he's definitely my favorite class, and then my favorite kind of analytical class, I would say is definitely finance. It was definitely challenging. That was when COVID hit and everyone was trying to figure out what was going on.

Maura Durkin:
And Professor Claire Rosenfeld definitely managed the ship really well. One thing I love about her, she held office hours religiously every week, you could always ping her with a question if you needed it, she was flexible with her schedule, and I think I felt most... Like I had the most reward after that one, 'cause it was definitely challenging topics, even though I'm in the finance role, she was tough, but I loved the culmination of that class and getting to know her more on a personal level as well, and now she's one of my new mentors, so those are definitely my top two classes. Group projects? Yes, so there's some classes that are more independent based, but there are a lot of classes with group projects as well, like for example, I'm in our Capstone class right now with Dr. Stephen Leonard, and we have a group that we analyze case studies, we just did one last week on Marvel and Marvel Studios, which was actually a very interesting story, but I get to jump on Teams calls or Zoom calls with my team. We work through our analysis, we write a case study documentation and then submit it as a team. Throughout the program, there's various different classes like that, where you're paired with a team, some of the teachers let you pick the people you wanted to be in your team as well, which was actually really nice.

Canvas made it super easy for us to meet or interact or... Like I have the app on my phone, so any time someone messaged me I knew, "Oh, okay, gotta jump on and do something." Obviously as well using today modern technology of FaceTime, Zoom, Teams, all of that. I definitely think COVID... We were ahead of the game with COVID because we already were used to working online and using these video platforms, so it was very easy for all of my teams for us to transition into working remotely as a team. It kind of reminds me what I do now. Most of my team is in Denmark, so this whole entire program is enhancing my skills, people to communicate with people across the world.

Bryson Brownlee:
Thank you for that answer. I think that's great to... Should we go on to Sienna? Do you wanna go back to the interacting with faculty or just continue going on?

Jeremiah Stevens:
Yeah, we can go back, we can do a... It too here for Sienna. Allow me to go back. Oh, also, I may have hit the button a bunch of times, so we may be getting a recap of everything, but we'll start off... Sienna, first off, welcome back.

Sienna Wagnon:
Sorry about that. That was a new one, the phone's overheating. [laughter]

Jeremiah Stevens:
Oh, no problem at all. Well, yeah, if you need to turn off your video, just let us know and we can just have you... If it's overheating your phone. But what have your interactions with faculty been like, will be the first question we'll get to you here.

Sienna Wagnon:
Sure, absolutely. Faculty has been amazing. Any time you had questions or having to reach out on the online platform, they were very helpful, they would jump in and answer any questions. Most of the time, I think everyone's pretty flexible and they're very intuitive on everyone's basic life, so they don't sit and think that everything is so structured to where they're not flexible with the timing, I think that's something I've appreciated the most out of these classes, they are very upfront and specific about what their expectations are, so you don't feel like you're in the dark of a new class coming in, but all the faculty has been extremely amazing. I think like Maura said, the finance class was challenging, the Econ class was a little interesting too, I think my favorite class overall was probably the marketing class. I've not done that capstone class yet, but that's exciting to hear. The group work is obviously good as well, so the teachers do a great job of facilitating all of the cohesiveness of the classes I think as well.

Bryson Brownlee:
I wanna do a follow-up on the group projects as well, because I get this question a good amount. How difficult is it, or even easy is it for you guys to be able to schedule time to meet with each other? Because everybody's on different schedules of course, and you want the flexibility, but does Canvas make it easy so that you all can kind of merge your schedules together?

Maura Durkin:
Go ahead, Sienna.

Sienna Wagnon:
Oh, I was just gonna say in terms of class schedules, I think it makes it easy because then you have all of the... You have all... Different... Like I'm in a different time zone and as you are as well, Maura, like so, we had people in New York or people in Kansas City, people in Arizona. I think the coordination obviously was a challenge at times, but I think we all have those priorities that we make in our lives. So it wasn't as challenging as I thought it would be. So I would just kind of jump on when you need to jump on and if some people can join and then you kind of do side groups, you know, when you have a large group of people. But I didn't find it challenging at all.

Maura Durkin:
And I'm just gonna second that motion as well as, as I'm repeating myself again, I really was impressed by the technology of Canvas and especially something as simple as having an app on your phone. It's basically like having like a Facebook messenger. Easily get alerts. You can see someone, "Oh, I have a question on X, Y, and Z, can you jump on, look at our Google doc?" The nice thing in all my groups, everyone was working professionals. They all knew, "Hey, we have time, we have family, we have a lot of responsibilities on our plate, but we have to make time for our projects in order to get it done." So I've had nothing but great experiences in my group work with everyone being flexible. I don't think I've had one person in my time zone yet. They've all been all over either the world or throughout the US and the Canvas tool is definitely just the backbone to communication for sure. And then a lot of people tend to take it outside of their... To Zoom or Teams or et cetera if they wanna have more of a personal face interaction.

Bryson Brownlee:
Perfect. And that's obviously a great opportunity for networking around the world as well.

Maura Durkin:
For sure.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Alright, so were you able to apply what you learned, or rather, what you're learning in your classes to your work? And we'll cut that second one off 'cause you guys were just kind of talking about it, but why don't you guys just tell us a little bit about kind of how you're incorporating what you're learning into your day-to-day.

Maura Durkin:
Sure, yeah. I'll start with this one. Definitely the finance class. I'm in more of like product management, but I work with traders every day and that class was very eye opening to me to just understand just basic calculations that my traders are looking at day in and day out when trying to figure out our exposure in the market. And then that was just kind of great foundation for me in my current role right now. And as well, currently I'm in the capstone class and it's also very reading heavy, writing heavy, but what I love about the material, it's all about leadership. And right now I'm actually in an organization where we've had reorgs and then leadership changes and then people's jobs are changing. And what Professor Steven Leonard has taught and like the material he's put in all of our weeks of the modules so far have been so relevant to what I'm going through right now.

Like the growing pains of what a reorg can be like, how do you get people motivated? How do you get people to buy in to the work that you're doing? 'Cause I'm in the type of work where basically I work with a team of IT developers and we are serving what are called stakeholders. So I'm the leader of my team, but I'm trying to get people above me, my stakeholders, to buy into everything that we're doing. So every single class I've had so far has had some sort of touch point into my current career right now, which again was very surprising to me. I just could catch myself writing in a discussion or a meeting. It's all about kind of my experience and what I'm going through and how I apply my learnings from the class to work. That's something that all these classes challenge you to do is try and bring some sort of aspect out of there to help you improve yourself overall.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect. Sienna, what have you been able to incorporate into your work from your coursework?

Sienna Wagnon:
You know, I think I had a very driven finance mind before I kind of transitioned into sales. And so I don't know how you guys feel about that, but I think they're very different aspects of business. So I think the courses kind of drew both of those industries together from accounting to like sales. So I used to think, you know, like accounting, what is sales doing? Or in sales, like what is accounting doing? Like why are... You know, so I think bridging the gap with the MBA program through Econ and the marketing class and the finance class, I think those were the three biggest drivers in incorporating now where I'm at in my career, only because they let you see perspectives of other sides of the business. So I really liked that. I really liked the... In the marketing class you do a simulation, like a real world simulation that kind of shows product development. I've never been in product development, however, in sales you have to kind of understand that chain, that process, supply chain to be able to understand where you're going. So I think that that was really eye opening for me. So we've had some product rollout and some marketing rollout that that kinda helped me with.

Bryson Brownlee:
Excellent, excellent. Thank you for those answers. Just another question that we receive a good amount, you know, what are the networking opportunities in the online business program that you guys noticed?

Maura Durkin:
Sure, yeah. As I said, most of the classes require some sort of a discussion or discussion board, it's usually one part of the module. And what I find interesting about that is yes, we have an assignment that we're usually writing an answer to on the material, but half the other time students are just going back and forth about what they're doing and then you can see they'll be like, "Oh, let's take this conversation offline and figure out how I can help you in regards to, I'm in product development, you're in product development, I'm in medical sales, you're in medical sales." It's so interesting how one assignment can lead to that conversation. As well, I have to go back to the teachers, they... Each one of 'em has reached out personally about, "Hey this is, you know, I even have a student or somebody that's interested in the commodities industry.

Do you think you could be of assistance just to start talking and mentoring to them?" So I got to be on the other side of networking, which is honestly such an honor, 'cause I used to be on the other side looking up to so many other people and now having undergraduates looking at me and having me kind of help shape their lives has been quite an interesting experience as well. As well, I've been able to get connected to the business career services, through Jennifer Jordan and Alicia, I think she's the graduate program, head of that career service program and we've done several webinars of...

Jeremiah Stevens:
Maura, you've muted yourself, just so you know.

Maura Durkin:
It was weird 'cause my whole entire screen just went black and that was like very scary and I was like, "My computer froze, I know it did." So apologies for the technical difficulties, everybody. I'll kind of backtrack. So I have been connected to the career business services through two of the members of the teams and I've been able to work with finding individuals internships, which is great. And then also as well, they've connected me with a few mentors in my industry in like the Kansas City area as well, just so I have some relationships. For example, I'm actually working on a current ISDA agreement with one of the energy companies in Kansas City. And I actually know somebody from there because of the KU program, which is just a small world, which is so weird. But that is just kind of one of the many ways you're always connected to finding new opportunities, new people. And Alicia has been great in being like, "Hey, if you ever wanna start networking or looking for a new job somewhere in the Kansas City area, Chicago area, et cetera, please just let me know." And she said she would gladly assist me. So they're there to help us. They're there to support you, whether you wanna be a mentor or on the other side, you need help finding your next step in your career.

Bryson Brownlee:
Excellent, excellent. And Sienna.

Sienna Wagnon:
You know, I think, similar experience to what you were saying, but I think at the other side of it, I've had an opportunity to just kind of see what else was out there. So I... The counterparts obviously like California, there's a... I've met a friend through the medical sales as well and we're partners in a class and so now we talk all the time like, "Hey, what do you think about this?" Or, "How's your business going? Are you guys out in the field?" You know, so we have that, you know, that it's kind of like the nationwide collaboration I guess. And then the last class I took, there was a gentleman in Indiana that was working on like nuclear... I think it's nuclear energy. So just having a conversation about that, something that you didn't even know kind of was a thing just to expand your knowledge and kind of see, you know, what other people are doing and then finding out why they're also getting their MBA, what they plan to do with it.

It kind of... I think it just broadens your perspective overall. I love networking in general. So I think it's a really great tool to just be able to bridge the gap between any sort of what... Like area you wanna get into. You can find a resource somewhere to ask those questions or maybe get some answers on, you know, would that be the right career path for me? Several girls I've met that are in the academic program that are doing athletics. So I was in base... I worked in baseball, so just bridging that gap with, you know, this is kind of what the front office looks like in that industry and this is kind of, you know, and then I've asked the same questions about what are best practices in medical sales. So it's definitely been an opportunity just to collaborate on best practices for the industry and just get perspective there.

Bryson Brownlee:
Perfect. Moving forward. So we'll take this one in sections 'cause there's... Yeah, we'll do the first two questions as one and then we'll come back around for feedback on the third question. But we'll start with Maura. What has been the most challenging part of the program and how do you balance school with your... With like a work-life balance?

Maura Durkin:
Sure, yeah. This is honestly a great question that we should be discussing. So obviously it's been a while since I've been in college and I was in college in 2015, so getting back in the whole entire kind of realm of being in the academia world and knowing how to actually plan out your time, from the beginning, that was a little bit of adjustment. I definitely had to figure out, okay, I work from 8:00 to 5:00 and then jump on and do my homework. The nice thing about being able to work from home, I've been able to find odd hours throughout the day where if I have free time, I can jump in and do some schoolwork if I have time allotted, which is kind of the great flexibility of this program. I would say the most challenging part definitely is getting used to the reading and the writing again.

'Cause right now I just write a lot of short memos and a lot of these classes are asking for essays, which aren't hard, it's just getting... Just putting that English cap back on from when we were all a bunch of youngins back in college, and then obviously keeping up with all the readings that there is, but if you manage your time wisely, it's not hard. You're not overwhelmed. There's some days or some weeks you're kind of slow on work and there's some weeks where, hey, I need to plan out a little bit more than last week 'cause I have a lot to get through. I'm actually a big proponent, so I come from the project management world as well, so you're probably gonna start laughing, but I use this methodology called Agile 'cause I use it every day with my development team and it's basically like a con bomb board mentality.

If I could like show it real fast, I have like this makeshift... Sorry, my lamp's in the way, but literally everything piled out into columns of, I have my work stuff on the bottom and I have my life/school on top and I just write myself reminders if there's something big, like I have a case study I have to do this week, a certain essay I have to get done. I'm that... I'm a visual type of planner. So I like to see it literally laid out in columns and it just works for me. It's just one of the techniques that's really helped me manage my time throughout this program and making sure I keep on top of all my assignments. The nice thing is too, Canvas basically is like a project manager tool in itself. So you can go through each module and you see what you have to do.

You always get reminders when something is due so you're not falling behind. Obviously you can reach out to your professor if you need a little bit more time and see if they can work with you, but the Canvas tool is kind of my skeleton of how I plan everything for my whole entire week. But that's how I've been able to keep on top of it. And honestly, I haven't had any super stressful nights or I haven't had to pull any all nighters throughout this program. I just manage the time knowing what I have and if I wanna go away for the weekend and have a trip, I just know okay, the next week I'm gonna do a little bit more school work and get it all planned out so I don't fall behind.

Bryson Brownlee:
Perfect. And we didn't even know we were getting visual aids, but there we go. [laughter]

Maura Durkin:
Yeah. Surprise.

Bryson Brownlee:
Alright, Sienna, both the top two questions to you as well. What has been the most challenging part of the program and how do you kind of balance school with your work and life?

Sienna Wagnon:
Yeah, absolutely. I think the most challenging was going back to the reading, back to the homework, back to the writing of the essays. I enjoyed that in my undergrads, but I didn't realize that I didn't miss it all that much. [chuckle] But I think it's actually taught me to have better writing skills and kind of allocating your time. I think time management is probably the most important piece of a work life balance with school. I mean, you know, I think we all, especially if you're getting your MBA, you're probably 100% dedicated to your job as well. So it becomes challenging to wanna do it all very well. So I think like Maura said, you just have to allocate the time, take the time, sit down and do it. And then just your resources. So like if you have, you know, the next weekend, you know you're gonna go somewhere else, allocate your time to just do the readings, do the writing, do the collaboration with your team, get it all done first. I don't know about you guys, but I kind of put personal stuff on the back burner if work things are pressing. So... And I'm a little bit of a procrastinator, so that's probably why that time management thing was a little challenging. But once I got through like the first two classes, I kind of had a routine down. I knew like Tuesday, Wednesday nights I was gonna be working on school, allocating that time for that. So it became routine and I think that's been successful for me.

Jeremiah Stevens:
All right, perfect. And we'll go back to Maura. This to me is always my favorite question 'cause this is where we get like trade secrets for how to be successful in the online MBA program. But what would be the number one piece of advice for success that you would give new students to the online business program?

Maura Durkin:
Sure. And Sienna kind of touched on it, is I think each individual needs to have his or her own set of just like the process of how they manage everything and stick to it. Don't break it. If... Like for me, I like to do a lot of my work after work or on the weekends, just so I know, okay, I might be able... Then I can have a lighter week going into Monday or Tuesday. 'Cause usually on Monday or Tuesday, I'm just a grumpy bear because work is starting again. So stick to your system, plan it out and you'll be okay. And then another thing I'd give you guys is, don't be afraid. I know it's probably... A lot of you are probably... Were in my shoes about a year ago where I was uncertain of, you know, what goes into an MBA program, what are the people like? Can I handle this?

Yes, you can, you can definitely handle it and you're not alone. You have so much support in this program, more than you would ever have in any other program. And I kid you not, I know I sound like I'm a cheesy commercial, but really there is nothing like the KU family. I came in with no previous ties to KU except for my mentor. And just to know that I'm... I feel so ingrained in a part of this community and that if something were to go awry or if I needed help, I have someone to turn to. It could be a classmate, it could be a professor, it could be my student success coordinator. Just know you are not alone in this program, and I promise you you'll have a ton of fun through it all. Just plan your time, get to know your fellow classmates and just enjoy the ride.

Jeremiah Stevens:
All right. Same question to you, Sienna. You can spill your secrets as well. What has been the secret to your success in the online program?

Sienna Wagnon:
Spilling my guts. I think after the first class, I decided I was going to read all the way through the syllabus from start to finish and block in those times when those classes were taking an exam or if you had a big project due so that I could allocate time previously. So that was one of the biggest things. Not that I didn't read the syllabus, but just when you have a work life balance, I like to try to focus on one thing at a time, kind of compartmentalize what I have to do. I'm one of those people that like multitask and I'm like doing four things at once. But I think with this program I was like, okay, when you're working, try to work and then when you're focusing on school, set your phone aside, don't answer work calls, focus on the projects, focus on the reading and then get the work done.

Sienna Wagnon:
Oftentimes, I think you're learning more and reading more as you're more focused. If you do that, I think you'll be more successful just in taking away a lot of the... I guess taking away the takeaways, right? So having those abilities to see, you know, with this quiz, what were the things that you actually left with that you could apply to real life? So I would always take notes during the quizzes too, just to kind of say, you know, some of the stuff I was like, "Well, maybe I'll apply this, but specific to my job or specific to my goals, like, how would I apply this?" So I would also do that as you're taking the classes, maybe make a little notebook. Like Maura, I'm visual as well, so I have a calendar, like an old school calendar. Obviously we have them in our phones and digitally, but I have an old school calendar where I write down what I do just because I wanna be able to look back and be like, "Okay, that's kind of what worked for me and let's just repeat that." And pretty successful at doing that. So that's something I would do. Keep a calendar and just time management for sure.

Jeremiah Stevens:
All right. We will move now to the question and answer. It looks like we have one already. First off. Hi Rhianna. I know Rhianna is a... I think Bryson and I have both spoken with Rhianna. But Bryson, if you wanna grab her question there.

Bryson Brownlee:
Sure, sure. And I think we pretty much touched on this a bit, but if there's anything else that you guys could think of, but I think a good one is the, how has your career prospects improved as you near the end of your MBA program?

Maura Durkin:
Sure, yeah. I'll actually touch on this one. So I actually switched jobs during my MBA program. I was previously at my first organization for about going on four years. And I just was at a crossroads of, was I really going anywhere? Was I really doing anything? There was a lot of changes happening in my team. So I was one of those people that decided I'm gonna be crazy during COVID and apply for a job and meet my whole team via the computer instead of actually in-person. And I have to say the first thing that stuck out when I was going through my interview processes was, "Oh wow, you're getting your MBA at KU while also switching jobs and during the pandemic. Like how do you balance all of that?" It was a really great conversation starter and I got to really kind of highlight my program, what I've learned from my classes and how I've applied it to myself and my career.

And my organization right now has been standing behind me fully for finishing up my MBA and just couldn't believe that I was doing it all at once and doing it all remotely. And I would have to say, going from here, I'm really excited to see... Maybe one day down the line I'll start looking for a job again if I wanna be somewhere else. And knowing that I have the whole KU network to work with to just start either having mentorship conversations or connection conversations, or just pick people's brains on what industries they're in, if I end up wanting to leave my industry, I have that whole entire playbook right in the front of me, in my hands and I'm so excited to know that I have the whole entire KU family standing beside me.

Bryson Brownlee:
Great. Thanks for that, Maura. And how about you Sienna?

Sienna Wagnon:
Well, so one thing that we had to do, my company's actually reimbursing me for my MBA program. So you get a passing course, a passing grade, and then they reimburse you. But in order to be accepted into that benefit, you have to write an essay to the CFO and the CEO that they read over and they say, "Are you eligible? Are we gonna grant you this benefit to reimburse you for your MBA program?" So two things. One, I think it gives the upper management the visibility that you're looking to grow, that you have the capabilities, you've been accepted into a program of the stature that KU has. So they look at you and they read your essay, but then they also know that you're driven and you're motivated to kind of do more. So I think that that's given upper management an idea of where my career goals are within the company or elsewhere. So I think it's made me very marketable. I think it's also given me the visibility to have that line of connection with the CEO and the CFO to have discussions, 'cause I've had several discussions since the time that I applied.

Which I think has helped me just grow in general. I'm looking into being the next level of a territory manager in sales, kind of do a regional manager position, and I've become a sales trainer, but I think the visibility of them knowing that I'm dedicated to the company, I'm dedicated to the program and passing the classes they obviously see that you're able to do project management, you're able to do finance and marketing, you have a 30,000-foot view of how to run a business. So I think that that's a huge impact on anyone's career, just having an MBA on your resume is going to impress just about anyone, but I think within your current company or other companies, a network of people that you'll end up kind of infiltrating when you apply for a program like this, I think the possibilities are endless.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect, and we are waiting on some more questions here, and as we're doing that, I just wanna take the chance to, I guess, so we don't forget at the end to say both to you, thank you. Wow. To both Maura and Sienna for your time today. I know you guys both have very busy schedules, and you guys have given us a lot of insight into the program. And to everybody who's looking to ask questions, please put them in the Q&A section, Maura and Sienna are both obviously not just great students, but also great examples of the types of students that are in our program. So if you'd like to get any type of insight into the program, what it might look like for you, please feel free to put that in there. While we're waiting for that though, I can ask a more personal question, because this is something that I noticed once I started working with KU and with this program. What surprised you the most from working with this program? For me, it was... I know Maura you mentioned you're from Chicago. I also am from Chicago, and I was downtown actually at Union Station once, right before the pandemic started, and was like, "Oh, I'd like to watch the KU basketball game."

And looked it up, and there were two KU bars within three miles of where I was at. So I got to go and it was like a little slice of Laurelton in the middle of downtown. And to me, seeing that was something that really surprised me about KU and the alumni base as well as how they reacted to me wearing my KU MBA polo. But we'll start with you Maura, what surprised you the most about the program, and KU or the MBA or whatever you'd like to share?

Maura Durkin:
I'll touch on both of them. Just in general, to the KU larger body, I would have to completely agree with you Jeremiah Stevens, there's been a few times where I'm like, hey, pre-COVID, I wanna go watch a KU basketball game or connect with somebody, and there's a bar not too far from here called Kincade's, it's just dedicated to all KU. And just to be able to walk in there and know I'm wearing a KU hat or a shirt, and everyone is just like, "Hey, do you want a beer? Do you wanna drink? What program are you on? And when did you graduate?" And those just instantly start conversations that easily lead to further networking discussions later on. And then I'd have to say overall, by the MBA program, I keep coming back to it. I am genuinely, seriously impressed by the staff and most importantly, the professors, and how each one of them has made their class uniquely different, but also they've been able to work with the students and get to know the students. I honestly was unsure on how an online program would work. Would I just be kind of the other body on the other side of the computer, and at KU I wasn't.

I still talk to my professors, I actually brought my little brother to go visit KU to look potentially for college next year, and I was in accounting, and I reached out to my accounting professor and I said, "Hey, would you mind meeting me in person, my brother is interested in finance, we're gonna go to Capitol Federal Hall and just do a tour." Immediately she was like, "Yeah." She put something on her books. She's never met me in person until that point in time, and we spent an hour with her, and she was talking about her experience, showing my brother around the business school, which was honestly something I'll never forget, is that the people... The people at KU, and it's all of us, everyone that's spread out throughout the world, we all are willing to help each other and be there for each other, and I think that's the cornerstone of KU, is we are one family. And even though it's a bigger school, we all take care of each other and we're all there for each other.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Alright. To you as well, Sienna. I know obviously KU is not a brand new experience to you, 'cause you were at KU for your undergrad as well. But what has surprised you most as you're looking at your experience with the MBA program?

Sienna Wagnon:
I don't know if it's specific to the MBA program, but I know when I started the MBA Program, we were at a regional sales meeting and a new United... Like the whole United States sales leaders sat down next to us at our table next to me. We started talking, he's like, "Where did you get your undergrad?" And I was like, "I went to KU, Rock Chalk," and he goes, "I did too." And I was just surprised. And it was really an interesting little... We had a great dialogue, but then about six months later, we were at a basketball game at ASU and ran into each other. And it was just a really interesting scenario 'cause it's Arizona, right? You're not in Kansas, but then, made me reach out... Like Facebook has a KU Alumni area here in Phoenix, so I joined that and then found the bars like you guys do with the basketball games, the camaraderie is just so amazing. And I think, I love that Maura had the opportunity to join us on the MBA side, so now she sees how close-knit it all is.

I just think that people in Kansas are amazing, I think most people who join this school are amazing, great hearts, good people. And I think that there's always just a common goal, and it's almost like a kindness and a common courtesy that I'm really privy to, so I really like that. So what surprised me, I guess, specifically about the MBA program, was how much I liked being challenged, it wasn't so hard that I wasn't able to achieve my GPA goals or whatever it looked like, but I enjoyed taking on the challenge because I felt like I was gonna collaborate with some really awesome, very intelligent people. We were gonna get some insight on things that I hadn't had insight on before, the networking and all of those little components that you get from joining a program like this, that was what surprised me the most, pleasantly surprised, obviously, but just a great experience overall.

Bryson Brownlee:
Excellent. Well, it looks like we do have a question from Psy. Hey Psy, how is it going? It's a pretty straight forward question, it's about how many students are in your classes?

Maura Durkin:
So I think this kind of ranges on what class you're in, but most of them, I believe there was around probably like 100 at max, but the nice thing about most of the classes is they break the classes down into sections, so like you're in section A or Section B. So your actual class size is a lot smaller. I think I had like 20 people that I knew who was in my class, I know who I needed to reach out to out of the larger group. So you get that experience of being in a bigger group, but also that experience of being a part of a smaller, interlocking group within the classes.

Sienna Wagnon: I was just gonna add, I think it's kind of what you make of it. And this is what I'll say, I think that the program, it's kind of a unilateral program. You're kind of doing a lot of your work on your own, you're doing your readings on your own, you read the lectures on your own time, which is like the flexibility we had talked about, but then if you wanna... You are categorized into those groups as well, but then if you wanna reach out ad hoc, like one off to other people in the group you can do that as well. A lot of it is a work at your own pace sort of program, I think. There's obviously deadlines you have to hit, but during the week, I think that I found Monday night I'm reading, Tuesday night I'm doing one of the lectures, Wednesday night I'm doing a quiz type of thing.

So that's kind of how my classes were structured. And then midway through each course, I'd say probably two times through the course, you do a group project and some of that expectation is by week three or four you meet up with your group, you have an initial introduction call then you have some working calls and then you finish your project. I think in most of my classes that's kind of how it was structured, but that's kind of what I found for the class sizes. So I didn't ever feel like I couldn't get in touch with a professor if there was so many people in the class, there were 60 or 100, I got responses very quickly, or there was another student that was willing to offer... During the discussion boards you could offer the answer if you had a question there as well. So very easy to interact and very easy to get any of your questions or needs met during the courses.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect. Alright, and we do have about what, nine minutes left here. So any questions? This is... We'll hold off here for another couple of minutes, and then we'll see if we can give everybody some time back in their day. I personally feel very well-informed through all of this... Oh, here we go. Casey, who also says thank you, 'cause that's how Casey rolls. How do you like the length of the classes? And for those who don't know, it's one course every eight weeks with the asynchronous course work. Do you find the semesters to be at a good pace? And are you able to keep up with the workload? Did this help you keep your MBA goal on pace as far as getting it done within two or three years? And the standard amount is 27 months, though there is some flexibility to finish quicker or to take longer. We'll start with Maura.

Maura Durkin:
Sure, yeah. So honestly, I love the way the semesters are set up. So if you're... Like I'm just doing the traditional route. I'm taking the full two years to get it done, where you have, for a semester you have two classes, but they're not at the same time. So you'll start with your first class the first eight weeks, and then your second class the second eight weeks. What I loved about that was you're basically knocking out two classes in a semester, but you're still doing them independently from each other. There is some time where there maybe a week or two, they may overlap, but usually the professors know that. And I remember starting my marketing class and professor Myer was like, "Oh, I know you're finishing up Managerial Econ, so I'm gonna give you guys a light week for this week, so don't worry about getting your homework in until the second week of the course," which was really nice of him to do that. As well, I really enjoyed how quickly you can get classes done, like for example, one of my closest friends that I met from this whole entire program was down in Texas, and she decided she wanted to finish her MBA earlier.

So she's able to stack classes on top of each other. So she is doing two classes at once, so technically four during a semester, and she's able to manage it and she loves it. It works for her. I'm the person, I like to actually do things a little bit slower and really try and retain things as much as I can, so the two-year program was perfect for me. But if you are the individual that wants to get it done and has the time and the flexibility, there is that option as well. Just knowing what works for you I think is kind of the best solution here. And the semesters are perfectly managed. Like right now I'm in my capstone class, which I was like, "How are we gonna do a capstone in eight weeks?" They actually extended it to 16 weeks, which is great. And everything's extremely manageable from the get go. I thought the capstone was gonna be absolutely horrible or long or tedious or hard. It's probably... It might come out as my favorite class at the end of this program.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Sorry. Sienna?

Sienna Wagnon:
I'm like choking over here, sorry. I really enjoyed the eight week... Excuse me. I really enjoyed the eight-week time frame because it gives you the chance... I think the pace is really good. I think they have... What do they say? Dedicate maybe like 10 hours a week, something like that. I think I did okay with 10 hours a week, and it worked well, like two hours a night. Sometimes you finish things sooner, depending on your pace, but I really enjoyed the eight-week classes. I don't feel like it went too fast. I feel like I took something away from each class as well.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect, alright. And as we kind of wrap things up here, I'll go with another question of my own, 'cause I'm greedy. So I know Maura you had mentioned, one of your best friends from the program, indicating that there's more than one of them, because how... Otherwise how would it be one of the best? Have you guys seen any successes or can you guys speak to the relationships that you've made in the course work, not just networking, but kind of looking at how that affects your viewpoint on your career moving forward? The networking opportunities and people that you've met within the program, whether that's professors or other students.

Maura Durkin:
Sure, yeah. So I'll start with the professors. As I said, every single one of them has reached out to figure out, "Hey, how can I help you, what do you need help with?" Which is honestly just a great stepping stone to know that you have that in your back pocket. The one thing that I was also kind of genuinely surprised by was being able to create just friends from this program. Yes, we talk about work, we talk about school, but actually getting to know people and what makes them tick. So for example, my one friend Catherine, we met because she was, we happened to be assigned on a group project together, and we ended up just really hitting it off, we have similar personalities, we're both in the energy business right now. And it's great to just have people that are walking this journey with you, just to message or call and like, "Hey, I'm having... I'm struggling with this," or, "How did you handle this?" Just to know you have that additional support, but also as you leave the program, you're gonna have that group of friends, you're KU friends now, which is great.

Maura Durkin:
Like for example, I'm visiting... I'm going down to visit Catherine in a few weeks, and we've never met in person, we've only met via Zoom and we met through this program, and that's something I never expected, was to meet somebody that I genuinely feel like I've known forever. As I said, a life-long friend, a great person, and that's something that this program can give you, is the opportunity to meet just down-to-earth caring people. And I hope you guys all have that same experience that I had.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Perfect. Sienna, do you have any experiences that are similar or what's your experience been with your students and the faculty?

Sienna Wagnon:
The faculty's all been extremely responsive and great, they're a good team. They put the courses together I think with your work-life balance in mind. And I think they really want you to succeed, so I think that's important as well. In terms of the friendships, there's been probably a handful of people... Oops. Hold on. [chuckle] Handful of people throughout the course that I've kind of made friends with. Not to the extent that Maura did, but I think that's awesome. There's a couple of friends that have come out for like a spring training game just 'cause they like baseball and they wanted to kinda check it out, help them kind of coordinate that, just from knowing the area in Scottsdale and Phoenix. But overall, everyone I've ever worked with in the... In the groups or on the teams has been just a good, solid person that you would want to keep in your phone book if you ever needed something and vice versa. So I think I've not ever come across somebody in the program that I've been like, "Ah," you know? Everyone is awesome, so everyone's reachable and very interactive, and I think the networking capability has been amazing.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Excellent. So no students that were like, ah. Perfect. Alright. So it does look like we're coming up to the end of our time. For those who are interested in the program, if we've spoken with you before or not, please feel free to reach out to us. We are more than happy to speak with you about whatever questions, comments, concerns you have about the program. What your admissions process would be like. For Bryson and I, it's what we're here for, and it's what we do. So please feel free to reach out. It just says here, the deadlines are the 3rd and with classes starting the 23rd. So with that in mind, here's our contact information if you'd like to reach out to either one of us, as we can provide you with some help, whether that be potential waivers for the essential skills assessment or if you are looking for... To waive your application fee, if you're a qualified student, we can look into whether that would be a good fit for you. But other than that, Bryson, anything you'd like to follow up with?

Bryson Brownlee:
No, I just want to thank you both for joining and giving your perspective. It's really great, like I said, I'm a little newer. It's actually four months today, the 8th, I just looked at that, which is great, but these conversations are what I have all the time, so it's just great to get that kinda, I guess, the feedback that I've been looking for. So I thank you guys both.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Yes, thank you both very much. And to everybody, thank you for attending as well and Rock Chalk.

Sienna Wagnon:
Rock Chalk, thank you guys.

Maura Durkin:
Rock Chalk, thank you guys.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Thank you. Thank you.

Bryson Brownlee:
Have a great day.

Jeremiah Stevens:
Bye.

Jeremiah Nast:
Welcome, everyone, to the KU Online MBA Programs Financial Aid Q&A webinar. We're going to get started off here. We do have a guest coming up, but first I'd like to introduce myself. My name is Jeremiah. I may have spoken with many of you over the phone. I am an admission outreach advisor for Everspring, who works on behalf of this program. I am also a student in this program. I've been working with it for a while. I loved it so much I decided to pursue it. And Diego, would you like to introduce yourself?

Diego Guerrero:
Thank you, Jeremiah. So I'm Diego Guerrero. I'm one of the Financial Aid Advisors or Financial Aid Counselors, excuse me, with KU. I am one of three right now, currently soon to be six. But if you ever had any sort of Financial Aid questions, questions about the Enroll and Pay website, questions about your plans that involve your Financial Aid, I would be one of the most immediate resources that you could contact and make use of.

Jeremiah Nast:
Perfect. All right. So as we get started with our presentation here, Diego is gonna go through a lot of information. He has an abundance of it. There's bound to be some questions that come up. I'm gonna encourage everyone to use the Q&A feature on the bottom of your screen. If you have questions, log it in there. We will get to them at the end. Diego's going to go through what he has to go through, and then we'll see if everything gets handled just kind of naturally throughout the process. But if you do have questions, we wanna make sure that we're getting those handled for you. So put them in the Q&A feature. Please do that rather than the chat feature. That allows us to handle them more easily, and we wanna make sure everyone's questions get heard. But Diego, I'm going to go ahead and get you going here in just a second.

Diego Guerrero:
Thank you. So to start, what are the costs of my graduate educations? Normally, the price per credit hour for this program is, as you can see there, $865 right, per credit hour. I believe the normal amount of credits required for the program is 42, hence the $36,330 estimated total program cost down below. We're trying to estimate any sort of fluctuation in the tuition and fees as best we can. But we do give a heads up that they might change in the future. This is the cost. As of right now, I checked this today just to make sure. That's really it for this slide. We can go to the next one. What is the estimated cost of attendance? The Financial Aid office uses the federal model to estimate a student's anticipated educational expenses.

These categories haven't really changed that much since they were originally introduced, and they just cover reasonable expenses that you're bound to have, both things that are charged by the university, such as the tuition and fees, possibly housing and meals, depending on your situation, as well as expenses that you may or may not incur while at the university. Books and supplies, transportation, personal expenses. Normally, when a student first files their FAFSA, our office will use some of that information as well as some local and institutional estimates to come up with their cost of attendance or their budget, as it becomes known.

Eventually, we would share that information with you, and it can be sometimes a useful way to anticipate what your educational expenses might be. But the other purpose that this serves is that it tells the government how much Financial Aid you can receive, and that includes everything, scholarships, grants, and primarily loans. If you ever find yourself in a situation where your cost of attendance does not allow you to receive more aid than you need, please reach out to the Financial Aid office, 'cause that's when we can initiate a process of the cost of attendance appeal. I would just explain the process to you at that time and give you the resources to get started.

We may end up having to adjust your cost of attendance based on either your bill, right, bill charges that weren't originally included in the estimate, or based on documentation of your off-campus expenses, your rent, car repairs, if you have to purchase a book somewhere else, anything like that. Reach out to us, and we can go over what those expenses are and see if we're able to adjust the budget, the cost of attendance, so that you're able to receive more Financial Aid and cover those expenses.

So, how do you normally apply for Financial Aid? Well, the first step would be you fill out the FAFSA. You have to go to studentaid.gov The upcoming academic year is the '23, '24 academic year. That's going to be from fall 2023 to spring 2024, and at least, Katie Lawrence, I would also include the summer 2024 semester. Based on your financial information, how many people are in your household, your age, a variety of different qualifiers, the FAFSA will come up with a figure that we use to determine your eligibility for different types of Financial Aid.

That's the expected family contribution. We also have an in-house process for international students. That's the Institutional Student Need Analysis Worksheet, which is a mouthful. We usually just say ISNAW. A minority of people say ISNAW. That's okay. That's essentially the analog to the FAFSA. While the FAFSA is for domestic students, the ISNAW is for international students.

It gives us a rough idea of what your expected family contribution would be. Unlike the FAFSA, this does not lead to immediate access to Financial Aid because it's not connected to any sort of like a federal program or a state program, but there are some institutional grants and scholarships that may take need into account, and for that, you would need to have that documented in the system. So you have to fill out an ISNAW, and if you're an international student, I always recommend filling it out either way, just in case. So what types of Financial Aid are available to me as a graduate student?

So for the most part, the most immediate form of Financial Aid that will be available to graduate students is going to be loans. We did share these resources here, and it's possible that, you may want to get them from, Jeremiah later on. I think we're having some [laughter] That's okay. No worries. I can send you those links later if you need them. To be honest with you, for the most part, a lot of Financial Aid, need-based Pell grants, or state grants are mostly for undergraduate students.

There's not a lot of need-based aid for graduate students, but we did share these resources in case you're able to, find some kind of, scholarship that you might be interested in KU Academic Works or, the Graduate Funding portal. A lot of them it would have to do with, research or benefits that would be more and more available for students studying on, like the campus, right, not online.

Nevertheless, it never hurts to look. That's what I always say. Your loan options, I will say ultimately how you choose to pay for school is up to you. But these options are listed in the order that I would recommend them. If a student came to me seeking to, finance their education as a graduate student, the first option that I would suggest is the, unsubsidized direct loans for graduate students. You have to file a FAFSA every academic year in order to qualify for this, and the maximum amount is $20,500. That has to fit within your cost of attendance. So if your loan offer is smaller than that, there's no need to be concerned.

That would be normal. The lifetime limit that you can have as a graduate student for these loans is, $138,500. So normally until a student, hasn't, exceeded their annual loan limit, or if they find themselves in a situation where they have reached their lifetime loan limit, it's not really up until that point that I would consider looking into the other alternatives. But if you do need it, especially if you need to cover off-campus expenses then the next option would be your Graduate PLUS Direct Loans.

If you had the experience as an undergraduate student to, have your parents take out a PLUS Loan for you, this would be somewhat familiar. They work in a similar way. And Graduate PLUS Loans wouldn't really be included in a student's aid package, so you wouldn't directly get a Graduate PLUS Loan offer after filling out your FAFSA. Instead this is something that you would've to seek out yourself, but you can find it very easily on the same website where you file the FAFSA, that's studentaid.gov. You can complete the application.

There is a credit check involved. If passed, good to go. You sign your master promissory note and in a few days we should have that information at the Financial Aid and Scholarships office. If for whatever reason you cannot pass the credit check, that's okay. You can always have... You have the option to just reapply with a co-signer backing you up for that loan application. And technically, there's really no annual limit or lifetime limit for Graduate PLUS Loans. You can borrow as much as you need, but it has to fit within your cost of attendance within your budget.

If you need a little bit extra, you can always look to KU Endowment. They are a nonprofit organization supported by donors, and they provide Financial Aid, support and assistance exclusively to KU students. For graduate students, the annual loan limit is $6,000. Your aggregate limit is gonna be $12,000. There's the link there, on the PowerPoint. You can again get that from Jeremiah if you need it. I think that can be a good option sometimes, especially if you don't necessarily need to, take out such a large amount of money that, would require a Graduate PLUS Loan. But you still need a little bit more than what you can get just through the regular unsubsidized, Direct Loans.

And lastly, private or alternative student loans. I've been getting this question a lot recently actually, of is it true that Private Loans are always worse than the Federal Loans? The answer is no. It is possible that you'll be able to find a Private Loan with a better interest rate, a, repayment plan that you'd like better, a Private Loan that works better for you. But that's the catch. You have to go out there and find it. You have to do the research. We, the Financial Aid counselors are not able to recommend a Private Loan lender to you other than KU Endowment.

So this is why this would be option number four. I would suggest everything else before suggesting a Private Alternative Loan, but if you need it and you find one that works for you, I think it can be just as valid. And good of an option to finance your education. And we do keep that list of, loan lenders that other KU students have used in the past, just for your convenience. So when will Financial Aid disperse? Normally Financial Aid disperses, 10 days before classes start? That means that we will take whatever the funds are there for the loans that you have applied for, and we will use them to pay whatever is on your bill.

Normally that'll be your tuition. Any remainders, of that disbursement would just be issued back to the student directly as a refund by default. This happens via pay per check. Obviously you don't want that. You want to make sure that your preferences are set to, direct deposit so that you can get your money as quickly as possible. Normally it takes just a couple days for disbursement to happen, and same for refunds. They might take out one business day or two to, process. I think that's it from me, right, Jeremiah?

Jeremiah Nast:
All right. Yeah. And we will get back to you for some Q&A...

Diego Guerrero:
Okay.

Jeremiah Nast:
But getting into kind of like, how do you get to the point where you would be working with someone like Diego, setting up a financial plan for yourself? As far as the deadlines for the upcoming semester, the final application deadline is August 7th, 2023.

Jeremiah Nast:
So there is time for that, but there are... You'd wanna be in contact as soon as possible with classes that start August 21st. And as far as that, those admissions requirements, a Bachelor's degree from an accredited institution or equivalent. They do prefer a GPA of 3.0 or higher. But if you're not at that level, please reach out.

There's every student is evaluated on holistically. So we'd love to speak to any students about kind of what may be best for them. There's no GMAT required. There is a separate assessment. It's called an executive assessment. There are two different routes that students may take. One would be if students do qualify for a waiver for that.

Best way to see if you've qualified for a waiver is to talk with someone like me or one of my colleagues looking into that. Feel free to give me a call. I'll give my phone number here by the end. But as far as what's required for the actual application, they would need your resume. They'd prefer two or more years of work experienced.

Once again reach out if you have questions. There's, everyone's situation is different and certainly we wanna help as many students as we can if you're qualified for the program. They would need three letters of recommendation, a personal statement, those letters of recommendation, you're looking at professional or academic letters of recommendation.

Just get their names put into the application itself. It will reach out to them on your behalf. So you wanna give them a heads up first. The personal statement, normally looking at 600 to 1000 words about why you'd be a good fit for the program. That application is online.

There is an application fee of $65 for US residents, or $85 for international applicants. Do reach out to us. There may be some ways that we may be able to help you out with that for qualifying students. The only way to know would be to talk to us, but certainly happy to talk to students about that application fee.

All right, so we made record time there, but it does look like we have a couple of questions for Q&A. With these pulled up. We have an anonymous attendee had asked about, "For the online program, are there book fees?"

Diego Guerrero:
To my knowledge, there's no book fees, right? We have to account for books and the cost of attendance because we assume that you'll be buying books, but you don't necessarily have to buy them at KU. I'm pretty sure that KU will not be charging you a book fee. I've never seen that before.

Jeremiah Nast:
So anecdotally, 'cause I am a student in the program, your courses may have books. The costs may vary. Where you look for it. There's places that offer books for digital rental for... There's just so many different ways. So that $36,330 number does not include the cost of books. Other than that, the question was, does this apply to the online MBA? I don't necessarily know what that was referencing.

But what we have been speaking about to this point has been the online MBA program. If you have a specific question you can feel free to reach out to me after the webinar today. I'll drop my phone number before. Well, I won't drop it. I will give it to everybody. I will give you all my phone number to give a call and ask questions if you have more specific questions.

Diego Guerrero:
Yeah.

Jeremiah Nast:
You share the application fee part of the presentation. Okay. I'm interested to know... I don't really understand. So were you looking at this for this part?

Okay. So they were hoping to see this slide. So this is what's required for the application itself. Happy to walk everybody through these. Once you've started your application, me or someone like me would be able to actually see what's there, what's completed. It'll also give you a nice application checklist so that you can see what is needed for your actual application. Lots of application questions. [laughter]

Paige, if your last day for your classes is August 8th, and the deadline for applying is August 7th, can they waive some time for the official transcripts? One thing to know about the transcripts is that what's required for the actual... For submitting your application is a copy of official transcripts. Normally if you're in your last semester of classes, you can get a copy of your official transcripts that would indicate that you would be about graduate. That is normally enough be considered for your application itself. You would need official transcripts with your graduation date on them by the end of your first semester. Potentially, Paige, that would be a possibility. That's a really interesting way that that ended up working out with the 8th and the 7th. But I think that most likely that would be something that would be able to be worked out if that's the case. I would just get a hold of those transcripts and we'd see what we could do.

Can this deck be accessed somewhere else later on? If you would like it, if you want to reach out to me at jnast@ku.edu I would be able to send you whatever information you were looking for specifically from it. I also... This webinar itself will be recorded, if you would like to receive a recorded version of this webinar.

Attend class in person if offered as an online MBA student.

Unfortunately, that is not an option for the a hundred percent online program. The way that the course is stretched... Or structured with the cadence and everything. It is offered as an entirely online alternative, so there would not be any campus courses. However, you would be a KU student, so things at the campus that you would be looking to access, like essentially, like the library or anything like that, you would be a KU student, but you just would be not able to participate in the campus coursework.

Okay, I think this one may be for both of us. [laughter] Here we go. So if accepted into the program, but you defer to start at a later term, accepted to fall '23, but looking at winter '23, due to the potential delays in loan financial aid, is that common? Is there a valid reason to defer to a later term? Diego, I guess a great place to start with answering this question would be how long would you normally see something like FAFSA taking to process?

Diego Guerrero:
Normally I would say if you file your FAFSA on Monday, at the latest by Friday, the financial aid office should have access to it. Now, I'm saying at the very least, we will receive what they call the FAFSA response file, would be able to see it. It doesn't mean that your financial aid will be processed in that time. It's still a bit of a manual process for the financial aid office to post all your loans. And in the case of a graduate student, that's usually just the one, I would say at the most, maybe like, I don't know, a week and a half. After that, if you don't hear anything or you don't see any changes in enrollment pay, that is the time to reach out, send me an email, call somebody so we can look into it 'cause it should not take that long. Yeah, it should not take that long.

Jeremiah Nast:
All right. And that was posted by an anonymous attendee. Reach out to your admissions outreach advisor as well. If it's something that we certainly want to make sure that if you're moving in the right direction for you, so if there's anything that anybody can do to help even if it were just someone pointing you in the right direction to speak with someone like Diego, I know that we'd be happy to accommodate that.

How many hours a week do you spend working on it?

Alan, was that question concerning the online MBA, how many... An hourly work, it does state on the website that most students are looking at 15-20 hours per week of coursework. It really does vary from student to student. There's no, with this being an asynchronous course, there's no dedicated login times or anything like that. It may take you less time than that, it may take you more time than that, but it is flexible. And I can say that as a student within the program, I don't have any required login times, but I do have deadlines and due dates. So it is a substantial amount of work, but it does fit really nicely around the other things in my life.

How long does it take to complete the program?

The program is built to be taken one course at a time over 27 months. That would be from start to finish, taking courses year round, one at a time. There are... Courses for this program are a little bit different. They are eight week courses, so all the courses are eight weeks long other than the capstone, which is 14. You can think of it as being like two courses pushed together. But they are... You take the courses then year round over those 27 months. Other than boosting my CV... Alan, I will get to the, I do want to make sure we cover student's questions about the program itself, about the, get to any financial aid questions. Alan, if need be, I can certainly call you after we get off here and we can talk about that. We'll get to these other questions first. But I do have a lot to say about that. Let's see here.

Okay. So this is from Jacob for you Diego to confirm most financial aid given out for this program is in the form of loans, and there likely aren't scholarships available for this program to reduce the cost of the program.

Diego Guerrero:
True. Yes. That sounds about right. I'll be honest with you, that's what I would usually see. And that is what the financial aid office would most usually handle. Opportunities that are outside of what the federal government can offer, or private loans you would usually get from your particular department, so you might want to inquire about that further with your department or the program advisor, or you could even ask with Jeremiah as well to see what might be available. But for the most part, anything that's tied to the FAFSA side is what we would be handling, and that's going to be your loan options essentially.

Jeremiah Nast:
Alright. Is there an option to get accelerated? As far as the timeline being those 27 months there, I would say to, it would be something that you would want to make sure that you were in contact with a student success coordinator if that was something that you were looking at doing, potentially accelerating this program from. It's built to be completed one course at a time for over 27 months. It's not necessarily an option to speed it up, but they may be able to help you out, but it'd be something that would have to be something built out specifically for your situation. Not every course is offered in every semester. And they would want to make sure that they were setting you up for success. So, to answer, the program is built to be completed one course at a time over 27 months.

It's not an option to double up through the entire thing and finish twice as fast, but they would help you out best they could based on what was available and your specific situation.

Are students from different educational backgrounds accepted?

I gotta say, it really depends on the question. I don't know if I necessarily understand it. Students from different educational backgrounds... The program itself, and I'll go back to the admissions requirements here. As far as for the requirements, if you're looking at having a bachelor's degree from an accredited institution, the educational type from that may... I would say to speak with someone like me to walk you through what your educational background, and what it may look like for you...

If you were... It doesn't require that you have an undergraduate degree in business or anything like that. As I mentioned before, I personally, my undergraduate degree was not in business. I had an interdisciplinary studies degree, just a general liberal arts degree. And that, it may affect your admissions process into the program, but it's certainly, if you have, if you have any questions about if you specifically, what your admissions process would be like, it would normally be a good idea to just give me a call, help you out in the best way possible.

Can the program be slowed down? Hoping to not have classes year round and take my time through the program.

That's a great question. I will cover part of this and then I'm going to ask Diego to hopefully cover maybe part of it. Potentially. The program does need to be completed in... The length of the program is not supposed to exceed seven years, which is a very long time, and I hope you don't take that long. But if you were looking at stretching it out, you would just want to speak with people like, someone like Diego as well to make sure that you weren't... Could you explain any potential issues with that as far as potential financial aid and taking fewer courses?

Diego Guerrero:
Yeah, so really the only thing that comes to mind in a scenario like that would be the, they're called the SAP standards, and that's S as in Sam, A as in Apple, P as in Peter. That's Satisfactory Academic Progress, it's a federal regulation to... It is a metric of how well you are doing in school, that you're meeting certain academic standards and that you are completing your course load in a timely fashion. Now, what that timeframe should be depends on the program, it depends on the reasonable expectations set between the department and the program itself. It's hard to say if there's a timeframe where you should be completing this just off the top of my head, but I would say, if you're concerned about that, you should definitely reach out to us so we can look more into it.

I have seen students, not in this particular program who take "too long" for whatever it is that they're doing, and at a certain point you become ineligible for federal financial aid. There's other things that would always be available, but that one in particular would be in jeopardy if you take "too long." We do have, I guess you could call them fail-safes for situations like those, so never be afraid to just reach out and see what can be done because there's, for the most part, always something that we can try to figure out, okay?

Jeremiah Nast:
All right. And it doesn't look like we have any more questions about that, so I can go back to Alan's question about the purpose of how an MBA can help you out other than just boosting your CV. And one thing that I've noticed from going through the program myself is that... I call it speaking the language of different departments. It certainly does help me out to understand not just what I'm being asked for from other departments as I work with them, but the root of what they're looking for. Helps me communicate very well with different people doing different jobs and that type of thing, to be able to help facilitate as best as possible moving forward. Obviously, a lot of students enter an MBA program looking for that boost for their resume to look better.

But a lot of it does go to not only, like I said, the knowledge gained throughout the program. I do... There is also opportunities for some networking as well. I personally I'm not local to KU. I actually live just west of Chicago, but I was on campus just a few weeks ago for the MBA leadership summit that was offered for online students to come and attend and network. And it was great to meet some of my classmates and go through and get an idea of what things were were like, and then make some great connections there as well. So there are a lot of great reasons too to doing that. Alan, I know you also mentioned being an analyst negotiator leader. Yeah, I mean it. Having a holistic viewpoint of business and understanding of the parts that make up the whole is really at the crux of what's using an MBA as a base to build your career off of.

So hopefully that answers your question. I know I get super jazzed up when talking about it, so if I got overly buzz-wordy, I apologize, but hopefully that helps out a bit.

It does look like we got a chat in. It was... Awesome. So, all right. We are out of questions currently. We will wait for a couple more here to see if anybody has any more questions. You guys really fired off a lot. That's awesome. It shows that you guys are engaged in the process. So any questions at all about... Oh, here we go.

What areas or careers can one expect to pursue after graduation?

That is an awesome question. It really... I feel like I say this too much. It depends. An MBA is purposefully broad. A lot of people are looking at using an MBA as a catalyst for upward mobility. And that doesn't seem to be located in one specific direction, especially for an MBA. I've helped students with their journeys towards the program in about as many different areas that I can think of, whether it be healthcare, whether it be finance operations at the... Really anything. I mean, I guess not anything it's... But like I said, it is very broad and the goal is that it gives you a base to build up from. So as you're looking at having a career that shows... A degree, that shows that you're serious in your career, that's why a lot of people end up looking at MBA programs.

All right. Jacob has a question about the deadline. So was the August 7th the application deadline to apply for the MBA program to start in fall 2023?

That is correct. That is the deadline. Make sure to be in contact with your admissions outreach advisor. We are here to help. And the closer we get to that deadline, the more of a bottleneck form, so please reach out. We are happy to help and make sure that everything is in by that point in time. Not saying that if you give, for people that like to take their time, that if you give me a call on August 6th that I won't try to help you, but it really is a nice process to go through if you give yourself some time.

How long does one class take before the next starts?

So the classes other than the capstone, the capstone is like two courses pushed together, but the classes are eight week classes. It's generally eight weeks. There may be a week or two in between, or potentially even a week or two overlap between courses, but by general rule, you're taking one eight week course at a time throughout the entire year.

And Diane asked: How many students are accepted each semester.

And it really, it depends. The program is... It's not necessarily something where there's a standard number of students accepted each semester. The program would like to accommodate as many students as long as they're qualified for the program as possible, and that there's enough course professors to be able to effectively engage with them. But there's not a standard number each semester that's going to be accepted higher or lower. The idea is to help students who are qualified for the program move towards it.
[pause]

Catch my breath a little bit. [laughter] Any other questions concerning, once again, the admissions process, the program itself? Diego is a great resource for questions about anything on the financial side of things. Feel free to drop those into the Q&A and we will get them answered, if not, I may give y'all some time back here in your night.

Alright. Well, I guess that, I guess we will call it a little bit early. If anyone has any questions, here, maybe if we go back... If you are looking for our email addresses, there they are. Diego, that's diegofas@ku.edu I am at jnast@ku.edu You're also welcome to give me a call, it's not on the screen, but at 785-727-1204, extension 314. I am always happy to answer as many questions as possible.

As I mentioned, if you do have questions about anything like the potential waiver for the assessment, or if you have questions about the potential waiver for the application fee, or someone would like me as a great fit to know if that's something that you may qualify for. But with that, as it does not seem like we have any other questions in the Q&A at this point in time, I do want to say thank you so much to Diego Guerrero for helping us out with the, to look at the financial side, what's available. And Diego, do you have anything to finish off with?

Diego Guerrero:
No, other than just, thank you for giving me the opportunity to come in and chat with you guys here today. And I just wanted to reiterate what Jeremiah said, we are here to help you, really any questions that you might have, I'm just, I work everyday, so please feel free to reach out to me, I'm happy to assist.

Jeremiah Nast:
And Sam. And we did get a thank you. You're very welcome, Paige. Everyone have a great night and, yeah, rock chalk.