Working beside Tyra Banks on America's Next Top Model, Nigel Barker knew before all of us that she had enrolled in a program at Harvard Business School. “I’ve known that she’s been going for quite a while, so it’s not really much of a surprise,” Barker told The Cut at the premiere of Meet Monica Velour last night. “And ultimately, she’s a very successful businesswoman, and what’s better than to go to Harvard and actually kind of work out the next steps?”

Barker says that Tyra is always talking about cutting-edge technology and cutting-edge ideas, pointing out that America’s Next Top Model was cutting-edge when it began. “It may not seem like it was, but actually the reality is that it was a departure for the fashion industry in many ways. It was to talk about personality, to talk about the average girl, to talk about the diamond in the rough, and to sort of say, ‘We believe in you.;’ That was a departure; it was a risk,” Barker said. “We started in a very commercial area, and right now, seventeen seasons later, we’ve never been more in Vogue." Literally! "You know, Italian Vogue is our magazine sponsor, André Leon Talley is our permanent judge,” he said. “Not back then, but now. That was a pretty smart move on her behalf.”

Related: 62 Minutes With Tyra Banks