You’re gearing up for your MBA. What’s the number one thing you need to know?

Costumes, costumes, costumes!

The WSJ covers four MBAs weighing in on how to maintain party-party, I mean school-party balance.

Lesson 1: Get thee to a costume shop, ebay, your parent’s closets, or at least a second-hand store.

At Stanford, costumes are de rigueur. “At Stanford, I don’t think it’s possible to try too hard with costumes,” says Heidi Robinson, 27, Stanford GSB student.

“I’ve been to a lot of costume parties. Almost every week, I’m struggling to find some piece of something to add to an outfit … The first costume event was an ’80s party organized by the social committee. It took place during the first couple weeks of school. We took over Blue Chalk, a local bar in Palo Alto.”

Lesson 2: To go out or not; that is the question. A student at the Kenan-Flagler Business School, UNC, describes the work-life decision-making process — “everything that happens you have to look at tactically: What’s the opportunity cost?” Sounds frightfully similar to “FOMO”, or the Fear of Missing Out phenomenon that we covered earlier.

Lesson 3: Say bye-bye to your old friends. A Columbia B-schooler is all about socializing with the school scene, so much so that there are even pub nights with professors.

Lesson 4: Brush up on those cooking skills. An HBS mom keeps up the quota of “mandatory fun” with dinner parties with the learning team.

Meanwhile, the B-school BBaller who forwarded us the article notes “One of these things is not like the others… GSB, HBS, Columbia, and… UNC Kenan-Flagler? Why even bother?”

P.S. How disturbing is the fact that their notes are accompanied by their resumes?