Greetings!

All of us at the Graduate Management Admission Council have been granted a gift. To some extent, our gift was earned; but there is also a generous measure of good fortune. We will be able to ride out the present storm and, we expect, to emerge on the other side stronger than ever. But we all believe that with that gift comes an obligation to share the bounty of this good fortune that we have been given with those who are less fortunate than we are.

For a dozen years now, we have elected not to send holiday cards to our friends, colleagues and business partners. Instead, we have “adopted” the children of families in the area who could use some help making the holidays merry. The nearby mall has an Angel Tree on which these children hang small cards sharing their dreams for the holidays. This year, we adopted 66 children from 26 families. They range in age from as young as six months to as old as 17 years.

And for those of you with inquiring minds, bikes are once again filling our halls here—19 kids asked for (and will get) a new bicycle this year. There is a little pink one (even the tires are pink...for the moment) with streamers coming from the handle bars at one extreme. At the other end of the spectrum is an aggressive-looking VFX, Magna Dual Suspension mountain bike. (Whatever happened to plain old red bikes with no gears and pedal brakes?) For little girls there is The Littlest Pet Shop-for the little boys, there are Leap Frog Learning toys.

All of us at GMAC want to wish you a wonderful holiday. May 2009 be a year in which your dreams are fulfilled.

Best wishes,
Dave

A reporter recently asked me whether GMAC’s recent adoption of a palm vein reader was a knee-jerk reaction to the theft of GMAT test questions by participants in the web site Scoretop.com. Her question was not an unfair one as the media had certainly offered us daily doses of stories on Scoretop.com. The comment lines, blogs, and chat rooms were replete with opinion by both the informed and the uninformed.

The palm vein reader that has now been installed in GMAT test centers in Korea and India will be a part of every GMAT test center by the end of the first quarter of 2009. It represents one more aspect of our commitment to continuous improvement.

The palm vein reader is less invasive and more accurate than the digital fingerprint that we have captured since January 1, 2006, when the Graduate Management Admission Council first launched the GMAT with partners Pearson VUE and ACT, Inc. Moreover, it’s a more reliable identifier than fingerprints. There are some individuals, myself included, who have fingerprints that are very hard to read. (It took me more than an hour to get two acceptable fingerprints when I was signing up for the Registered Traveler program. In the end, they chose my iris scan as my identifier, not being able to rely on the fingerprints.)

Early in the decade, GMAC uncovered a test imposter ring. A ring of very proficient test takers would take the GMAT or another high-stakes test on behalf of someone else. We were able to crack that ring and we canceled GMAT scores and notified schools.

But we also discovered that the imposter ring was engaging in document fraud. In order to pose as a test taker, the imposter needed a government-issued identification such as a driver’s license or a passport. And so for the $3,000 to $5,000 that the ring charged their clients to take the test, they also produced very convincing but fraudulent documents.

The introduction of digital fingerprinting in 2006 was a step along our path of continuous improvement. The palm vein reader is but one more step. And our journey is not at an end. We are committed to continuously improving every aspect of the GMAT—from test items to supporting materials, to the measurement of more constructs, and, yes, to even tighter and improved security.

The first in a series of occasional commentaries by GMAC CEO Dave Wilson on topical issues in management education.

Although it’s been weeks since the Olympic torch moved on from Beijing, for me, the impact continues to resonate.

In the final heats or sets, which is most of what dominated the televised coverage, we were all watching athletes who had earned their way into that final event by defeating other athletes; athletes all, but only the exceptional ones are in the medalist heat. The medalist heats are populated with peers who have proven their mettle in the rigor of earlier races.

Many years ago, I entered a 10K run in Houston to support the Houston Symphony Orchestra. As I approached the starting line, there were signs indicating where one should line up depending upon the pace per mile you expected to run. I got into my place at marker for those who would run a 6:30 pace and waited for the starting gun. As this was a small race, there were no invited world class runners, just ordinary weekend runners and joggers. I was amazed at the number of runners who were planning to set a pace faster than 6:30.

Those of you who have run in these kinds of events know the end of this story. The overwhelming majority of these alleged 6:30 pace runners were not close to that pace. They apparently suffered from an undiagnosed (in fact, never even known) condition called “numeric inversia” where a “6” looks like a “9.” 9:30 was about the pace they set.

It took more than half a mile to clear myself of these slower runners. There were no early heats to eliminate these runners or place them in a different race. Nor was there any requirement for an objective measure of ability that granted them a space with the runners who were setting a 6:30 pace.

But it also did not matter much. The purpose in our run that day was to support the Houston Symphony Orchestra, not to win any medals.

Imagine that you have decided to invest US$50,000. You are going to get an MBA. As you walk in the classroom, you have tested your abilities and concluded, metaphorically speaking, that a 6:30 pace is your level of ability; a flat course plays to your strengths and temperatures in the 70s are where you perform best. You chose the program that meets all of these criteria. You show up at the starting line. The gun cracks and off the pack goes.

But your classmates are not 6:30 runners. They are 9:30 runners. And this time it does matter. They are your peers and they will be in your case groups. They are going to be with you for a year or more as you study. They will also be in the cohort that the career services office has to place. And you have written your check for $50,000.

How does this happen? You did your due diligence on the program. The curriculum looked great. Tuition and fees were competitive. The faculty roster was impressive. How did you get this huge cadre of classmates who are not your peers?

The answer is “the same way -- the 9:30 runners lined up with the 6:30 milers.” There was no objective measure of ability that stratified the pack.

Anytime an MBA program tells a student that “you do not need the GMAT to matriculate,” those students will be running with the 9:30 milers. And this time it will be a very costly policy for the student, and the school.

Great MBA programs want students who have worked hard, trained hard, and competed. They want students who are willing to subject themselves to the rigors of the GMAT. The cohorts at these programs are indeed peers. Classmates give to each other as much as they learn from each other.

Don’t get caught in the pack where the 9:30 milers are clogging the channels for you and your 6:30 pace.

You are on the front lines of graduate business education every day. I welcome your comments about this and other topical issues in graduate business education around the world.

This forum is open and I look forward to the dialogue to come.

Dave

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