When I started my MBA search, I had an elaborate spreadsheet to help me decide the schools where I wanted to focus my application energies. It included looking at location, GI Bill and Yellow Ribbon Program support, the various aspects of their incoming class profile, job outcomes, rankings, entrepreneurship programs, and a variety of other factors. After a while, the whole thing was stressing me out. I was trying to subjectively weigh too many factors.
So I stopped.
Then I returned to the process a few weeks later, and thought, “Ok, what really matters to me?” The first thing I decided on was that I wanted to graduate with as little to no debt as possible.
GI Bill makes veteran entrepreneurship easier
My goal is to go down an entrepreneurial path while at school. Because of this, I am worried about potential student loans holding me back from my goals. I don’t want the need to pay back student loans to prevent me from creating the life I want. And when I have veteran benefits I can use to get the education for free, that’s hard to ignore.
Interested in entrepreneurship? Check out these three ways veterans can pursue an entrepreneurial path.
People look at this and say “Oh, wow! That sounds super risky.”
Yes, it is a riskier option (on the surface) than going for a regular post-MBA job. But here’s how I view the ways I’m mitigating that risk:
- While getting a degree, I have two years while I’m surrounded by people from different backgrounds who can help me formulate my business. I’m also surrounded by faculty with extensive business knowledge that want to help me succeed. This provides a rare opportunity as an entrepreneur to have a great environment around you to help you succeed.
(Quick note on this: The problem I will fully admit with this line of thinking is that the overwhelming majority of people at an MBA program are not going down an entrepreneurial path. They very much are trying to go into more traditional jobs like consulting or investment banking. So the value of the people is not necessarily in having fellow entrepreneurial-minded people around you, but the background of people. Also, business students see potential businesses EVERYWHERE. I get all kinds of ideas from my classmates.)
- As a veteran with deployments to a combat zone, I’m receiving free healthcare for the first five years after the Army (find out how this works here). This gives me comfort that I will have this taken care of at no expense while trying to start a company. I’m assuming that I will not have a lot of money coming in at first and healthcare is expensive.
- I also know that there are some really outstanding programs out there to help veterans succeed in entrepreneurship. Groups like Bunker Labs and Patriot Bootcamp are dedicated to helping veterans succeed. Does the existence of these groups guarantee a start-ups success? Absolutely not. But it takes some of the edge off, knowing that there are groups with a proven track record out there designed specifically to help veterans succeed.
- The way I’ve viewed it… worst-case scenario I totally fail at trying to start a company. I then have a top-notch MBA to fall back on. I also have a great story of what I learned failing at entrepreneurship to take into a job hunt.
And most importantly, for me, there is the risk of not trying. The risk of not laying it out there on the line is not a risk I want to take.
But that means that my income right after graduation likely won’t look like those of my classmates who will be going into investment banking or consulting. So any student loan debt is likely to be much more of a burden if I want to stay on that path. That’s what I decided to apply (mostly) to public schools, where I could maximize my GI Bill benefits.
In my MBA application search, I submitted applications to the University of Virginia Darden School of Business (where I currently am), the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Texas McCombs, Berkeley Haas, and the Yale School of Management. Later, I’ll get into why I included the two private schools, Stanford and Yale.
Public school MBA options
In the top 20 MBA programs, there are some great public school options where you can maximize your GI Bill.
Note: by law, any veteran with 100% GI Bill benefits does not have to pay for tuition and fees at a public school if they are attending as an in-state resident. And because of the Choice Act, schools will almost always give veterans in-state residence.
Berkeley Hass, UVA Darden, Michigan Ross, UCLA Anderson, Texas McCombs, UNC Kenan-Flager, and Washington Foster are all public schools in the top 20, according to the 2021 rankings from US News and World Report.
The fact is, for most private schools, you should still expect to walk away with debt, even if you are using the GI Bill and the Yellow Ribbon Program. I just personally couldn’t justify doing that when there were great public school options where I knew I could walk away with a debt-free education.
Private school exceptions
It wasn’t until I started doing more research for this site that I started finding out more about the funding options for veterans at private schools.
Schools like NYU Stern and Chicago Booth have massive endowments just for veterans that can enable you to still walk away from your MBA with no debt, just like you could expect if you attended a private school. I have also heard anecdotal stories from veterans at Tuck, Yale SOM, and Tepper that the school provided them enough scholarship money that their MBA was no-cost to them.
If I could go back in time armed with this knowledge to talk to myself when I was applying, I might look at these options more than I did.
For a more in-depth look at this, check out the article I wrote about funding your MBA as a veteran, which you can find here.
Lack of M7 options
Now, there is something to note here.
The “M7” are the traditional powerhouses of the MBA schools. They include, Harvard Business School, Stanford Graduate School of Business, UPenn Wharton, Northwestern Kellogg, Chicago Booth, Columbia Business School, and MIT Sloan. These are the upper crust and they are definitely at the top of the pecking order concerning where you went to school.
Notice the lack of public schools. But if you look at the rankings, you will also see that Haas, for example, is right behind HBS and ahead of Columbia.
It’s hard to ignore the “prestige” factor when it comes to MBA programs. Some of it definitely feels very elitist, but it’s also hard to ignore the fact that many of the top schools have indeed produced important business leaders.
Was this because of the top academic program offered at the school? Or was it because these people were already top performers, wanted to go to a top school, and probably would’ve done well wherever they got their MBA from? Or perhaps they made networks at the elite schools that got them to where they are?
Honestly, who knows. The answer is probably some mixture of all of those options.
Point is, the top schools absolutely provide an advantage that’s hard to ignore.
Buuuuuttt….that GI Bill
I have to say, it’s a weird dynamic being someone getting an MBA using veteran benefits. My classmates are taking on huge amounts of debt to pay for their degrees and are very much worried about getting good jobs after they graduate so that they can start paying off those student loans. Meanwhile the vets in the class…are just less worried.
It’s just a nice feeling to be receiving a top-notch education…for free.
Look, you can absolutely prioritize rankings. And don’t underestimate those rankings, they are important.
There are also some who would say that you will be able to quickly pay off any debt after getting an MBA. The thought is that the larger salary will be able to quickly erase those schools loans.
Find out how all the top MBA programs work with the Yellow Ribbon Program here.
Yes, you can likely expect to do this once you start raking in that post-MBA cheddar.
Or you can use that money for literally anything else. Anything.
- Buy a house
- Buy a business (sound crazy? think again)
- Travel
- Whatever the hell your heart desires
The GI Bill is one of the most amazing bits of social policy ever put forth by the American government. And I’m not just saying that because my grandfather, my dad, and I have all used the GI Bill. The GI Bill is strongly connected with the rise of the middle class after WW-II. Returning GIs used it to get an education, buy a home, or start a business.
Use it for all the power and options that it gives you.
Why did I include the two private schools?
Yes, I know I was just lauding all the reasons why you should prioritize public schools in order to maximize your veteran benefits
And I also mentioned that I applied to two private schools, Stanford and Yale.
Here’s why:
- Stanford was absolutely a “reach” school for me. I knew my profile wasn’t very competitive. But GSB is such a good school with such a strong track record of support to entrepreneurship that I thought the potential debt was worth it.
- Originally I had no intentions of applying to Yale. Then I had a conversation with a friend who is at Yale SOM and he told me that they were EXTREMELY financially generous to veterans. The school appeared to be a good match for me otherwise and so I applied with the expectation that I would be able to graduate without debt.
As I said earlier, I wish I knew some more about what other private schools offer for veterans for financial aid. If you really want to look at these schools. ask detailed questions about money when you are speaking with vets from those schools. It can be an awkward conversation but it’s important to understand the full picture before committing.
Final thoughts
What I ask that you think about is what you want to do with your life after graduation.
I’ve spoken with a number of people who received their MBA from a private school and took on the associated debt. Has it financially ruined them? Absolutely not. But do they think it was worth the extra money when they could’ve gone somewhere else for free? Routinely that answer is no.
The career benefit difference between a top MBA where you will have to incur debt and a top MBA you can get for free is not so great that you should ignore the benefits that come from graduating without debt.
For me, the freedom of options is too good to pass on. Being able to decide my own fate after graduation is worth more to me than anything else.
Think about how you want your own life to be and set it up accordingly.
GI Bill® is a registered trademark of the Department of Veterans Affairs.
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