From January 27 to February 3rd, 2008, Tsinghua  Students participated in the third annual STEP exchange program to Stanford University.  This year, the Tsinghua body comprised of twenty students from different countries. 

STEP (Stanford Tsinghua Exchange Program) is a partnership started in 2006 that encourages cross-cultural learning and network building between the MBA programs of the Tsinghua School of Economics and Management and the Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB).  Selected students participate in a sequential two-way exchange where first the Tsinghua students will go to the Stanford GSB for one week to engage in a variety of learning and integration activities and then Stanford GSB students will come to Tsinghua for a similar experience.  From January to March, students are broken into small groups where they work on a research project to be presented in China.

The program includes academic, social and business aspects. For example, during the 2008 visit to Stanford, students took GSB classes every morning in classes such as “Making Ideas Stick,” “Managing Sales Organizations,”  and “Venture Capital.”  The most popular classes among Tsinghua Students were those which involved case studies where the leading antagonist in the case attended the class.  In addition, students were able to use the resources of the Stanford GSB, including the library and career services and attending seminars.

As Silicon Valley is home to a large amount of successful businesses, the business trips during the STEP program proved to be quite rewarding.  Business visits included Cisco, Facebook, IDEO, Chevron, United Commercial Bank, Kleiner Perkins Venture Capital, and GAP Inc.  Students had the opportunity to learn how these companies operated and ask about any China related strategies that the companies had.

The cultural aspect was also a very special part of the exchange.  For many students, it was their first time to the United States.  Experiencing a Stanford basketball game, dinner parties, and shopping in San Francisco were special highlights for many.  In addition, both Stanford and Tsinghua students went on a day long trip to NAPA valley to taste the wonderful wine famous to the region.

Tsinghua students are currently working diligently to host the Stanford MBA students during their visit in March.

More about STEP:

For additional information regarding this program, please also see Stanford's Global Management Program (http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/GMP/programs/step.html).  STEP is Stanford GSB’s first exchange program. The success of STEP has led to similar programs including an exchange between Tsinghua and M.I.T. and another among Stanford and IIM (Bangalore, India) (The SAIL Program).