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Published: October 22, 2014
U.S. News & World Report Ranks Business Schools by Graduates’ Indebtedness
Rankings of graduate management education programs abound, each with their own particular criteria for assessing which business schools ultimately come out on top. Separate from its overall business school rankings, U.S. News & World Report recently used data collected from schools to determine the top 10 programs from which MBA students graduate with the most debt. The number one spot goes to Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, where full-time MBA students from the 2013 class who borrowed for business school had an average indebtedness of $108,186. Fuqua’s full-time MBA students had more debt than any of the other 86 ranked institutions, according to data submitted to U.S. News. Read more
Published: October 21, 2014
Majority of Business Schools Now Accept GRE, But More Applicants Stick with GMAT
A whopping 85 percent of U.S. business schools now accept the GRE as an admissions test alternative to the GMAT, according to a 2014 survey by Kaplan Test Prep. That’s up from only 24 percent of business schools who said they accepted the GRE in 2009, when Kaplan first began tracking the issue. GRE acceptance by business schools has been growing steadily year over year, Kaplan reports. But even as more schools report accepting scores from the GRE, most MBA applicants are still choosing to submit scores from the more traditional GMAT. More than half of the admissions officers surveyed by Kaplan this year reported that only one in 10 or fewer applicants chose to submit GRE scores instead of GMAT scores, representing a slight increase from Kaplan’s past surveys. Read more
Published: October 20, 2014
New Light Installation Commissioned for MIT Sloan School of Management Main Building
When Building E52, the main facility for the MIT Sloan School of Management, reopens after extensive renovations in January 2016, it will feature a new light installation by artist Leo Villareal, the school announced recently. Villareal, who last year created The Bay Lights on the San Francisco Bay Bridge West Span, was recently awarded an MIT Percent-for-Art commission to create a light installation for MIT’s Building E52. His plans for E52 include a light sculpture in the north vestibule of the building as part of a new, glass-enclosed entrance. The sculpture will feature 240 hanging LED rods – each approximately 9 feet tall with 72 individual LEDs – arranged from the ceiling in rows. As part of the work, Villareal will create a software code programming the LEDs to cycle through a randomly generated series of combinations. Read more
Published: October 19, 2014
UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business Awards Scholarships to Half of Full-time MBA Class
The Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley set a new record this year, awarding scholarships to a full half of its entering full-time MBA class, the school announced earlier this month. In all, Haas will provide almost $6 million in scholarship aid to students across its three MBA programs, with an average award of $26,000 for students in the full-time MBA program. “It’s a real tipping point, and we plan to continue the trend of providing the highest level of financial support possible to help our students achieve their academic goals,” Daniel Roddick, Haas director of financial aid, said in a statement. Read more
Published: October 16, 2014
Bloomberg Businessweek Unveils Social Media Campaign #WhyMBA
Yesterday, Bloomberg Businessweek launched #WhyMBA, a social media campaign designed to get MBA hopefuls, students, alumni, and business leaders talking about the value of a graduate education in business. The #WhyMBA campaign is part of the run-up to the release of Bloomberg Businessweek’s full-time MBA program rankings on Tuesday, November 11. Every day until the release, Bloomberg will post daily questions on Twitter with the hashtag #WhyMBA, and track the ensuing conversation on the campaign’s website. The Business Education Editor of Bloomberg Businessweek, Francesca Levy, explains that Businessweek created the social media campaign to prompt a wider look at business education. Read more
Published: October 16, 2014
Fridays From the Frontline: In the Thick of It
Fridays From the Frontline is Clear Admit’s weekly summation of posts from the business school blogosphere. This week, applicants are in the thick of things, submitting their applications, doing interviews and even hearing back about their results, while current students offer thoughtful takes on their time in business school. Among current applicants, Pullingthatmbatrigger lets us in on his approach to writing business school essays, and also reports that his interview at Fuqua went smoothly. Along the same lines, Roadtomymba enumerates the criteria he used to select his recommender, while Grantmeadmission shares individual thoughts on his five different applications to top business schools. Also completing an interview this week, Scottgduncan summarizes his experience taking the Kellogg video essay, and received word that he was deferred to round 2 at Harvard Business School. Read more
Published: October 15, 2014
UNC Kenan-Flagler Publishes New MBA Application Guide for Prospective Applicants
MBA@UNC, the online MBA program at the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School, has just released a new MBA application guide designed to aid prospective applicants in the admissions process. Though produced by Kenan-Flagler, the guide was designed to serve as a resource for students applying to any business school. Through a series of online articles, MBA@UNC has compiled best practices along with tips and advice for preparing the strongest possible MBA application. Articles in the series delve into topics ranging from choosing between the GMAT and the GRE to how to secure strong letters of recommendation. You’ll also find posts devoted to strengthening your resume, writing compelling essays and acing the interview. Read more
Published: October 14, 2014
Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business Announces Semi-Finalists in Inaugural Rural Entrepreneurship Challenge
Entrepreneurship has certainly become a buzz word at business schools, but “rural entrepreneurship” is a term you don’t hear quite as often. Unless you’re at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, where rural entrepreneurship is currently front and center. McDonough yesterday hosted the National Summit on Rural Entrepreneurship, which included the announcement of 10 national semi-finalists in the first-ever Rural Entrepreneurship Challenge. The challenge – a joint venture between the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), McDonough’s Global Social Enterprise Initiative (GSEI) and the Georgetown Entrepreneurship Initiative’s Startup Hoyas – is an opportunity for individuals to showcase innovation taking place in rural regions of the United States.   Read more
Published: October 13, 2014
Harvard Business School to Release Remaining Round 1 Interview Invites Tomorrow
For all those anxious Harvard Business School (HBS) Round 1 applicants still waiting to learn their fate, tomorrow will be a telling day, according to Managing Director of MBA Admissions and Financial Aid Deirdre Leopold. About 150 additional interview invitations will go out tomorrow, October 15th, adding to the roughly 800 invitations extended last week, Leopold shared in a recent post to her Director's Blog. Another group will also learn tomorrow that HBS wants to “further consider” their applications as part of Round 2. “We anticipate that there will be ~200 applicants in this group,” Leopold wrote, adding that the email communicating this decision will also provide information regarding a timetable and communication plan for this group. Read more
Published: October 13, 2014
Chicago Booth Releases Interview Notification Timeline
Did you apply to the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business Round One this year? Tyler Smith, an Assistant Director of Admissions at Booth, has written a post titled “Behind the Scenes of Round One,” where he provides crucial details of Booth’s admissions process for Round One applicants, including Booth’s timeline for Round One interview notifications. The Admissions Committee at Booth is currently reviewing Round One applications. Applications are read in random order and interview decisions will be made on a rolling basis. Booth will notify candidates whether they have been invited back Read more
Published: October 12, 2014
Survey Finds GMAT Integrated Reasoning Section Scores Unimportant to Most B-School Admissions Officers
A majority of admissions officers from more than 200 U.S. business schools surveyed this fall say that an applicant’s score on the GMAT’s Integrated Reasoning section is not currently an important part of their evaluation of a prospective applicant’s overall GMAT score, according to Kaplan Test Prep, which conducted the survey. Kaplan found that 60 percent of admissions officers surveyed this year said that performance on the IR section was not important, an uptick from 57 percent of those surveyed last year. That said, Kaplan reports that 50 percent of business schools surveyed point to a low overall GMAT score as “the biggest application killer.” For its 2014 survey, Kaplan polled admissions officers from 204 business schools from across the United States, including 11 of the top 30 MBA programs as ranked by U.S. News & World Report. Read more
Published: October 12, 2014
Admissions Director Q&A: Grace Kim of the USC Marshall School of Business
Grace Kim is senior associate director of MBA admissions at the University of Southern California (USC) Marshall School of Business. She was generous enough to make time recently to answer our questions about the admissions process at Marshall, and we thank her! In the interview that follows, Kim shares new developments planned for the school, including the creation of several half-semester electives as part of the curriculum. These new, shorter courses are designed to add greater breadth of content and allow students to better prepare for highly specialized careers. Read more
Published: October 9, 2014
Fridays From the Frontline: Some Kind of MBA Madness
Fridays From the Frontline is Clear Admit’s weekly summation of posts from the business school blogosphere. Author Sherrilyn Kenyon once said, “I don’t suffer from insanity – I enjoy every minute of it.” This week, applicants continue wading through the craziness of the business school admissions process, while current students discuss the opportunities and challenges facing them in business school. Read more
Published: October 8, 2014
Yale School of Management to Host Online Career Panels for Prospective Applicants
The Yale School of Management (SOM) admissions team will kick off a new series of online events later this month designed to showcase for prospective applicants the many MBA career paths the school’s students choose to follow. The live events will each focus on a different industry and will feature relationship managers from the Career Development Office joined by current SOM students. Read more
Published: October 8, 2014
Admissions Director Q&A: Maryellen Lamb of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School
Maryellen Lamb was named deputy vice dean of Wharton MBA Career Management, Admissions and Financial Aid last fall, and she tells us that she absolutely loves the role. “I have a great job because I get to see both the comings and goings. I see Wharton students from when they just start thinking about an MBA through their time here as students and then as they advance in their careers,” she says. “It is so fun to watch really high-performing individuals reach even higher.” Philadelphia born and raised, Lamb began her career in Princeton as a currency trader, but she found that the more successful she became, the farther away from Philadelphia she was forced to move. About 10 years ago she decided she wanted to return to Philly, and when she got a call from Wharton to come work in the Career Office as an advisor to students looking into investment banking, she jumped at it. “Over time, I have loved being at Wharton even more than I ever thought I could,” she says. Read more
Published: October 7, 2014
LinkedIn Launches New University Rankings Tool Charting Career Placement Success
LinkedIn has launched an innovative new rankings system that analyzes career and education data shared by its more than 300 million users to rank undergraduate institutions according to where their graduates land jobs. Violà! You can now use LinkedIn not only to network for jobs following graduation, but also to assess which schools will best position you for the jobs you want before you even reach the job search phase. Using its vast troves of employment data, LinkedIn analyzes the patterns of individual career choices to define the most desirable jobs, the most desirable companies within professions and the most relevant graduates for those jobs. It then uses these data points to rank universities based on the percentage of relevant graduates who have obtained desirable jobs. Read more
Published: October 6, 2014
Harvard Business School Professor Launches U.S. Cluster Mapping Tool
Renowned Harvard Business School (HBS) Professor Michael Porter has launched a new tool that provides data on the presence of “clusters” – regional groupings of related industries – and regional economies throughout the United States. By providing a view of economic development through the lens of clusters rather than specific types of companies, industries or sectors, the new U.S. Cluster Mapping tool can help identify important links and potential synergies between technology, skills and information. Porter launched the new tool, based on his path-breaking research, as part of a two-day conference called Mapping the Midwest’s Future, held late last month at the University of Minnesota. The conference drew business leaders, policymakers, economic development officials and academics from multiple Midwest states and Canadian provinces. Read more
Published: October 5, 2014
New Loan Program Launches for International MBA Students at U.S. Schools
A new pilot loan program will provide expanded options for international MBA students at a number of top programs in the United States, according to a recent report in Poestandquants. The program, offered by Prodigy Finance, will extend to international students and U.S. residents with non-permanent status who are studying at 16 top schools, including Harvard Business School, the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School and MIT Sloan School of Management. Especially in recent years, banks have been reluctant to lend to students who are studying internationally. Prodigy Finance seeks to fill this need using a “community finance” model. Basically, alumni from participating schools fund loans for current students, banking on the value of a degree from their alma mater and the likelihood that future alums will repay. Interest rates on the loans vary between 6 and 12 percent, depending on the school, the individual borrower’s profile and current rates. Read more
Published: October 5, 2014
Admissions Director Q&A: Itziar de Ros of IESE
Itziar de Ros has been leading the charge since 2011 as MBA admissions director and president of the MBA Admissions Committee at IESE in Barcelona, Spain. She is responsible for global marketing, student selection and administration of scholarships for the IESE MBA class of 280 students. No stranger to the school, de Ros herself obtained an IESE MBA in 2006. She worked as a marketing and sales consultant at DuPont before returning to IESE in 2007, where she held roles in admissions, marketing and communications and development before stepping into her current role. Read more
Published: October 2, 2014
Fridays From the Frontline: the Light at the End of the Tunnel
Fridays From the Frontline is Clear Admit’s weekly summation of posts from the business school blogosphere. Biologist Barry Commoner once said that "if you can see the light at the end of the tunnel, you are looking the wrong way." This week business school applicants begin seeing the light at the end of the tunnel for their application process, while current students and alumni update us on their recent endeavors.  Read more
Published: October 1, 2014
Kellogg School of Management Launches New “Inspiring Growth” Brand Strategy
The Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University wants to be known for educating leaders who inspire growth, and it’s rolling out a new brand strategy with this in mind, the school announced earlier this month. Part of a larger strategic plan launched four years ago, the new “inspiring growth” theme is intended to capture both what the school has achieved since the overarching Envision Kellogg plan was first implemented and what’s still ahead. Kellogg Dean Sally Blount noted in a statement that while growth is a challenge faced by every organization, bigger is not always better. "Sometimes growth means pulling back to attain greater clarity and focus,” she said. Kellogg’s new brand strategy – “brave leaders inspire growth in people, organizations and markets” – is intended to spotlight this focus on developing growth-minded leaders, which Kellogg believes sets it apart from its peers. Read more
Published: September 30, 2014
GMAC Reports Application Volume Growth for Full-Time Two-Year MBA Programs  
The number of people applying to full-time two-year MBA programs increased for the third consecutive year, according to recent data from the Graduate Management Admissions Council. GMAC’s 2014 Application Trends Survey, released earlier this week, showed that as two-year programs enjoyed application volume gains, other graduate management programs saw flattening or decreasing numbers of applicants. The survey also revealed an increasingly global applicant pool, with GMAT testing trends showing that more students are seeking to study outside their country of citizenship. According to GMAC, these candidates make up a sizeable portion of the applicant pool for many MBA and non-MBA graduate management programs. Read more
Published: September 29, 2014
UPenn’s Wharton School Welcomes Exceptionally Entrepreneurial Class
Students entering the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School this fall bring with them record levels of entrepreneurial experience and aspirations, according to a recent blog post by Nadine Kavanaugh, associate director of Wharton Entrepreneurship. “We’re especially excited because the Class of 2016 is already incredibly entrepreneurial,” wrote Kavanaugh. “We can’t wait to see what amazing startups they’ll start.” Read more
Published: September 29, 2014
Trivia Tuesday: The Entrepreneurship Initiative at Harvard Business School
It’s time again for another edition of Trivia Tuesday, our weekly examination of the programs and opportunities that differentiate the leading MBA programs.  This week we take a peek into the Clear Admit School Guide to Harvard Business School to share an excerpt on HBS’s Entrepreneurship Initiative. “Harvard offers students an array of opportunities to study entrepreneurship. In addition to analyzing cases on varied startup enterprises during the RC year, all RC students are required to take the course titled “The Entrepreneurial Man­ager.” In their second year, students may choose from over 30 courses and field study opportunities offered on the topic. Read more
Published: September 28, 2014
Johnson’s Career Management Dean Shares How to Accelerate Your Job Search Before Business School
Fred Staudmyer, assistant dean for career management at Cornell University’s Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management, has more than 25 years of experience in executive recruitment, human resources, human capital consulting and entrepreneurship. Before joining Johnson in 2009, he led the Garrett Sayer Group, an executive search and specialty staffing firm focused on technology, financial services and consulting industries. Prior to that, Staudmyer held a range of other senior positions including human resources officer for Ziff Communications focused on human resources and recruitment and head of worldwide talent management for Chase Manhattan Bank. He also happens to be a “dual Cornellian,” having obtained both his undergraduate and MBA degrees from the university. “I’ve always been a career geek,” Staudmyer confessed in a recent interview with Clear Admit. Indeed, he knows a thing or two about helping people shape their careers. We caught up with him last week, when he generously shared some top tips for prospective MBA applicants to jump start the career search before arriving at business school. Read on and take note – you might even discover that some of Staudmyer’s advice will help you in the MBA admissions process, too.   Read more

MBA Applywire

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.
5
November 27, 2024 6:51am ET
Applying: Dartmouth / Tuck, Harvard Business School, Stanford GSB, UPenn / Wharton, Yale SOM
Intake Year: 2025
Pre-MBA Career: Program Manager, Humanitarian INGO
Post-MBA Target Industry: Entrepreneurship, Non Profit/SI
GMAT: 685
GPA: 3.27
Years of Work Experience: 4
Location: US Citizen (positioned abroad)
Notes:

Long time listener first time caller. Love the podcast! Adding my profile just because I want to be part of the community.

R2 applicant for Fall 2025 entry.

Background: mid-to-late 20s US citizen, lower-income single parent upbringing.

Work experience: currently a manager at a humanitarian INGO in active / post-conflict settings (think Afghanistan, Yemen, etc.) with several million in project budget under management and overseeing multiple teams. Will have been in emergency aid for 2 years upon matriculation, career before that was 1 year quantitative analyst ---> 1 year teaching English abroad. High impact job, recently promoted.

Academics: 3.27 cumulative. Small state school for first year with a 4.0. Transferred to an Ivy, but had to work full time to support family, had just above a 3.0 at the Ivy. I've also done a masters since at a top 5 UK (shout-out to Alex!) with distinction (3.9+ equivalent). Additionally, took Calculus this year (got an A-) to give schools a bit more reassurance on quant abilities since my quant record in college had its ups and downs, and to demonstrate respect for the rigors of the Y1 MBA curriculum.

Test: took the GMAT only once, 685 (86V 82Q 84D). First mock exam was a 625 with a terrible quant score, but brought quant up to 76th percentile with a couple months of study. Internet is too slow to take online, so only had one chance to do it in-person while I was on leave -- retake physically impossible even if I wanted to.

ECs: Very focused on social entrepreneurship. Have also been helping teach / support one of the foreign language programs at the state school I originally went to and transferred out of. Community service award as well, and mountain climber.

Post-MBA goal is social entrepreneurship that can help people in crisis contexts.

I've listened to enough Wire Taps to guess exactly what the advice will be: "You might want to cast a wider net due to the lower GPA, right now you're only targeting top schools." -- Absolutely fair call. However, what I want to do is extremely difficult and will require a ton of resources. I've selected the programs I think best fit my goals / have a strong social and entrepreneurial mission. I don't particularly mind getting dinged everywhere and reapplying next year if need be.

Long post, thanks for reading! Have a great holiday!
2
November 27, 2024 3:06am ET
Applying: Berkeley / Haas, Harvard Business School
Intake Year: 2025
Pre-MBA Career: Technology
Post-MBA Target Industry: Technology, Entrepreneurship Companies: Amazon , Apple , Microsoft
GMAT: 675
GPA: 3.2
Years of Work Experience: 5
Location: India
Post MBA Location: Bay Area / New York
Notes:

I wanted to get your thoughts on my R2 Strategy.

I've 2.5 years of work in Deloitte Strategy Consulting (promoted)
Worked at a unicorn tech startup for a year in a strategy team
Founded my own startup, after multiple side projects for an year
Currently working at another early-tech startup as a program manager

In the long and short term, I'm looking at entrepreneurship. with short-term flexible to be PM in Business Technology companies

I'm interviewed at Columbia MBAxMS, Cornell Tech MBA, USC Marshall
Waitlisted at NYU Tech MBA.

What should be my R2 strategy. Thinking to go optimistic and target dream schools.
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MBA LiveWire

November 27, 2024 1:46pm ET
Rejected at Washington U. / Olin
Round: Round 1
Received via portal November 27, 2024
GPA: 3.9
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Operations Management
Application Location: Asia
November 27, 2024 12:44pm ET
Accepted to Washington U. / Olin
Round: Round 2
Received via phone November 27, 2024
GPA: 3.75
GRE: 330
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Consulting
Application Location: Phoenix
Note:

Consortium and received a full-ride plus a stipend. Interviewed on November 10th and received offer today, November 27th.
I feel very optimistic for Booth and Yale results next week.
November 27, 2024 12:29pm ET
Accepted to Cornell / Johnson
Round: Round 1
Received via portal November 27, 2024
GPA: 3.94
Program Type: One Year Program
Target Career: Technology
Application Location: India
Note:

Interviewed for Cornell Tech MBA program on 13th Nov. GMAT/GRE test waiver.
November 27, 2024 10:41am ET
Accepted to NYU Stern
Round: Round 1
Received via email on November 25, 2024
GMAT: 715
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Finance
Application Location: India
Note:

Interview on 7/11. Received email regarding a status update. No scholarship
November 27, 2024 10:38am ET
Accepted to Cornell / Johnson
Round: Round 1
Received via email November 27, 2024
GPA: 3.65
Program Type: One Year Program
Target Career: Entrepreneurship
Application Location: New York City
Note:

Interviewed on November 11th. Received admissions offer on November 27th. Applied for Cornell Tech MBA.
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