Eeks

I'm always happy when I see my grad school (University of Chicago) in the news. So the fact that this popped up on My Yahoo (which I barely use) was encouraging:

Rose Martinelli, associate dean for student recruitment and admissions at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business stands in the Gleacher Center lobby in Chicago, Friday, July 27, 2007. As technology advances the school is now requiring applicants to include a PowerPoint presentation in their applications. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

But...really? Power Point is perhaps the single most misused application in the free world. I'm not sure what the GSB hopes to accomplish with this. There are lots ofgreat examples around the web about bad PowerPoint, and I can't imagine that 24 or 25 year olds are going to reset the bar. More on point, there's no CALL for a presentation, when it's a submitted application. There is no dialogue here, just a printed slide or two. (Or ten. With animated clip art and .wav files attached.) I suspect these students, or prospective students anyhow, might learn the wrong lesson here.

Not good, GSB. Not good.