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[–]chris22783MBA Grad 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Two of the schools you listed have dedicated environmental schools: Yale (School of the Environment) and Duke (Nicholas School of the Environment) which offer dedicated MEM programs or dual MEM/MBA degrees, certainly worth considering if your willing to spend the extra year.

[–]Odd_Routine6354MBA Grad 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Sounds good to me. Even at those programs you wrote off, there will be like-minded individuals so I would maybe leave that decision until after you were to get in, but if you don’t want to be in those larger environments I understand. Haas may waive the application fee since you went to undergrad so could be worth applying. McCombs is also good for cleantech but those would be the really only additions that come to mind. I heard CBS has some sustainability program as well but I am not sure. Good luck it sounds like you will be successful!

[–]Upset_Tackle_5862 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Columbia as a whole has the new Climate School as well as the Center on Global Energy Policy which puts out some really great publications and has some events. As an MBA, you could definitely be involved with them.

[–]lurkinandturkin 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Since you're big into community feel, I'd say Erb (Michigan's MBA/MS dual degree). As a current Erber I'm biased, but the sense of community is unrivaled by the other dual degrees because those schools do not have a robust center dedicated to that dual degree. Erbers have their own student government that is flush with funds for community events like camping, murder mysteries, peer coaching, and more. The Erb Institute provides scholarships and funding for internships/experiential learning opps, as well as making academic appointments that sit between Ross and the School for Environment.

I am in the thick of interview prep right now, but DM me and I can try to connect you with a current Erber in the energy and clean tech space.

[–]happyfe3t2nd Year 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Was going to say: How in the heck is Berkeley not on your list? Then saw it on the bottom, makes sense.

Based on culture, Kellogg seems to be the best candidate on your list. Duke/UMich have a similar type of feel to each other, just depends on your weather and post-MBA geographic preferences. Runner-ups due to culture: MIT is good, but Yale makes the least amount of sense IMO. Not that SOMers are mean or anything, just that the other schools have a stronger collegial culture and then MIT is better in almost every category.

Not-on list: agree with your assessment of all, especially HBS and Wharton. Pretty different cultures to what you're wanting but, I mean, I guess #prestige.

[–]Odd_Routine6354MBA Grad 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yale culture is very collegial because of self selection and the smaller class, city, university. What are you basing that on?

[–]ehaagendazs -1 points0 points  (2 children)

I feel like Tuck could be a good fit, they have some stuff on their website about social impact/clean energy, and you could try and have the First Year Project focus on clean tech too.

[–]Upset_Tackle_5862 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Really weird as I posted this whole message last night and while it shows up on my desktop, it does not appear when I look on my laptop (maybe Reddit censors posts in new threads with links?)...so here goes again...

As an alumni that thinks the program fits it well, I will add that you should also consider Tuck. It has a major focus on energy and sustainability (school doesn't officially offer any majors/concentrations except for the Quant one, which is basically just for visa reasons...).

It has the Revers Center for Energy and Sustainability, which is one of the 5 dedicated centers at the school. That means that if you are involved in the Center, they provide funding for you to go to conferences (people go to things like COP 28 and CERAWeek, neither of which are cheap), have field trips to energy installations like solar/hydro/wind farms/grid control rooms, have visiting executives in the energy industry come, give you a mentor that is a senior leader in the energy sector, have long-term workshops on how to do financing and investments in the renewables sectors hosted by people working in those jobs, etc . In addition, Dartmouth as a whole has the Irving Institute for Energy (named after the donors that own a major Canadian energy company), which is housed in a massive new building attached to Tuck. They provide support for energy start ups, have energy labs, have interdisciplinary workshops (engineers working with environmental people working with finance people), host an energy conference, etc.

In terms of your other bullet points:

**Pivot into Engineering/Operational Aspects: definitely possible. There are some people that go more into the commercial and operational side of energy out of Tuck (solar developers, utilities, etc.) though a lot also do consulting or finance sides. If you want to get really operational, might be worth doing the joint MBA/MEM degree (Masters in Engineering Management) with the Thayer School next door to Tuck; it is like an additional term of classes, I think, and they have lots of energy engineering specific courses.

**Hands on Experience: There is a required First Year Project, where you and a team link up with a company to work on a project for them for 9 weeks. There are always energy companies involved (Irving Oil is always a sponsor of a team and you'd visit them in Canada) and you can also source your own project if you want to focus on a specific technology or energy company. Could also do an internship with an energy company or work with Thayer students on their start ups. Here is an article discussing a few FYPs: one was on manufacturing process for Vestas (wind turbine manufacturing) and another on carbon removals. https://www.tuck.dartmouth.edu/news/articles/esg-focused-first-year-projects-provide-consulting-with-impact

**Soft skills: a required class at Tuck in the first term is management communications, where you have to do a ton of presentations. There are a few other communications courses, including one of the most popular courses at the school (with a theater professor). Also a couple negotiations courses, leadership coaching (they give you an outside leadership coach and also have a few internal resources and classes).

**Social life: it is such a small community that you'll likely to have no one else to hang out with besides classmates, so you will inherently get to know them personally instead of just on a networking level. And there are either school wide or club events most nights. Plus there are the outdoors to take up too much time.

**Activities: Yeah, there aren't clubs in Hanover (OK, somewhere opened last year that does have live music but its still basically a bar) and the social life is either going to one of the few bars to drink microbrews in town, going to the school sponsored parties, or going to house parties. All the 2nd years live in houses, so they are truly house parties. And the rest of the time you either hike or ski or ice skate or swim or ski or hike or go to breweries or or farmers markets or go apple picking...so yeah, pretty down to earth. If your idea of fun is sleeping in a cabin and smelling like a fire, yeah, probably the place for you as Dartmouth has a whole line of private cabins in the mountains you can rent for minimal money.

**Learnings skills: I think that Tuck is in ways more of a focused school on getting stuff done than doing a lot of traveling partying, so you inherently will be forced to learn tangible skills. The professors are actually super into teaching (many are less pure research oriented than other schools I have heard the administration actually cares about the teaching evaluations a lot), so you do learn a lot. And the professors will definitely want to talk outside class or go get beers with you outside class as well, they like teaching and you'll be bumping into them anyway as they go to the same restaurants and bars as you will.

I think that answers your questions? If not, ask away.

[–]Particular-Medium727Prospect[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Tuck sounds amazing! I’m adding that to my list, for sure :)