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Distance-learning EMBA via the Internet, videoconferencing, or some other medium? No
Graduation Requirements:

Students must have attended a minimum number of classes
Students must have earned a pre-determined GPA/Letter grade average
Class participation accounts for some percentage of students' grades
Write a complete business plan
Present final
company-specific project results to relevant parties
TECHNOLOGY
Technology improvements in the last three academic years: Active learning environment in Rosenfeld Library (group pods); UCLA Anderson Board Room in Rosenfeld Library; Jim Easton Global Connections classroom (tech classroom); wireless upgrades; faculty expertise system; virtual server capability; new e-mail/calendaring system for students; new network infrastructure; new storage infrastructure; website refresh; new e-mail/calendaring system for faculty/staff; CRM system for Alumni Relations and Development.
Amount spent: $3,100,000.00

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B-SCHOOL ALUMNI

Living MBA alumni: 20,153
Active MBA alumni clubs: 32
Countries in which MBA clubs exist: 11
Business school endowment $116,943,891.00
Does the main university offer career placement services for alumni? Yes
Does the main university have an alumni networking Web site? Yes
University alumni networking site: http://www.uclalumni.net
Does the B-School have an alumni networking Web site? Yes
Business school alumni networking site: http://www.anderson.ucla.edu/x24248.xml
Do current MBA students have access to an alumni database? Yes

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SCHOOL COMMENTS

Additional school comments: The EMBA program has instituted Certification tracks in 5 areas: Entrepreneurship, Finance, Marketing, Leaders in Sustainability, and Advanced International Management and provides increasing international opportunities, e.g. 6 Exchange Partnerships with top international Busienss Schools and 11 one-week International Travel Study courses. Its mandatory experiential Strategic Management Research project also has an international focus and places a strong emphasis on developing global leaders.

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UCLA Anderson and the EMBA program were perfect for me. The reputation and rigor of the program, combined with the proximity to my home and work, was ideal. I enjoyed my classes and classmates and the professors were great. The travel programs in which I participated were an enriching addition to my experience.

The classroom experience could be improved if the size of the class was larger. While Anderson goes to great lengths to maintain a small class size with the highest caliber of students, expanding the class would further diversify the background of experiences included in the classroom discussions.

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UCLA Anderson has a great faculty, curriculum, and support system in place for EMBA programs. [Administrators] are very cognizant of the fact that everyone in the class is very busy, and they go out of their way to make sure we optimize our time in school. We do the same core courses as the full-time program, and the key difference between the full-time and EMBA program at UCLA is the number of electives since the EMBA is more geared toward general management, unlike a particular area of specialization like in the full-time program. However, the EMBA program at UCLA does provide students the opportunity to take more electives, as part of the FEMBA program, and participate in international exchange. Our class has the choice of ISB-Hyderabad, London School of Business, Bocconi, and HEC-Paris.

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Since most class sessions are recorded, having sessions to provide feedback on presentation skills will be very valuable. The school is already taking steps to implement this for the 2010 class based on our feedback.

I did get a salary increase during the program and a promotion recently. However, this was based on my accomplishments at work and not directly attributed to my MBA. However, with the MBA, I now feel that I have opportunities to move more into a business-oriented role (which was one of my key reasons for the MBA), and it will help subsequent growth promotions (assuming that I perform at a high level).

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Some field visits to certain companies/factories could probably make the topic more real, but I can see it could prove to be a real logistics challenge, specailly in the EMBA format.

UCLA Anderson's Strategic Management Research is an excellent hands-on program that has students developing a full-blown business plan, which is not easy, but is a great learning experience. The International Exchange program (in addition to our week-long International Seminar in China) is relatively new, but it's such a wonderful opportunity to learn about other countries' business environments. Various classmates went to Chile, London, Paris, Milan, India, etc. for a week. Much of the prep work was completed in the U.S. to save precious time overseas for company visits, etc. UCLA Anderson has done a great job at coordinating the exchange program. A significant percentage of the class took advantage of these classes to learn more about business in other countries.

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Those who were full-time professors were well published and generally top experts in their field and credible beyond reproach. Those who were active in industry and teach in addition were also very impressive - having tremendous careers and lecturing on their functional area of expertise. The instructors were mostly great professional speakers, dynamic and engaging. The weakness, which is probably typical for any EMBA instructors who also teach full-time students, was the times when the assigned work was too rigorous for the work and family commitments of the class and actually got in the way of maximizing the learning.

More time for social interaction with classmates would have improved the experience. I would guess five years from now I will be in touch with my classmates and building on relationships started in the EMBA program, but the details of many of the class lectures will not be employed in my day-to-day work functions.

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I think this and all EMBA programs could do more to market the value of the executive program structure to the general business community. I spent a lot of time in interviews explaining to people what the EMBA program was and how it was structured, and explaining how this was not much like an online program such as University of Phoenix.

The international programs added this year were incredible experiences, and I attended three (Dubai, Chile and China). I think [administrators] should continue adding locations. Also, I loved the Mediasite and the convenience of being able to watch a class online if I had to miss one on a rare occasion.

The classroom experience was actually very good. The amphitheater-style seating and A/V equipment were great. But it would have been good if there was no Internet connection during lectures.

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The program was great and has helped me become a better manager and leader. It has given me the right analytical, functional, and strategic knowledge to take on higher roles. I really can't find faults with the program, but if I had to nitpick, a majority of the students were from the West Coast, and it would be great if we could get more East Coast-based students.

More guest speakers from relevant industries and job functions would have definitely improved the classroom experience.

Our instructors had a deep understanding of their field with many years of experience not only in academia but also in the field. This enabled them to distill the core knowledge to us in a concise way and also tie it into the real world.