Introducing the Hybrid MBA Culture Hero Award

This year, Hybrid MBA students launched a new award to recognize their peers for demonstrating values of the Foster School of Business. At the end of each quarter, up to four Hybrid MBA students will be celebrated for exemplifying the Foster values outlined below. The Culture Hero award is one way to strengthen and celebrate the Hybrid MBA culture by recognizing people who demonstrate a great attitude, add more than they take and positively impact the learning experience.

Awardees demonstrate the Foster MBA Core Values:

  1. Builds Diverse and Inclusive Teams. We believe in the power of diverse, inclusive teams. Inclusive, diverse teams produce more resilient thinking, better solutions, and perform better than any collection of individuals could. We believe that there is strength in our differences. At Foster, we know and understand that the power of a team is not additive, not multiplicative, but exponential. We work with the intention to ensure that all voices are heard.
  2. Maximizes Learning Outcomes. We embrace a learning and growth mindset. Ultimately, we are a community that believes in progress for ourselves and our group as a whole. We consider all of the evidence, we make insight-informed decisions, we try new and sometimes risky things, and—yes—sometimes we make mistakes. But we learn how to do it better next time. We have a growth and not a fixed mindset that leads to better outcomes in the end.
  3. Serves as a Role Model Beyond Foster. We strive to leave it better than we found it. We take the spirit of the Seattle region to heart in that we recognize our shared responsibility to improve the world not just for ourselves but also for others. We work to make our organizations, our environments, and our communities not only better today than they were yesterday but also even better tomorrow.
  4. Contributes to the Foster community. We believe in being part of something bigger than ourselves. We recognize the importance of community and the powerful idea that we belong to something bigger than ourselves. We recognize our responsibility to our community and the community’s responsibility to us as well. We ask for help from the community when we need it and we give back freely to help the community so that others can receive assistance when they need it too.

Winter Quarter ’22 Culture Heroes

Students are nominated by their peers and awarded based on one of the Foster core value categories. Quotes from their nominations are included below.

Nilesh Dixit ’23, Category: Builds diverse and inclusive teams

“Nilesh is DEDICATED to the Foster Values through building diverse and inclusive teams, maximizing learning outcomes such as making remote immersion folks during winter quarter feel included. He has heart and is committed to DEI, as well as the success of others.”

“Nilesh is an excellent demonstration of a true Foster growth mindset.  I could have checked all four boxes above for the Foster values he has demonstrated over and over throughout the program. ”

Dave Reid ’22, Category: Maximizes learning outcomes

“Dave has exemplified a growth mindset in his role on student council. He has attentively gathered feedback from our cohort and has transformed that feedback into practical, constructive changes that will improve this program for future classes.”

“Dave did an outstanding job collecting all the feedback about the class design and keeping everyone in the loop. I really appreciate Dave’s hard and productive work in maximizing the learning outcomes for us. A true culture hero!”

Kiruthika Arulmozhi ’23, Category: Contributes to the Foster Community

“Kiruthika is a courageous and brilliant leader who sets high standards in immersion and Foster live sessions. She stepped up on many occasions. Her wealth of industry knowledge as a consultant has helped the class in many different ways, especially in the Global Strategy course”

“Kiruthika is always prepared to contribute during our Foster live classes. Her questions, contributions, and comments always provide relevant and helpful context to what we’re learning. I’m grateful to have her in our cohort.”

Christina Green ’22, Category: Contributes to the Foster Community

“From before our first class, Christina has been a rallying force for Class 4 (Class of ’22). She is always ready to help and looking to strengthen our Foster community!”

“Christina has been an informal lead of our community here in HMBA since the beginning of the program and the last quarter was not an exception. Christina did a great job initiating meaningful conversations, little events, making our connection on Slack and in-person fun and easy.”

Other Hybrid MBA Nominees:

Class of 2022 (Class 4): Miya Dotson, Evan Kim, Brian Halbur, Ben Bierman, Tony Segura, Anton Fedoseev

Class of 2023 (Class 5): Anne Kertson, Adam Alonsagay, Emily Horn, Joy Merriner

Explore the Hybrid MBA Blog:

Meet more UW Hybrid MBA Students through our Hybrid MBA Student Q&A blog posts.

Get to know Hybrid MBA Class of 2023

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