Carnegie Mellon / Tepper - 06-05-2024

June 5, 2024 6:24am ET

Applying: Carnegie Mellon / Tepper, Other, Rochester / Simon, USC / Marshall, UT Austin / McCombs, Washington U. / Olin

Intake Year: 2024

Pre-MBA Career: Advertising & Design

Post-MBA Target Industry: Consulting, Technology, Entrepreneurship Companies: Accenture , Deloitte , Ernst & Young , KPMG , McKinsey , Apple , Facebook , Google , IBM , Microsoft

GRE: 318

GPA: 3.64

Years of Work Experience: 4

Location: Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam

Post MBA Location: Southern California

Notes:

Also applied to:
University of Utah
Case Western Reserve University Weatherhead School of Management
College of William & Mary Mason School of Business
George Washington University

Total: 9 schools
Was denied admission by U of Utah and Rochester Simon, waitlisted at WUSTL, accepted to William & Mary without scholarship, and accepted to CWRU Weatherhead with merit-based scholarship and fellowship.
Awaiting decisions from CMU Tepper, USC Marshall, GWU, and UT-Austin McCombs.
Tepper, Marshall, and Weatherhead (in that order) are my current top choices.

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Show Comments (9) Last: June 25, 2024

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1607 Marshall would be a great option, if you want to be in Southern California, post MBA. I assume you will be hearing from them, very soon? (1)

benjik Likes Earned: 12 I hope so; I interviewed on May 19 and from the looks of things USC are starting to release R4 decisions this week. Since posting this, I've been informed that I'm wailisted at CMU, and I expect the mostly likely outcome at USC would be that too. For GWU, I think I have equal chance of being admitted or waitlisted. (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1607 Best of luck! (1)

benjik Likes Earned: 12 Another update here: Just got accepted to GWU with a scholarship offer as well. I'll probably decline it though because Case Weatherhead offered me more scholarship (and has a much lower base tuition to begin with, not to mention Cleveland being a much more affordable place to live than Washington, DC). Only waiting for USC now, and still on the waitlists at Carnegie Mellon Tepper and WUSTL Olin. (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1607 Well done! Key will be, which program gives you best access to your post MBA career goals? (0)

benjik Likes Earned: 12 I considered that question a lot before I submitted my applications (I was quite selective about which programs I thought would be a good match for my career goals). Given the facts that: (1) Case Western Reserve's Weatherhead offered me the most scholarship (on top of having the lowest tuition and cost of living); (2) Weatherhead's MBA has a concentration in Design, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, in which I can leverage my background and experience as a designer; and (3) I really like the curricular offerings there, and CWRU seems to be a pretty diverse university with an active and engaged student body (and Cleveland is a very diverse city with lots of culture, which I'll be thrilled to explore) -- that's where I'm having my heart set on at the moment. Now, USC is still the wildcard for me -- since I haven't heard anything, I'm not putting much hope in it. The only outcome that would make a difference in my decision making is if USC Marshall offers me a $100k+ scholarship (I doubt they will). Otherwise, Case is where I'll be. (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1607 USC will provide you more access to a future career in Southern California, so consider that if they do provide you an offer. Best of luck. (1)

benjik Likes Earned: 12 Last update (apart from waitlists): as I expected, USC waitlisted me. I also managed to negotiate up the scholarship offer at Case Western Reserve from 60% to 75%, bringing the cost of tuition down to less than $13k/year. (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1607 More details on this decision in this episode of Wire Taps: https://www.clearadmit.com/2024/06/mba-wire-taps-360/ (0)