Feb 9th 2012, 17:15 by J.L.H.D | ATLANTA

Our query last month as to the future of business schools in 2012 drew a reply from Alon Rozen, an assistant dean at ENPC in Paris:

[One trend we are] seeing is a rising interest for MBAs in Europe among older AND younger candidates. Older candidates are often wondering if they are too old for an MBA or Executive MBA. Even if they feel the need and see the interest they are not always comfortable with a too-large "deviation from the mean". Somehow I feel, with the help of the ongoing financial/economic crisis, that this will evolve. Younger candidates, generations Y and Z are increasingly in a hurry to pursue an MBA, with many typical full-time MBA candidates expressing interest in Executive MBAs.

In theory, business school admissions offices, which are forever trumpeting the “diversity” of their resulting classes, should be encouraging deviations from the mean: the grizzled veterans and the callow youths can learn from each other. But the data provided by the Graduate Management Admissions Council, which administers the GMAT, only half agrees with Mr Rozen. Between 2006 and 2010, the percentage of GMAT test-takers over age 30 dropped in Canada, the United States, and Europe as a whole, with particularly large drops in Germany, Russia, and France. The number of younger test-takers increased: in 2010 over half of those taking the GMAT in France and Germany, and nearly half in Italy and the Netherlands, were under age 25.

Deborah Knox, an MBA admissions consultant, wrote on the question of being “too old for an MBA” in December.  In a later comment she suggested that the bias towards younger students is driven in part by future MBA employers, namely investment banks and consulting firms. It is easier to get an employee to work 80-hour weeks regularly, and travel extensively, if the employee has more youthful energy and fewer family commitments. 

The presence of older candidates also raises the slightly uncomfortable question of the purpose of an MBA. If it’s to introduce the student to strategic thinking and the basics of finance, wouldn’t an older candidate have picked up such knowledge along the way? The exception would be MBAs specialising in a particular field, attractive to managers with experience looking for a way to learn about a new industry. Mr Rozen later told me that ENPC’s new executive MBA in aviation management is generating inquiries from older executives.

Despite this, the trend is for applicant pools becoming younger, especially in Europe. With nearly half of Spaniards and Greeks under age 25 unemployed—and a third of Portuguese, Italians and Irish, and a quarter of French and British—it may make more sense to apply to business school immediately after finishing university, rather than wait and have little more than a couple years of frustration to show for it.