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Parenting at Owen

Posted on February 8, 2012 by Owen Bloggers

Guest Blogger Ben Meek, MBA 2012, gives some insights into being a parent while pursuing his MBA. If you’re a parent (or soon-to-be parent) thinking about coming to Owen and want to ask Ben or his wife Katie more about parenting as a student send an e-mail to: benjamin.meek@owen.vanderbilt.edu or reach out to the Owen Partners Association: OPA@owen.vanderbilt.edu

Ben and one of his kiddos

My wife Katie and I took a leap and moved from San Diego to Nashville despite knowing very little about the city. From a family perspective, we could hardly have made a better choice. I can’t weigh in too much on day care and schooling, but here’s what I can tell you about.

Kids – When we arrived, Katie was 6 months pregnant with our second son. We thought we’d be the only couple crazy enough to have a child during business school, but at least a couple of other Owen families did it as well this past year. (Tell you one thing that made that easier—the hospital is about a 5 minute walk from campus.) Our kids have really thrived here. There are plenty of good outdoorsy things to do, including some great hiking trails in Brentwood and elsewhere, and my 3-year old loved his first camping trip. If that’s not your cup of tea, there are plenty of good places to take the kids, play groups and the like. We’ve found Nashville to be a stellar family environment with plenty of young families.

Read the full post (est. reading time 2:18 mins)

Posted in Graduate Life, Guest & Alumni Bloggers, Partners & Sig-O's | Tagged family, kids, parenting | 1 Comment

Adventures in the Middle Kingdom – Part 2

Posted on November 9, 2011 by Henry Ko

Henry Ko is a second year MBA student from Los Angeles, CA. He is currently studying abroad at Peking University in Beijing, China. This is his adventure…

Classes at PKU

Well, the fun is over (sort of) and it’s time to get serious about school. I’m finishing off the third week of class and cases are starting to pile up, group meetings are scheduled into Outlook, and I’m even prepping my CV/cover letters for the impending job search when I get home. A couple of people have asked me about the classes I’m taking, so here’s a brief overview.

Case Study in Financial Accounting

I was never going to take another accounting class after finishing off the required ones at Owen. But here I am in China taking accounting with Professor Paul Gillis who was a partner at PWC for 28 years.

Bring it.

He powerlifts competitively with the Chinese Olympic team, consults with hedge funds to short fraudulent Chinese companies, and is an active tax accounting blogger. It seems like all accounting professors are characters. This guy is no exception; he makes the class entertaining and I’m enjoying it so far.

E-Commerce

Read the full post (est. reading time 3:23 mins)

Posted in Graduate Life, Guest & Alumni Bloggers, Uncategorized | Tagged china, international business, studying abroad | 1 Comment

Adventures in the Middle Kingdom- Part 1

Posted on October 6, 2011 by Henry Ko

Henry Ko is a second year MBA student from Los Angeles, CA. He is currently studying abroad at Peking University in Beijing, China. This is his adventure…

It has been a crazy couple of days but I have arrived safely in China and I’m settling into my new home for the next three months. The first 24 hours of craziness started with some delayed flight drama in Nashville, followed by a sleepless 12.5 hour flight from Chicago to Beijing, ensued by long and chaotic queues at the Beijing airport, and topped off by a frustrating search for my living accommodations on campus. Things are finally coming together now and I’m ready to enjoy my China experience.

So far, Beijing has been everything I expected and a lot of what I didn’t expect. Here are some of my observations:

- China is growing and it is painful, for me: I’m reminded every day from 5AM to 12AM that China is experiencing unrelenting growth. Example: there is a new building going up about one hundred yards right outside my window and the site never seems to shut down. Just the other day, there was a thunderstorm rolling through the area. Lightning struck not too far away. Yet, the workers kept on hammering and the crane kept on lifting. Talk about commitment. The only time it seems to be quiet is when I wake up in the middle of the night wondering why there isn’t any noise coming from outside.

Read the full post (est. reading time 3:44 mins)

Posted in Graduate Life, Guest & Alumni Bloggers, Lifestyle | Tagged china, study abroad | 4 Comments

Launching a Business: Rentstuff.com

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Adam Albright

Adam Albright is a second year MBA and co-founder of rentstuff.com. (www.about.me/adamalbright | www.linkedin.com/in/adammalbright)

Have you ever wanted to try something new on the weekend, like go camping or for a bike ride? As a student, opportunities such as these can be limited by minimal space to store gear or insufficient money to purchase equipment.

This problem led my co-founders and I (Adam Albright) to launch Rentstuff.com, a person-to-person rental marketplace that allows individuals and rental businesses to post items for rent. Now you can jump on RentStuff.com and rent that tent, or bike, or guitar that you want to try out. If you want to earn some extra cash, you can also lend out your stuff to others through our convenient, secure system.

Owen has been key in helping me launch this business. While being a student and entrepreneur can be extremely busy, there are some definite perks. Here are the ways Owen has helped me along the way:

- The Summer Business Plan Competition: In this annual competition students present business plans and the winner is awarded a grant to use for launching the start-up. Pitching RentStuff.com was a great experience, and the grant money was extremely helpful as we worked towards our launch in August 2011.

Read the full post (est. reading time 2:16 mins)

Posted in Guest & Alumni Bloggers, Why Owen? | Tagged business school, entrepreneurship, starting a business | Leave a comment

Why International Networking is Essential

Posted on September 19, 2011 by Taylor Forman

Taylor Forman is a first year MBA student at the Owen Graduate School of Management. He comes to Vanderbilt from California where he worked in international human resources for an engineering company after graduating from UNC-Chapel Hill.

When I arrived at the Abu Dhabi airport a little before midnight on a Monday, I collected my luggage and walked outside to find a taxi. I only know two Arabic words so when I handed the driver the address and he looked confused, I had little recourse other than to simply point at it again. And then, after he asked me a question in Arabic, I responded with “shukran” (which means “thank you”) and again resorted to the pointing tactic. We started driving toward the city and I thought how massive and well lit and familiar it seemed, and as we passed grandiose mosques in the distance, how foreign it was. When we arrived at my new home for the next eight months, a large apartment building rising skyward in the midst of multiple similar buildings, I paid the driver, grabbed all my belongings and he sped away.