Iowa State University offers options for working students

On May 8, 45 Iowa State University students graduated from the school’s master’s of business administration program. Of the 45 graduates, 13 were full-time students, and 32 attended evening or Saturday classes. David Mescher, a 33-year-old M.B.A. graduate of the class of 2002, remembers the thrill of graduation, and before that the anxiety of going back to school.

On the 65-mile drive from Pella to Ames, Mescher became increasingly nervous. He knew the campus from when he attended the school as an undergraduate, but two years had passed. As he headed toward orientation for the M.B.A. program, he worried that he might not be up to the challenge or that the classes would be full of vice presidents, middle managers and certified public accountants, all more experienced and better prepared than he. When he got to orientation, however, his fears were quelled.

“I found out there is no typical student in the M.B.A. program,” Mescher said.   “There were accountants and managers, but there were also nurses and engineers. They broke us into study groups by geography, and my group had an agronomist, a newspaper editor and a pastor.”

Mescher was a department manager at the Pella Windows and Doors plant, but dreamed of a job in finance. He had a bachelor’s degree in finance from ISU, but said “to get anywhere in an organization, it seemed like an M.B.A. was necessary.” While working for Pella, he began investigating his options. Iowa State’s M.B.A. program offered the finance emphasis Mescher desired. He consulted Ron Ackerman in the university’s business department to learn more about the coursework and what his classmates might be like. Ackerman encouraged Mescher, who said the professors and the university were helpful and flexible.   “They’re more flexible now, with Des Moines classes,” he said.

For the first two years, Mescher attended Saturday classes in Ames, with one class from 8:30 a.m. to noon and a second class from 1 to 4:30 p.m. During the last six months he was completing course work, he took one Saturday class and one evening class. The courses were challenging, but he found he could handle it. Most difficult, he said, was making time for his family between work, classes and homework.

What Mescher says he remembers most about the program is the team environment.

“The same group is with you throughout the first year or two of core classes,” he said. “It built teamwork, and we could work off each other’s strengths. In my group, my strength was finance and numbers. The newspaper editor was great with communication and polishing reports.”      He speaks fondly of lively discussions in class, of teachers who showed their students respect and of students who applied themselves because they all really wanted to learn.

“Everyone’s work backgrounds and past experiences contributed to class discussions,” he said. “It was taking things to the next level, and opening your mind to different views.”

Although reading, projects and case studies were employed to develop students’ skills, Mescher says the class discussions were where the bulk of the learning happened.

While earning his degree, Mescher began looking for a new job in Des Moines. He joined the Citigroup Inc. credit card center in West Des Moines as a financial analyst and nine months later, he went to work for Principal Real Estate Investors as an asset manager.

“The M.B.A. was something I had prepared myself for and really threw myself into,” he said. “When you discovered you can do something like that, it’s like there’s nothing you can’t accomplish or overcome.”