Dean’s Q&A: David Thomas Of Georgetown McDonough

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What do you make of the increase in applications from 2009 to now?

I think there’s a few things that might explain it. In particular, for Georgetown, one of the strengths of our program is that our undergraduate program is not an MBA light. It really is a program that is liberal arts in its orientation. Our students take the same required core courses as all students at Georgetown. So for the student and parent who want a business education but they don’t want to lose what you gain by having the classic liberal arts education, I think Georgetown’s value proposition has become more and more attractive to kids who are at the, if you will, top-end of the applicant pool—who in the past might have been drawn to a selective liberal arts college or to one of the Ivies that doesn’t have an undergraduate business program. So I think that’s a huge driver for us.

And then you combine that with the thought that there’s a lot in the environment increasingly for this generation that points them in the direction of business. For some, it’s the focus on entrepreneurship—and I think every generation has a movie that defines it and for this generation, I think it was the Facebook movie, kind of like back in the 80s it was Gordon Gekko and Wall Street. And if you also think about this generation, I think they’ve grown up in an era where the idea of markets and capitalism is not really questioned. What’s questioned is, how do you make those markets work for the vast majority of people on the planet? It’s not like there’s an opposing social order like there was when you still had a very strong communist block in the world.

And likewise, I think there’s not a sentiment anymore that government is the beginning and end of addressing important issues and opportunities that face society.

How do you think people view Georgetown’s undergraduate program and how has that changed over the past few years?

I think people view the program very positively. I think some evidence of that is we have the number one school of foreign affairs in the country. That’s the School of Foreign Service. This year, we’ll launch the first joint undergraduate program between the business school and the School of Foreign Service. And I think that grows out of a recognition that even if what we want to do is train the best people in international affairs and international policy, they will only be the best if they also understand the fundamentals of business. And vice versa for us, as we increase our focus on global, and pursue our mission to be the premiere destination for global business education, we recognize that our students also have to have an understanding of how the non-market aspects influence global commerce. And that’s in the realm of international affairs and governmental regulation and those sorts of things.

We’ve just launched a program for Georgetown Law students where we offer a very intense two-week financial acumen immersion experience because our law school leadership recognizes that the people there graduating today can’t wait till they get on the job to understand the fundamentals of business, given that most of them are going to go work in firms or companies that are focused on aspects of corporate law and business.

I think it’s also evident knowing that the test scores and grade point averages of students applying to business school are on par with all the other schools at Georgetown. So there’s no difference in the quality of who’s coming to the business school versus other parts of Georgetown.

It’s also evident in the fact that our alumni have increased their level of engagement with the school and in the last four years, we’ve exceeded our capital campaign goal of $100 million one year ahead of schedule. And I think all that has to do with an increased appreciation for the business school and it’s contribution to the university.

What are some innovations you’ve spearheaded as dean?

Well, I’m one of those deans that doesn’t spearhead innovations, I just unleash the innovators. So I would say there are some areas in which I’ve unleashed the innovators to come up with innovations. One is this program that we’re bringing online that is a joint program between the School of Foreign Service and the McDonough School of Business is the Global Business Fellows. It is a series of courses, as well as a set of extra-curricular experiences, and a capstone event, which will be to work in teams to consult to a company outside of the U.S. on a real business problem.

We’ve also taken that model and created an offering for students not in the Global Business Fellows Program called the Global Business Experience, which again is a practicum where students work in teams. They go to a country and work in the context of an industry. So for example, the first time we did it, we went to Barcelona and worked with companies in the luxury goods industry. Students worked on projects and those projects required them to bring the certain clinical skills and framework that they’ve learned after three years at the business school. And then it culminated with the senior leadership of those companies coming together and listening to our students share their collective understanding of the luxury goods industry in Spain. And we’ve now repeated that a couple of times.

Another area where we’re fast innovating is an initiative we’ve launched in real estate. And we just inaugurated the Steers Center for Global Real Estate this past spring because of the philanthropic generosity of Robert Steers and his wife, Lauren Steers. And Robert runs one of the world’s largest asset management companies focused on real estate.

We’ve also enhanced our opportunities for our students to have global experiences by increasing the number of partnerships we have with schools outside the U.S. In particular, we’ve just launched one with Chinese University of Hong Kong as well as an ongoing relationship with ESADE in Spain. And we’ve now launched the Global Social Internship Program, which gives our students the opportunity in the summer to go to different parts of the developing world and apply their business skills to help organizations in those parts of the world that are trying to deliver services for populations in need.

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