Staying thankful in the home stretch.
We’re knocking on the door: eleven more days of class for RCs. Take an average of 2.5 cases per day, participate once every three classes, and you’re looking at nine sentences between you and the beach (ex-finals, ex-FIELD, ex-internship, etc., etc.).
Our spread this month covers a diverse set of topics. To me, the throughline is a spirit of gratitude for the wealth of opportunities afforded to us at HBS, one that makes it bittersweet to think about being this close to re-entering the “real world” (be that permanent, or for two months of highly-value-additive MBA-summer-associating).
We’re grateful for the communities we’ve found and the communities we’ve forged. For wonderful role models, supportive classmates, and mountaintop yoga sessions that give us clarity on the difference we want to make in the world. For the chance to build something and put it to the test. For male allies. For jaw-dropping cinematography, for the TSA, for Boston!
And of course, we’re grateful for Bitcoin. $70k!? Almost enough for EC year.
I am everyday impressed by the remarkable grit, creativity, and kindness on campus, and I hope we take a few moments this month to acknowledge – out loud – when we see something amazing in one another.
I want to end with a brief anecdote from my fourth year at the University of Virginia (go hoos). I was getting off a particularly crowded bus to go to class. A student hopped off ahead of me – I didn’t know her, but I assume our classes started at the same time. Like always I was running way late, so she was too. As I started down the bus’ back steps, she suddenly turned, as if she’d forgotten something. She ran back to the bus and up the steps – surely she has no time for this! Must be a laptop or a phone, something important. “Thank you!” she yelled to the driver, over the entire crowd – loud. She smiled, turned, and ran off.
That’s the moment I remember six years later.
Tim Ford (MBA ’25) is originally from New Jersey. He graduated from the University of Virginia with degrees in Commerce and Spanish in 2018, and completed an M.Phil. in Latin American Studies at the University of Cambridge in 2019. Prior to the HBS MBA, Tim worked in growth equity in San Francisco.