Thunderbird School of Global Management-Taiwan Club

My name is David. I grew up in Togo, West Africa and then I lived in France for 15 years working in investment banking. I came here in Thunderbird because I wanted to improve my management skills and expose myself to an international environment before making my transition to Africa. Indeed, my career objective is to connect international investors and entrepreneurs in Africa and Thunderbird is the best place to link with investors from all around the world.

What I like here in Thunderbird is the diversity of the Student body. For this intake, 40 countries were represented in the Flag ceremony and I was proud to represent the Togo. When I just walk across the commons, it is the name we give to our cafeteria in Thunderbird, I may easily ear up to five spoken languages used among the students, French, Spanish, Mandarin, Hindi and English of course.  We are at the UN here.

The courses are also very interesting and the professors are internationally renowned especially because Thunderbird is the best school in International Business based on several news magazines. My preferred course so far is Entrepreneurship and Family Business, maybe because this class gives me so many ideas I could apply in Africa. I would love writing a business plan here before I leave Thunderbird because the professors will help me make it as best as possible. However, we are very busy, I have already found myself spending ten hours a day in the IBIC, the library located on the campus.

Socially, there is a lot of activities on campus; I am a representative in the Thunderbird Student Government, which means that I participate in the administration of the social life of the campus. I am also a communication conduit between the students and the school staff and faculty. Fortunately, we have only one meeting per week although I am involved in the organization of any event occurring on the campus from the regional night event to the corporate learning events that could be organized when guest speakers come to talk on the campus.

To make it short, Thunderbird is a really good school and I won’t be surprised if we get in the Top 20 of the best business schools in the next five years.