New this year, Jump Start is required as part of our orientation program. Jump Start courses are designed to ease your transition back into the classroom by providing you with a minimum level of competency in concepts that will be assumed known on the first day of core classes this Autumn. All incoming students will prepare for the quantitative rigors of the Foster MBA Program together: accounting, statistics, math, and finance.
Jump Start Schedule
| Monday, September 10 | |
| 9:00am-12:00pm | Statistics Session #1 |
| 1:00-4:00pm | Statistics Session #2 |
| Tuesday, Sept 11 | |
| 9:00am-12:00pm | Mathematics & Microeconomics |
| 1:00-4:00pm | Statistics Session #3 |
| Monday, Sept 17 | |
| 1:00-4:00pm | Accounting Session #1 |
| Tuesday, Sept 18 | |
| 1:00-4:00pm | Finance Session #1 |
| Wednesday, Sept 19 | |
| 1:00-4:00pm | Accounting Session #2 |
| Thursday, Sept 20 | |
| 7:30-9:00am | Optional: Excel Skills Workshop |
| 9:00am-12:00pm | Finance Session #2 |
| 1:00-4:00pm | Accounting Session #3 |
| Friday, Sept 21 | |
| 9:00am-12:00pm | Finance Session #3 |
This module serves to introduce (or review) data analysis methods in Excel and teach the basics of statistics, to optimally prepare you for the Autumn quarter statistics core class. We will cover a wide variety of topics and introduce hypothesis testing and regressions, the main tools of quantitative business analysis. The module will contain many practical examples, such as finding a statistical
relationship between firm-level returns and market returns. List of topics:
- Characteristics of distributions: mean, median, variance, standard deviation, skewness
- Covariance and correlation
- Random variables
- Hypothesis testing
- Regression analysis
Mathematics & microeconomics
The mathematics module is offered to help you review your basic algebra and calculus skills, which are crucial tools for your finance, statistics, and first-year microeconomics classes. We will review these tools using many examples, such as finding the price of a set of goods sold by a profit-maximizing firm given some cost constraints. List of topics:
- Algebra
- Linear equations
- Quadratic equations
- Systems of equations
- Derivatives and calculus
Finance
The finance module provides an introduction to finance and mathematics of finance. The goal is to learn one fundamental concept, the time value of money, and to apply this concept when calculating present values. In addition to the topics below, you’ll be introduced to financial markets, finance terminology, rates of return, interest rates, present value, future value, arbitrage, and efficient markets. You’ll then learn to value streams of cash flows, bonds, and mortgages, both by hand and using a financial calculator. Please note that all of the concepts covered in the course will be assumed known on the first day of the Autumn quarter core finance class. List of topics:
- Time value of money: discounting, compounding
- Annuities, perpetuities, growing annuities, growing perpetuities
- Bond pricing, yield-to-maturity
- EAR and APR
- Mortgages
- Financial calculator and Excel
Accounting
This module introduces the language of business: accounting. We will discuss the logic underlying Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). We will define revenues, expenses, assets, liabilities and equity. We will practice recording transactions, and will create balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements.