Forget about the "super" distinction

Hey guys,

today I talked to "number 5" to ask, what's the differences about the distinctions.

MBA = average > 50%
MBA with distinction = average > 70%
MBA with super distinction = average > 80%

... so I'll just forget about this now and try to get as many marks as possible, but to keep my feet on the ground, I think the rest I'll see when I get my first results.

Today I was in the mood between "yeah, I think I got this now" and "I'll never get this crap in my head" ... so let's see... today was my MCQ (multiple choice question) day, tomorrow I try to do a "test-exam-day" in starting one of the past papers at exactly 2pm like we do next week on Monday and try to do it in the 3hours like next week... let's see, how it comes out :)

When the Exam is over next week, I'll go to the city and drink as muss as possible to celebrate the good or bad feeling ... and on Thursday next week I'll join some guys to go to London for the weekend... I think after this hard 2 month I deserve a little break with some pleasure time :)

...and on the last Exam days, we already get the next two books for "Marketing" and "Accounting" to read and be prepared for classes in January ... :)

Studying Studying Studying

Hi Folk,

the weak of the truth is coming and I try to study as hard as possible... yesterday I started at 12am and stopped at 4am... today I therefore woke up at 12 and started studying about 1:30pm and I didn't reach my goal, so when I finish this post, I'll push my notebook to the side and start OB again...

At the moment I get a good feeling for OB and Economics and I'm confident, that I can reach my goal and get as many marks as possible... my goal in the background is to reach a distinction! :) ... One of the teachers was telling another group about me and that I'm an example for excellent effort and they believe I could be a candidate for a "super distinction" ... till now there have been over 10.000 graduates for the MBA at EBS. And till now there are 5 !! guys who got a "super distinction" ... so that's a good motivation go be number 6!! :)

...I have to go back to my books...

new pictures

board at my study-room :)


By the way, today was graduation and the director was telling us in his speech that he is proud of his MBA program, because it is the second largest and the one with the highest FAIL rate, so everybody who passes the exams can be proud :)

Economics Revision

Hi Folk,

yesterday I did some OB revision, today and tomorrow is Economics my subject. Sometimes I have the feeling, that I slowly get trough it, sometimes I think I'll never get this stuff in my head :)

Today I tried to learn all the formulas to calculate government spending, taxation, national input/output, inventories....

This one is the most important "basic" formula:

Y = C + I + G + X - Z
which means: National income/output (they are equal by definition) = consumption + investment + government spending + export - import. And then you have much more formulas related to this one :)

Today I although tried to learn the stuff about "fiscal policy", "inflationary gap" and "deflationary gap" ... now I have to go back to study "monetary policy" ... which wouldn't be such a big act, but as always there have to be two different theories "Quantity" and "Keynesian".... ggggrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

So sleep well, I have to do some stuff now to use my time!

Carpe diem!!! :o)

oh... and by the way, just right now I listen to the first Christmas song of this season at the radio!

Time management

Today was my last day of OB revision classes, now it's up to me to study all the stuff I should remember on exam day... I'm just about to make a plan, which day I study which subject and I'm not sure, if I should switch every single day or do a system with blocks of two days for each subject ...

12 days are left to study, I could make 6 days for each subject... but I think I spend one day more on Econ and make 7 days Econ and 5 days OB ...

I try to write you a few lines each day so you guys to keep you informed :)

Elective Courses + Exam dates

Hi folk,

I finally decided, which elective courses I'll take.... and the winners are ....

Strategic Risk Management + Making Strategies Work

and this now decided about my study-plan for next year with the following exam dates:

03.12.07 Economics
05.12.07 Organisational Behaviour
10.03.08 Marketing
13.03.08 Accounting
02.06.08 Project Management
05.06.08 Finance
18.08.08 Strategic Planning
20.08.08 Making Strategies Work
22.08.08 Strategic Risk Management

... and finally if everything goes well, I'll graduate next year in November :)

Economics Revision

After a little break and joining a Rotaract Back2Front Party I started my Revision to prepare for our "Revision classes" which start tomorrow morning. There we will go trough past papers and discuss open issues and hope to get the link between the theory in our heads and how to use it :)

Today we had a meeting of the Student Representatives and the EBS (Edinburgh Business School) staff and it was really interesting to see there reaction about our feedback :) I think they didn't expect, that we don't save our complaints about everything we had in mind ...

But it was really good to get a few numbers, for example are there a few guys in our group with no work experience and we asked, how this can happen, because we thought it is hard to come to EBS. They told us, that at least everybody must have min of 2 yrs of work experience. There are between 250 and 300 applications each term of whom are 20 - 25 are selected to study!! Which means, that I'm one of the 10% who passed this border and so I feel much better now, even when there are guys without working experience :)

At the moment I try to find a way through the economics jungle to review all the stuff. EBS has a Profiling system on there Student-Page which really helps, because you can answer multiple choice questions to prove, how good you understand the text. This is for each module, which means, that I have to finish at least 21 Tests of 10 Questions each. When I finished this, I get a diagram, which shows me, on which Modules I have to work harder and which are ok :)

After the two days of Economics revision I plan to study round 10hours per day OB on Saturday and Sunday and be prepared for there revision on Monday/Tuesday...

Macroeconomics, Day 4

This day we just went to classes, got some instructions and then we had 3 hours in our groups to run the US Economy, but this time as a competition between the groups... unfortunately there was a better team then ours and so we didn't win the bottles of wine... but it was a really interesting lesson about running the economy!

Macroeconomics, Day 3

This was really exciting, compared to the tow past days, we went into classes, the Prof told us some stuff and then we spread up into some groups and tried to "run the US Economy" which is not easy :) ... at the evening we had a nice Barbecue at the School building and then the Prof told us some stories of the US Economy...

Microeconomics, Day 2

This was a really really hard day!!!
... hard not to fall asleep :) ... In the morning it was really hard, not to sleep and actually I could see a few guys sleeping, one of them just in front of the Prof :)
After this classes everybody was so tired, that we just left the building in a rush and take a nap before studying again....

As a result, the classes of Microeconomics was just wasting our scarce resources...

Microeconomics, Day 1

Today was the first day of Microeconomics and it was quiet interesting, because it was not just presenting slides :) This time we had a few more examples of companies in real life and some nice discussions. There are many new faces in our class this week of students who are studying executive and just come for taking the classes... hope to get a picture for you guys tomorrow :)

Economics classes ahead

Tomorrow starting the economics classes, so I have to go to bed early today, but after I finished the book yesterday I can sleep with a good feeling :)
Today I started with checking the Review-Questions of each module I did, but I didn't check the answers. That's a good practice, because they don't just say "B is right", they are giving you a few sentences why this answer was right and not another one, that's really good for studying!

Then I still didn't decide, which elective courses I should take, but I have to decide till Friday which is not really easy... but tomorrow I'll talk to one of the professors if he can give me some advices which courses are good for my career plans...

Slowly a few guys getting stressed by finding out, that the time is running and today in a month the exams are already over!!!

I have Economics Exam on 3rd of Dec 1400 - 1700
and Organisational Behaviour on 5th 1400 - 1700

Finished Economics Book!

Today I finished the Economics book with the last two modules I had left after my day off yesterday!

Tomorrow I'll do some vocabulary learning and start with the review questions... and Tuesday till Friday we have our Economics classes ...

I'll go to the supermarket now, my stomach cries for food :)

first day off!!!

Saturday (Nov 3rd) I decided that it's enough of studying for the moment and took a whole day off! --> The first day without studying since I started on October the 1st!

I went to the Pentland Hills ( details see wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentland_Hills ) next to our campus which present a nice view over the land and over Edinburgh! It was nice to see something different :) I went there with two other guys of my group and with my experience of the Swiss mountains I showed the two how to climb a mountain ;)


Overview on top of one of the mountains
Me and Lachlan
The last meters to the top :)


Nice view to the castle-hill of Edinburgh


Lachlan and Lorraine