School-aged children & the Cambridge Public School System

Have school-aged children? Looking into the Cambridge Public School System? Start early!

I had been planning my adventure in Cambridge for the last 3 years or so, and most seriously over the last year (I was admitted to the program w/ the class of 2010, but opted to defer admission). I knew that my daughter, now age 11, would be relocating with me and that I'd need to "look into" schools. However, based on my experience with schools in Los Angeles and in the Seattle area, I was predisposed to believing that the apartment address dictated the school. In L.A, in Seattle, and in most other civilized U.S towns, public schools are assigned to district zones and where you live determines where you may learn, unless you're part of a magnet program or have a crazy talent or something like that.

So, in about March or so, I started looking into schools and behold the CPS (Cambridge Public School) surprise. Within Cambridge city limits, all schools are assigned by lottery. Parents apply to the district, rank the schools of their preference, and the system runs through a crazy algorithm that attempts to diversify gender, race, and socio-economic factors (ex whether or not a child qualifies for free lunch).

Why is this system a pain for parents?
1. The "good" or popular schools have a long waiting list. The waiting list is prioritized primarily by the date your application is submitted.
2. In order to submit an application, you must have secured a place to live within Cambridge city limits.
3. The application must include your choice of schools - in order to rank school choices, you have to conduct lots of research and arrange school tours (time, stress, reading, time, stress, reading).
4. The application must be submitted, in its entirety IN PERSON at the Family Resource Center in Cambridge.
5. The coup de gras for me is that you're forced to select an apartment...then your school is selected for you...and the school selected could inflict more time and stress due to transportation, after-school programs, accessibility concerns.

So, what happened in MY case? I found out about the CPS process in mid March and picked 5 schools I was interested in [also note that in Cambridge, most elementary schools service grades K-8]. I also found out about a program called Intensive Studies Program (ISP), offered at 2 Cambridge Public Schools. The program covers the same curriculum as every other class, but is geared towards students with a motivation and interest in learning. Nothing fancy - same breadth, but more depth. As my luck had it, the application for the program was due early April, and in order to apply to the program, I had to concurrently apply to the district. In order to apply to the district, I had to secure an apartment.

So...I attended LGO Open House in early April and set up 5 school tours while I was in town for 2 weekdays and 2 weekend days. I flew in on a red-eye from Seattle, arrived Thursday AM and went on 3 school tours and 1 apartment showing that day. I also attended most LGO activities. The following day, I went on 2 school tours and 3 apartment showings. I picked an apartment, signed a lease, got my affidavit of residency notarized, ranked my top school choices, and ran to the Family Resource Center to hand in my registration packet!! Months later, I heard back and was happy to hear that we got our first choice and the ISP!

In summary, life worked out and despite the heartache the CPS system caused ME, I must say that I appreciate the effort that goes into ensuring multi-faceted diversity in the classroom. As far as YOU are concerned, please start the process early!

For more information on registering your kids with the Cambridge Public School system, go here: http://www.cpsd.us/FRC/forms.cfm

I'm tackling after-school programs next!

Company Sponsorship

The LGO program is a special amongst seemingly comparable MBA programs for many reasons, although one of the most distinguishing is the financial "break" it gives students.

Typical MBA program tuition costs are on the order of $50K/year. According to mbaprograms.org:
The average cost is $40,000 for a year (or $80,000 for two years). Some MBAs are $60,000 a year, and with MBAs the more you pay the more you get. It’s not just the instruction, it’s the brand.

At the Harvard Business School, tuition for the Class of 2011 students is $46,150, according to the HBS website. At MIT Sloan, the 2009-2010 tuition cost for a "regular" MBA is $48,650/yr according to the MIT Sloan website. By comparison, the LGO tuition for both years of the program is $30,193, per the LGO website.

Not bad, huh? ~1/3 the price gets you 2 degrees, company visits, exclusive speakers, and an internship. What do you lose? 2 summers and some time throughout the two years due to the additional engineering courses and the committee work. Also, some shame befalls you if you happen to pursue a career in consulting post-grad.

Alright...we finally get to the subject of this post: Sponsorship.
Throughout LGO's history, partner companies have "sponsored" their employees through the two-year program. What sponsorship exactly entails is to the discretion of the company and therefore varies significantly. For most, sponsorship entails a post-grad employment commitment of ~2-3 years of employment with the sponsoring company; for others, there is no formal/legal/binding employment commitment. Sponsorship benefits often include tuition, housing, and a portion of the employee's salary at the time of leave.

Each year, the number of sponsored students varies based on company performance and policies and "the economy". The LGO Class of 2009 had ~5 sponsored students. The LGO Class of 2011 has only 2.

Post Summer Break!

After the summer term, we got about 1.5 weeks during which to relax and debrief before coming back for more and meeting the incoming "Sloanies".

Some of my classmates were headed to super cool places like Paris (Diego and Iliana), Belize (Mike & his new bride), Costa Rica possibly ?. Others were headed home to "hug their cars", see old friends and reminisce about the ordinary lives they left behind. Others yet were staying in Boston, taking in the sites and taking advantage of all New England has to offer via camping treks to Vermont, duck tours, kayaking, and the seemingly-endless happy hours.

Me? Chas and I headed home to Seattle. We flew out the morning after classes were over and I will be return Sunday night (Orientation starts Monday morning). Chas will stay an extra week and will come in just days before starting school.

Seattle welcomed me with 90+ degree weather. I was still feeling icky from the cold I caught the day of my Statistics final (I blame "it" for my performance, btw), and so the lack of an AC upset me more than usual and overpowered my mood for the first few days. Since then however, the weather cooled (now overcast and in the 70's, the way I like it), and i've managed to actually leave my house. I have a slew of appointments to take care of (doctor, dentist, nails, wax, hair). I'm also seeing some friends and old co-workers while in town.

Chas has been able to also visit with friends while in town. She hosted a "gathering" at our house on Friday - a handful of 11 year-old girls. They make look harmless, but together, they're like a Chuck E. Cheese's on a Sunday morning (think aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh; then repeat in various pitches until the pencil drives itself dangerously close to your pupil).

I'm looking forward to heading back to school, although i'm nervous about all the coordination that will have to take place once the year begins.

Summer, 2009 Courses

Summer classes are over, so note that perspective as you read this....

I'll try to sum up the summer courses by noting the professor and their special quirks, the class content, the workload, and a super subjective short phrase about whether or not I enjoyed it!

15.761  Intro to Operations Management

• LIKE FACTOR: Loved it!
• The PROFESSOR:  Bradley "Call me Brad" Morrison.  This class truly separated the undergrad MIT experience from the business school experience.  As I sat during the introductory Intro to Ops Mgmt class, I recalled some of my "firsts" in undergrad - as they relate to courses, of course.  I'd walk into class, the professor would point to their name on the board, and then start writing on the chalk-board.  And, there would be homework that night.  There was no "easing" into the school deal, it was all business.  In contrast, there was the class at the beginning of summer, casually-clad in t-shirts and flip flops, and there is Professor Morrison....except that he notes we may call him BRAD.  Brad? I'm thinking wtf, are we not in business school?  It was a short-lived indignation. I got over it.  Brad was an awesome professor and I hear he finished off the year playing beer-pong during the LGO end-of-summer party.
• The CONTENT:  As the class title suggests (whoever comes up with class titles, btw, is a genius), this class was an introduction to Operations Management and covered topics such as the Economic Order Quantity and light Inventory Management, tradeoffs between Service Levels and Inventory Holding Costs, the "Newsvendor Model", and others that have escaped my memory
• The WORKLOAD: Light.  There were a bunch of cases to read and analyze for class discussion, but I generally enjoyed them.  I only remember 1 HW assignment, and there was 1 midterm.  There were also some team assignments and a competition using a web-based simulator.  We also played the famous Beer Game as part of this class - http://web.mit.edu/jsterman/www/SDG/beergame.html

ESD.60  High Velocity Organizations

• LIKE FACTOR:  Liked it.
• The PROFESSOR:  Steve "Bowtie" Spears, author of Chasing the Rabbit.  
• The CONTENT:  "Lean"; how organizations can leverage the tools required to sprint ahead of the competition.  From the syllabus, class objectives were:

Objectives

By the end of the semester, students will be able to:

1. Understand the capabilities that distinguish high velocity market leaders from

their capabilities.

2. Have some capacity to apply these capabilities to their own work.

3. Understand how various quality and productivity programs—lean, six sigma,

TQM, and the like can be useful in supporting the development and

deployment of the four capabilities of high velocity organizations.

• The WORKLOAD:  Light.

15.064  Probability & Statistics

• LIKE FACTOR:  Undecided. The first half of the class was enjoyable due to the professor's dorkiness; the second half was painful for similar reasons.  However, the material was noticeably valuable, and I wish I had learned more.
• The PROFESSOR:  This class was unusual in that the first half was taught by one professor with the support of one [unpublished] book, and the second half was taught by a different professor with the support of a different book.
• The CONTENT:  As the title suggests.
• The WORKLOAD:  Moderate.  Individual assignments, group assignments, a midterm, a final, and a helicopter build competition.

15.066  Systems Optimization

• LIKE FACTOR:  Loved it!
• The PROFESSOR:  One smooth French dude - Jeremie Gallien.  Professor Gallien was a no-BS professor who called out students when they were late, felt they had better things to pay attention to, or simply looked guilty of not understanding the material.  For some reason, I always thought of the Disney movie, "Ratatouille" while I was in that class.  Weird.
• The CONTENT:  Optimization - learning about how to solve for Max/Min problems given a set of constraints.  My ultra favorite problem was on an Individual Homework assignment.  It was so awesome that I spent about 90% of the time allotted for the assignment on this problem.  The problem was titled the McDonald's Diet Problem and it had to do with finding the least-cost daily diet that was nutritionally complete based on guidelines provided and was composed entirely of foods from McDonald's.  The answer to part a of the problem had someone acquiring an insane amt of honey packets (because these gave you calories for free), which was pretty funny.  Added constraints yielded a much more "rationale" answer.
• The WORKLOAD:  Heavy.  Only 1 individual assignment, for which we were  given 8 hours and 8 hours only.  I spent 8 hours and did not complete it.  For the homework assignments, our team easily spent about an average of 6 hrs each (x 6 people) per assignment.  No midterm...no final.  The final project, however, was pretty work intense and many many hours were spent on it!  

15.317 Leadership

• LIKE FACTOR:   Undecided. On some days, the material was relevant and interesting, while on other days, I struggled in finding the value in the examples/analogies to something i'd actually encounter post graduation.  Our journey with "leadership" is to continue throughout the remainder of our 2 years, so we'll see how my opinion changes. 
• The PROFESSOR:  Jan Klein.
• The CONTENT:  
• The WORKLOAD:  Moderate.