Duke Daytime MBA Student Blog

My journey at Fuqua was not linear. I moved from Brazil to the United States specifically to join Fuqua. I’ve experienced all the feelings and struggles international students usually go through when pursuing their MBA.

Getting your MBA provides an opportunity to explore different interests and build on existing skills. The challenge is weighing the desire to be busy and explore new opportunities with maintaining a healthy balance in your life.

As I was boarding my flight for a spring break ski trip in early March 2020, I thought our class had already been tested. And that had nothing on what was yet to come.

In February, my MBA Association Co-President Mike Treiser and I were speaking to a classroom full of prospective students about leadership opportunities at Fuqua. Just before the session, I had found out one of my best friends was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer.

Fuqua On Board is a volunteer-based, year-long program where MBA students are selected from a pool of applicants and paired with a local nonprofit to serve as a non-voting board member

One of the great pleasures I have as dean of a business school is engaging with business leaders around the world and learning about the challenges they face and the evolving capabilities they seek in new talent

So, you’ve read online the names of courses you’ll be taking when you start at Fuqua, but what do they really entail? And how nervous should you be if it’s been five or more years since your last economics exam

The final term of my second year at Fuqua has come to the end, and it was another term full of emails, calls, and busy schedules. People usually worship second-year MBA life as the most chill period of the business school experience. It seems like the reality was different, at least for me.

Business school serves a range of purposes, from career shifts to personal and skill development. For me, school was about transitioning from an individual contributor to a leader, and developing the skillset to lead effectively.