Business Students Need AA

Graduate students are always celebrating something

Since the last few posts have been rather dry (learning teams, classes and career resources), let's talk about something a little more wet.... like drinking.  Apparently it's a very important aspect of the business school experience.  So much so, that on UCLA's entire campus, the only place alcohol is allowed is in select portions of the business school.  I guess they figure with all the networking they tell us to do, that it would be a little easier if we weren't completely sober.

Most of the time when the school is providing the drinks it is directly for an evening networking event when recruiters are on campus.  The exception is Anderson Afternoons (Fun Fact: many years ago this event used to be called Beer Blast.  I think they changed the name to clean it up, but the initials AA still make it an interesting choice).  This weekly event begins at 4:30 on Thursdays, after most classes are done for the week (there are actually some Thursday evening and Friday electives, but they're rare b/c who would want to take those?).  Sometimes the event is sponsored by a company (so even this could be a recruiting event for some), but all students are invited to meet up in the North Lawn behind the business school to partake in food, kegs, and wine.  The food goes pretty quick, but there are usually still some drinks flowing a couple hours later.  It's a nice opportunity to catch up with students from other sections on events for the week, and start formulating some weekend plans.  Since the Anderson Afternoons during midterms week wasn't going to be attended too heavily, they let us celebrate on the Friday after our last exam.  It was only 11 am, so it featured brunch and a large quantity of mimosas.

The other regular, large scale, Anderson drinking event is the Lit Club on Wednesday nights at a random bar either in Westwood, Brentwood, or Santa Monica.  This isn't sponsored by the school, but all students are encouraged to attend.  Lit is short for "literature" (also cleverly slang for "not sober") and during each event there is a "reading."  Except the reading is actually a power point slide-show and narration roasting other students in the class, usually involving embarrassing photos pulled from Facebook.  The lesson is to avoid getting any compromising pictures taken of you, b/c you never know when you might become a victim of the Librarians.  It's all in good fun (I think), and a way to bring everyone together to have a laugh at yourselves and each other.  When I came to UCLA for A-Days (the admitted students weekend), they took us to a sample Lit Club event.  The event was hilarious and was one of the most memorable parts of that weekend.  I've kinda soured on it a bit since I've been here though, because its always so overcrowded which also makes it's tough to even hear or see the reading going on, and it hasn't been as funny lately anyway.  Also the reading usually goes from around 10:30-11, and I have 8 am classes on Thursdays.  But of course part of the draw is that you don't want to miss a hilarious show that everyone is talking about the next day (especially if you're in it).  These are the type of decisions that make business school so tough.