Flying back to London for the Christmas vacation allowed me to reflect on my hectic first semester at Wharton. The academic workload was heavier than I had expected, which often made it difficult to find time for the multitude of extracurricular activities on offer.

Wharton has the reputation for having the best course of any business school in the world. The first year devoted to the core curriculum which is designed to give students a broad foundation to their business education.

Recently, I took courses in accountancy, operations management, competitive strategy, general management and business ethics. Classes are a mix of case study discussions and traditional lecturing.

In more technical subjects, such as finance and accountancy, the emphasis is on teaching a detailed understanding. Hence lecturing is favoured to the case study approach.

Competitive strategy, on the other hand, is taught with reference to case studies involving major top-level strategic decisions faced by companies such as Walmart, Disney, BSkyB and Coca-Cola. The quality of teaching is outstanding.

Later this semester, I hope to be taught macroeconomics by Professor Jeremy Siegel who is an internationally renowned economist. He has been rumoured to be a possible candidate to succeed Alan Greenspan as chairman of the US Federal Reserve.

He starts each class at Wharton with his perspectives on the market, after which speculative students rush to computer terminals to process trades.

Not all courses are taught by career academics. My ethics class was taken by Professor Larry Zicklin, who is chairman of Neuberger Berman, the US investment advisory firm, and president of the United Jewish Association Federation of New York. He teaches at Wharton to pass on the lessons he has learnt from his 25 years on Wall Street.

We discussed a number of cases in class, such as Merck's decision to develop and distribute a drug to cure river blindness even though doing so would never be profitable. This ultimately made business sense as it increased employee morale, attracted the best scientists and enhanced Merck's reputation.

Professor Zicklin's classes, however, were dominated by the demise of Enron. On the day of our first lecture, Enron's stock stood at over $20 but six weeks later it traded at less than $1.

Professor Zicklin was always one step ahead of the game: accurately predicting the nature of the damaging information that would come to light. If we had acted on his advice and 'shorted' the stock we could have paid our school fees, which is perhaps an ironic conclusion for an ethics class but very Wharton.

The multitude of extra curricular activities form a large part of the MBA experience. The most inspirational that I attended was the visit of Jack Welch, the legendary former chief executive of General Electric.

In a country that treats successful business leaders as fully-fledged celebrities, Mr Welch is the brightest star. His performance justified its billing. He spoke of his passion for managing people and promoted the tenants of his leadership philosophy that helped make GE the largest company in the world.

Commenting on the European Commission's obstruction of the Honeywell deal, Mr Welch joked that the EC was but ten years old and like any 10-year old it was badly behaved.

Student-organised events included separate European, Latin American and Asian conferences to which eminent speakers came to share their thoughts on financial, political and business issues affecting the regions.

One of the speakers was Arminio Fraga, president of the Central Bank of Brazil, who discussed his experience of helping to restore economic stability following the Brazilian devaluation of 1999. The Argentine students in the room took notes particularly keenly.

Another highlight of last semester was my first Thanksgiving. One of my classmates invited me to stay with his family in Connecticut.

The three generations of the Vogel family present made me extremely welcome and were greatly amused to discover that I had never before tasted pumpkin pie.

As I have a summer job with a private equity firm in London as part of my Fulbright scholarship, I was freed from the stresses of the recruitment process that most students face. I did, however, spend an inordinate amount of time fruitlessly contacting potential sponsors for the second year of my MBA as my scholarship only covers the first year of my course.

The recruitment process begins almost as soon as students arrive at Wharton. First-year students vie to get three-month placements during their summer vacations.

They do so to get their foot in the door in companies for which they are interested in working after they graduate. Second years seek full-time employment. Companies visit the campus to tout themselves as the most appropriate vehicle for ambitious MBA graduates to pursue their career goals.

The economic downturn, however, has radically changed the relationship between recruiter and MBA student. Two years ago investment banks and management consultancies - the staple MBA recruiters - felt pressured by the competing allure of internet start-ups to offer substantial signing-on bonuses to new business school recruits.

However, the boot is now on the other foot. Over the past two years there has been a fall of about 20 per cent in the number of employers visiting campus to recruit MBA students.

Moreover, the recruiters still coming have cut back the number of job offers available by approximately a quarter. The fall in places is even more drastic at business schools lower down the MBA league tables as employers have refocused their efforts on the top schools.

Even those students with a job offer are not as happy as they were two years ago.

This year, average starting salaries are expected to be down for the first time since the early 1990s. Even worse is the fear that the offer may disappear or be delayed.

Last year at Wharton, six students had their job offers rescinded and 48 had their start dates pushed back, which fuels the sense of insecurity. Faced with a tougher job market, MBA students compete ever more aggressively for the attention of potential employers.

The friendly collegiate atmosphere that prevails at Wharton is often absent at recruiting events. But it is not all doom and gloom. There is still a full range of career options on offer and many more vacancies than students to fill them.

The whole Wharton experience has far exceeded my initial expectations. I have already learnt more from the course than I imagined I would, met some fascinating people and become aware of many more career options that are open to me once I graduate.

The challenge for the rest of my time at Wharton is to make the most of it.