We continue to meet new MBA candidates in our series, Real Humans: MBA Students. This week, we get to know a group of new students who have chosen to pursue their business management education in New Haven, Connecticut, at the Yale School of Management. For Yale SOM, their mission is to educate leaders in business and society, and strategically position graduates to maximize their academic and professional development.
Yale’s faculty collaborate to advance knowledge through a number of centers and area specific initiatives. Research centers include Center for Customer Insights, International Center for Finance, Program on Entrepreneurship, Program on Social Enterprise, Program on Financial Stability, Center for Business and the Environment, Chief Executive Leadership Institute, Yale Center Beijing, China India Insights Program, and Initiative on Leadership and Organization.
Yale celebrates and emphasizes diversity with a number of seminars and events. The Emerging Leaders Seminar is a three-day intensive geared to a cohort of talented young professionals of color in their early career (0-2 years of experience). Women at Yale can access events such as Women’s Leadership Program, Women Faculty Seminar Series, and Women on Boards. Past seminars include Emerging Leaders Seminar: Finance Leadership Across Sectors, and Emerging Leaders Seminar: Global Organization and Management.
Of the 345 enrolled students in Yale’s Class of 2021, women account for 42 percent of the group. International students comprise 44 percent of students entering in the Fall of 2019, 29 percent are U.S. Students of Color and 13 percent are underrepresented U.S. Students of Color. During their undergraduate years, the new class earned a median GPA of 3.66. Thirty percent had majored in STEM, followed by 28 percent having studied humanities/social sciences. Twenty-three percent had pursued business and 19 percent had studied economics. For the Class of 2021, the median score for the GMAT landed at 720. The middle 80% scored between 680 and 760. Twenty-six percent of the class had taken the GRE instead of the GMAT. These test takers earned a median score of 165 in both the verbal and quant sections.
While Yale SOM students arrived on campus with a diverse array of work experience—from manufacturing and tech, to retail and real estate—financial services and consulting were the most popular pre-MBA careers. About 20 percent had worked in financial services before heading to Yale, and another 19 percent had worked in consulting. Seventeen percent came from the non-profit sector, and another 10 percent came from the government sector.
Read on to hear directly from 5 current Yale MBA students, their advice on the admissions process, why they chose Yale and more.
