Leading business schools are driving an effort to ensure that the MBA emerges from Covid-19 stronger and more relevant than ever.

In their pandemic pivot, business schools have experimented with new tools and teaching methods to deliver an MBA experience that they hope remains worth the high price of admission. For their part, students have pushed for tuition adjustments to reflect the Covid-impact learning experience as well as for more relevant case studies.

Meeting in the middle, professors and students are finding creative ways to engage with each other and the business community in the Covid era. In the “flipped classroom,” prep work – case studies and class readings – is done at home, lectures are minimized, and class time is used for problem-solving; in “blended classrooms” some classes are held online and some in person—or half the class attends while the rest participates online.

The pandemic crisis has underscored the need for MBA programs, professors, and students to be agile and resilient.

For example, as the global workforce began to work remotely, Cambridge Judge took a deeper look at the effects of remote teams on leadership and organizational culture. INSEAD students raised questions about the ethics of governments propping up wages and potentially restructuring the workforce post pandemic.

Covid’s impact on supply chains and the economy aside, ethics and sustainability have also been key themes.

The pandemic has brought the question, how to be a good corporate citizen, to the fore, and many business schools are responding, not only via relevant new courses but by offering online materials and webinars on leadership to the business community and wider public.

Last summer, for example, Stanford GSB launched “Stanford Rebuild,” a free online “8-Week Guided Innovation Sprint” (open to anyone over 13) that was preceded by a 1-week speaker series on the challenges and opportunities of the pandemic. Stanford Rebuild participants used the Stanford Embark platform to walk through building and launching their post-Covid venture—over 5,300 proposals were ultimately submitted.

Post Covid, will we truly return to ‘normalcy’ or will this spirit of innovation and questioning continue? Stick around.