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Published: May 29, 2016
Darden Invites Reapplicants to Sign Up for Feedback Sessions
The University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business has long stood out for the resources it devotes to helping unsuccessful applicants understand how they can strengthen their candidacy and reapply. This year is no exception. In a blog post late last week, Darden announced that its admissions committee is currently offering 15-minute phone sessions with candidates who are seeking to reapply to the school in the fall and would like feedback on their applications. Read more
Published: May 29, 2016
Admissions Tip: The MBA Career Goals Question in Essays, Short-Answers, and Interviews
Though essay questions tend to vary year to year, the two things that nearly every prospective student can count on being asked are “What are your short-term and long-term post-MBA goals?” and “How will Business School X help you achieve these goals?” Even those schools that do not ask this question directly in their essays will likely ask the question in their data forms, or during the interview. These are the fundamental questions of the entire application process; identifying clear answers will help in everything from creating a list of target schools to communicating effectively with recommenders and interviewers down Read more
Published: May 26, 2016
Mobile App from MIT Sloan Alum Facilitates Loans For Pakistani Farmers
MIT Sloan recently published an article on its blog about Ricult, a new startup aimed at giving “the world’s poorest farmers direct access to credit and supplies through a mobile platform.” Read more
Published: May 26, 2016
Friday from the Frontlines: Kellogg’s Efforts to Infuse Design Thinking into the MBA
For those of you not yet familiar with the MMM Program at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, it is an immersive dual-degree program that pairs the rigorous business education of the MBA with a strong foundation in design thinking and innovation. Graduates of the MMM Program receive an MBA from Kellogg and an M.S. in design innovation from the Segal Design Institute at the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science. The first degree-granting program of its kind, the MMM program was designed to help students become innovation experts capable of driving the entire innovation lifecycle of a product, service or business strategy. In addition to its unique curriculum, the program also features an annual MMM Innovation Council, drawing together business innovation leaders, including many MMM alumni. Read more
Published: May 25, 2016
Admissions Director Q&A: SMU Cox’s John Roeder
As the latest addition to our Admissions Director Q&A Series, we recently connected with John Roeder, assistant dean of graduate admissions at the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University (SMU). Roeder is a graduate of the Cox MBA program, so he knows the school and its offerings inside and out. Roeder oversees all of the graduate programs at Cox, including the full-time MBA, “which is obviously close to my heart since it’s my program,” he says. He obtained his undergraduate degree from SMU as well, before heading into consulting at Andersen. Heading back to SMU for business school he then took an alternate path to head into graduate management admissions. “I graduated on a Saturday here at Cox and was working at Vanderbilt’s Owen Graduate School of Management the following Monday,” he says. Read more
Published: May 23, 2016
Career Services Director Q&A: NYU Stern’s Beth Briggs
An English major with a master’s degree in social work, Beth Briggs brings an array of resources to her role as senior director of the Office of Career Development at NYU’s Stern School of Business. After devoting the first portion of her career to various forms of social work, she transitioned to a more formal consulting role at Mercer, where she spent eight years, initially as a team writer but ultimately as a principal in the firm. At Mercer, she worked with a range of New York City‒based clients across industries around their human capital needs. Coming to NYU Stern in 2008, she started initially at what has since become the school’s Office of Student Engagement, helping to run its NYC experiential learning programs, including Stern Consulting Corps, through which MBA students work with for-profit and not-for-profit organizations throughout New York City. Briggs left the Office of Student Engagement for the Office of Career Development in 2009, where today she leads the career coaching, relationship management and operations teams for full-time MBA students. Read more
Published: May 22, 2016
Stanford Graduate School of Business Taps Renowned Economist as Its Next Dean
‘Tis the season for the appointment of new deans at leading business schools. Following on the heels of last week’s appointment of a new dean to lead the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) today announced that it has appointed a new dean to succeed Garth Saloner, who will step down after seven years in the post. Stanford has named economist Jonathan Levin, former chair of the Stanford Department of Economics and a noted expert in the field of industrial organization, to serve as its tenth dean. Levin’s appointment is effective September 1, 2016, Stanford President John Hennessy and Provost John Etchemendy announced today. Read more
Published: May 22, 2016
Duke / Fuqua Interview Report: Round 3 / Skype / Adcom
The following Duke / Fuqua interview report was submitted to Clear Admit by a Round 3 applicant who was admitted. Congratulations to them! I submitted my application on the day of my deadline, May 4th, for the class of 2017. I’m not sure if that was the reason I was interviewed by the Admission Officer director, but I’m glad I did. The interview was very conversational and relaxed, but it was clear that he had a set of questions to ask me. Also, I was interviewed by video skype and it was very conforting seeing his face during the conversation. Here you Read more
Published: May 22, 2016
Dean-to-Be Q&A: Ross’s D. Scott DeRue
Last week, the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business announced that a new dean has been appointed to succeed Alison Davis-Blake when her term comes to an end on June 30th. Taking the reins is 39-year-old D. Scott DeRue, who joined the Ross faculty in 2007 as an assistant professor of management and has since gone on to lead the school’s executive education, part-time MBA and executive MBA programs. Read more
Published: May 19, 2016
Jones School Rises in Ranking of Top MBA Programs
The Rice University – Jones Graduate School of Business MBA program has ranked No. 25 of the best full-time MBA programs in the nation by U.S. News and World Report. Over the last decade, Rice has seen a tremendous rise in ranking, increasing from below the top 40 to top 25 in all three top business school rankings: Bloomberg Businessweek (unranked in 2006 to No. 19 at present), U.S. News (No. 44 in 2006 to No. 25 at present) and Financial Times (No. 41 in 2016 to No. 24 at present). Rice is the only university to experience Read more
Published: May 19, 2016
Fridays from the Frontline: Recent HBS Alum Turns Down Google to Found His Own Startup
Tim Chaves, a graduate of Harvard Business School’s Class of 2015, snagged a coveted internship at Google during the summer following his first year at HBS. His performance led Google to offer him a full-time job after graduation. He turned it down. Who turns down Google? He turned it down to found a startup. And here’s the real kicker: He has three young kids. “That’s so risky,” said basically everyone. But in the post that follows, you’ll see why he thinks it was absolutely the right choice. His startup, ZipBooks, is a free small business accounting software platform Read more
Published: May 18, 2016
Student Alliance Helps Propel Wharton to Add Lactation Suite, Gender-Neutral Restrooms
Wharton Dean Geoffrey Garrett a few weeks ago sent out a briefly worded email with the scintillating subject line “Wharton Facilities Updates” to the Philadelphia business school’s community. Some may have been tempted to delete it without reading. In fact, the updates and the process that helped bring them about offer fascinating insight into efforts at the oldest business school in the country to foster a more welcoming and inclusive community. Read more
Published: May 18, 2016
Michigan’s Ross School of Business Appoints Insider as New Dean
A celebrated professor who helped lead the school’s executive education program to its best performance in a decade will be the next dean of the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business, effective July 1st, the school announced today. The school’s Board of Regents today approved a five-year appointment for D. Scott DeRue, who is currently the Gilbert and Ruth Whitaker Professor of Business Administration, associate dean for executive education and professor of management and organizations at the Ross School. He succeeds Dean Alison Davis-Blake, who will complete her five-year term at the end of June.   Read more
Published: May 17, 2016
Why Is Goldman Sachs Hiring So Many MBAs?
If you are looking for a career in finance, it’s likely that industry giants like Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan and Morgan Stanley are already on your wish list of potential employers. As it turns out, the same companies you are looking for may just be looking for you. Read more
Published: May 16, 2016
Push-Up Throw Down Sweeps Business Schools, Raising Awareness of Veteran Suicide
Veteran organizations at leading business schools are getting in on the latest challenge to sweep the internet—this time to raise awareness of the incidence of suicide among veterans. The #22PushupChallenge is so named to reflect statistics that suggest that 22 veterans, on average, commit suicide each day. Untreated or inadequately treated mental health issues such as post-traumatic stress (PTS) and traumatic brain injury (TBI) are often to blame. Christopher Molaro, co-director of alumni relations for the Wharton Veterans Club at the University of Pennsylvania and formerly a captain in the U.S. Army, acknowledges that some have questioned the accuracy of this number. “The 22 number is not substantiated and is debated, but the cause is less about the specific number, 22, and more about building momentum to change the perception of mental health,” he says. “Whether it’s 22 or one per day, it needs to be addressed.” Read more
Published: May 16, 2016
MBA DecisionWire Data Analysis Reveals Trends Among Stanford, Wharton, Booth Applicants
Welcome back for the fourth in our series of posts offering analysis of the data we are receiving on MBA DecisionWire, a resource that allows candidates to share where they decide to attend business school based on the offers they receive. If you have made your final decision in terms of where you will attend, please share on MBA DecisionWire. You can also use the filter options to see how other candidates have made their choices. In the first two posts in this series, we dug into the MBA DecisionWire data to examine popular school pairings—that is, pairs of schools where applicants who apply to one often also apply to the other. In the first, we looked at the following pairings: Stanford and Berkeley Haas, Columbia and NYU Stern, and Wharton and Chicago Booth. In the second, we examined overlap between Michigan’s Ross School and Duke’s Fuqua School, Chicago Booth and Kellogg, and Stanford and Harvard. Read more
Published: May 15, 2016
Admissions Tip: Feedback Etiquette
Recently, we discussed the importance of signing up for a feedback session when one is planning to reapply to a program that provides this opportunity. Today we’d like to follow up on that post by offering a few thoughts on feedback session etiquette. While on one hand a feedback session marks the close of this year’s process, it’s crucial that you realize that the impression you make on the adcom member conducting the session, as well as the advice that the adcom member provides, may be added to your file and come to bear on your candidacy next year. Taking Read more
Published: May 12, 2016
Fridays from the Frontline: Welcome Weekend at Vanderbilt Owen
Continuing our series of posts from applicants sharing how they arrived at a decision on where to enroll for business school, this week we hear from Dylan Bright about the admitted students’ weekend he attended at Vanderbilt University’s Owen Graduate School of Management. As you’ll read, the well-planned weekend helped him know that the Nashville school was the one for him. If you’ve recently decided on where you’re heading in the fall, we’d love to have you share your decision-making process with us in a subsequent post. And if you haven’t already, remember to submit via MBA DecisionWire! Read more
Published: May 11, 2016
UCLA Anderson Takes on Gender Inequality in Faculty Promotions
To address perceived gender inequality, faculty and staff at the UCLA Anderson School of Management will soon vote to implement revisions to the faculty promotion process, according to a recent article in the Daily Bruin, UCLA’s campus newspaper. Suggested revisions, which include changes to the tenure and evaluation processes for Anderson professors, come in response to a July 2015 report by consulting agency Korn Ferry that found that the school fostered unconscious biases against female faculty members, according to the Bruin report. The Korn Ferry report also found that there is a perception that it is more difficult for women to earn promotions, tenure and equal compensation than it is for male faculty members. Read more
Published: May 11, 2016
Babson Olin MBA Interview Report: Round 3 / Second-year Student / Skype
The following Babson Olin MBA interview report was submitted to Clear Admit by a Round 3 applicant. Good luck to them! I interviewed with a current student. It was approximately a 40-minute interview with all standard questions. No curveballs. It was a blind-interview as he had only seen my résumé (said to use examples from application if desired) – Walk my through your résumé. – Why MBA? Why Babson? Why now? – Position desired after MBA and how you intend to obtain it – Biggest failure? Greatest achievement? – What would you bring to the cohort? Read more
Published: May 11, 2016
Indiana / Kelley MBA Interview Report: Round 3 / Second-year Student / Skpe
The following Indiana / Kelley MBA interview report was submitted to Clear Admit by a Round 3 applicant. Good luck to them! The interview was pretty straightforward interview with a current second year student. Typical questions that started with walking through résumé and explaining decisions on switching from job to job. Asked about leadership experiences and working in different cultures / businesses. Then: why MBA and why Kelley? What drew me to Indiana as a state / community. Asked about my short term goals and how the MBA would help in achieving them and finally closed with a question I had Read more
Published: May 10, 2016
MIT Sloan Alum Connects Hard-Up Nonprofits With Deep-Pocketed Millennials
This post has been republished in its entirety from original source, metromba.com. MIT Sloan’s blog recently published an article on 2013 MBA graduate Isa Watson’s giving company Envested, which connects local Chapel Hill, North Carolina-based nonprofits to philanthropic millennials. Read more
Published: May 9, 2016
It’s Dream Job or Bust, Say Today’s MBA Applicants
Seventy-one percent of current applicants to business school say there’s just one industry they want to work in, up from 58 percent with such a singular focus in 2014. This according to the latest Prospective Students Survey Report from the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), released today. Not only that, 61 percent have a particular job function in mind upon graduation, up from just 46 percent the year before. The economy, GMAC notes, likely plays a role in this phenomenon, with prospective students perceiving their “dream job” as more attainable in today’s market than in the years following the Great Recession. The Prospective Students Survey Report, which polled more than 10,000 candidates throughout 2015, also revealed that today’s candidates are considering fewer types of graduate management programs than in previous years. On average, prospective students considered 2.8 program types in 2015, such as full-time two-year MBA, or full-time one-year MBA or Master of Finance, for example. This is down slightly from 3.1 in 2014. Half of all those surveyed globally indicated that they are only interested in MBA programs. Slightly more than a quarter, 28 percent, said they are considering both MBA and specialized master’s programs, and 23 percent are considering only specialized master’s programs. Read more
Published: May 9, 2016
GMAT: Consider Algebra, not Arithmetic
Many test takers fail to make the connection between not being permitted to use a calculator on the quantitative section of the GMAT and, well, not making intensive, calculator-required calculations. The reality is, when you are working through a question and think a calculator is needed and/or there is some simplistic, obscure formula is required, you are not using the right strategy. This proves most true for arithmetic questions, when tedious calculations take test takers down the road where an algebraic approach should be considered instead. Let’s look at an example: 5^10 + 5^10 + 5^10 + 5^10 Read more
Published: May 8, 2016
‘Lean In’ for Littles: Two HBS Women Seek to Bridge the Confidence Gap for Young Girls
First-year MBA student Preeya Sud came to Harvard Business School (HBS) from consumer product goods giant Procter & Gamble, where she worked for five years, ultimately in the role of senior assistant brand manager for Braun across six countries. Classmate Ching-Ching Chen, meanwhile, worked in institutional securities and global capital markets for Morgan Stanley and just happens to also be an accomplished violinist, pianist and vocalist. Sitting in the same section at HBS last fall, what did they discover they had in common? “Both Ching-Ching and I think that we are admit mistakes,” Sud says with a laugh. Only it’s not funny. Why on Earth would these talented, bright, accomplished young women think they got into HBS on a lark? Because, like too many other talented young women, they both struggle with self-doubt. In fact, a Glamour article last year cited data showing that girls begin to lose their confidence starting as early as kindergarten. Read more

MBA Applywire

6
November 28, 2024 8:12am ET
Applying: Berkeley / Haas, Harvard Business School, MIT Sloan, Northwestern / Kellogg, Stanford GSB, UPenn / Wharton
Intake Year: 2025
Pre-MBA Career: Consulting
Post-MBA Target Industry: Consulting, Technology
GMAT: 645
GPA: 84%
Years of Work Experience: 3
Location: Brazil
5
November 27, 2024 5:44pm ET
Applying: Berkeley / Haas, Duke / Fuqua, MIT Sloan, Stanford GSB, UPenn / Wharton
Pre-MBA Career: Corporate Communication Specialist
Post-MBA Target Industry: Other
GPA: 3.9
Years of Work Experience: 6
Location: Indonesia
4
November 27, 2024 12:00pm ET
Applying: Berkeley / Haas, London Business School, Northwestern / Kellogg, Stanford GSB
Intake Year: 2025
Pre-MBA Career: Eingeneer
Post-MBA Target Industry: Other
GMAT: 675
GPA: 3,5
Years of Work Experience: 4.8
Location: Chile
4
November 27, 2024 9:07am ET
Applying: Duke / Fuqua, Michigan / Ross, Northwestern / Kellogg, NYU Stern
Intake Year: 2025
Pre-MBA Career: Finance Manager
Post-MBA Target Industry: Consulting Companies: Accenture , AT Kearney , Bain , BCG , Deloitte , Ernst & Young , McKinsey , PWC
GMAT: 690
GPA: 3.79
Years of Work Experience: 2
7
November 27, 2024 9:07am ET
Applying: Carnegie Mellon / Tepper, Duke / Fuqua, Michigan / Ross, Notre Dame / Mendoza, UNC Kenan-Flagler, UVA / Darden, Vanderbilt / Owen
Intake Year: 2025
Pre-MBA Career: Banking
Post-MBA Target Industry: Consulting, Commercial Banking Companies: Accenture , AT Kearney , Bain , PWC , Bank of America
GRE: 306
GPA: 3.64
Years of Work Experience: 5
Location: Africa
Notes:

Recently wrote the GRE. It's not a super score but I will probably apply with it anyway. I am still considering retaking the test, as the next time I can take it is around the Round 2 deadline.

My educational background is in social sciences, so wasn't very quant-heavy. Looking at taking an additional quant course to back up my GRE score as the exam fee is about 10x the minimum wage in my country. Any suggestion is welcomed.
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MBA LiveWire

November 28, 2024 4:55pm ET
Applied to Emory / Goizueta
Round: Round 2
Received via email
GPA: 3.19
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Finance
Application Location: Nigeria
November 28, 2024 1:14pm ET
Interview Invite to Berkeley / Haas
Round: Round 1
Received via email on October 27, 2024
GPA: 84%
GMAT: 645
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Technology
Application Location: Brazil
November 28, 2024 10:17am ET
Interview Invite to Indiana / Kelley
Round: Round 1
Received via email on October 16, 2024
GPA: 83%
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Finance
Application Location: Nigeria
November 28, 2024 10:15am ET
Interview Invite to Emory / Goizueta
Round: Round 1
Received via email on November 07, 2024
GPA: 83%
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Finance
Application Location: Nigeria
November 28, 2024 9:53am ET
Interview Invite to INSEAD
Round: Round 2
Received via email on November 26, 2024
GMAT: 655
Program Type: One Year Program
Target Career: Consulting
Application Location: France
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