The Leading Independent
Resource for Top-tier MBA
Candidates

Posts by Clear Admit

About
Clear Admit is the leading resource for top-tier MBA candidates.
Published: September 15, 2013
UPenn’s Wharton School Offers Free MBA Foundation Series Classes Online
The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania has added a new series of massive open online courses (MOOCs) covering many of the fundamentals of business and management that students in Wharton’s full-time MBA program learn, taught by the same professors. The first of the Wharton MBA Foundation Series, “An Introduction to Financial Accounting,” begins today. Three other courses make up the new series – introductory courses in operations management, marketing and corporate finance – and all are available via the free online platform Coursera. The new series complements five elective courses already on offer from Wharton via Coursera, including courses on sports business and healthcare. All nine are expected to draw students from around the world, and more than 695,000 students have so far enrolled in a Wharton course, Coursera reports. Read more
Published: September 12, 2013
Harvard Business School Startup HourlyNerd Raises $750,000 in Seed Funding
A startup founded by Harvard Business School (HBS) students as part of a required first-year class secured $750,000 in seed funding earlier this week, including $450,000 from angel investor and Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, the Boston Business Journal reports. HourlyNerd, co-founded by Rob Biederman, Peter Maglathlin, David Connolly, Patrick Petitti and Joe Miller, is an online platform designed to connect small and mid-sized businesses with MBAs from top schools willing to provide freelance and part-time work. The idea was born as part of HBS Professor Clayton Rose’s Field Immersion Experiences for Leadership Development (FIELD) course, an experiential learning course added as a first-year requirement as part of HBS’s recent curriculum redesign. Through the HourlyNerd platform, businesses can post descriptions of the projects they need help with, and MBAs within the network can bid on work they are interested in by indicating the hourly rate they would charge and the milestones they intend to hit. Within its database, the startup boasts roughly 900 current MBA students and recent graduates from top programs including Stanford, Tuck and Wharton. Read more
Published: September 12, 2013
Fridays From The Frontline
Hello and welcome to Fridays From The Frontlines, Clear Admit's weekly perusal of the best of b-school blogging. This week applicants were a busy bunch with one large deadline in the forefront of many of their minds. Current students were adjusting to campus life. BSchool Admit introduced his fellow applicant bloggers to the world. Domotron submitted his HBS application and shifted his focus to his Wharton and HBS applications. ExpectingMBAMILF pondered whether there is a true gender gap in MBA programs. Sanket was in love with the MBA application process. Sarah reviewed the Economist's GMAT prep software. TimBob  vacationed in France and shared a humorous chart of the process one goes through to complete an application. McCombs '15 Raj was three weeks into his MBA experience and didn't regret it a bit. Anderson '15 Daniel  introduced his fellow first year bloggers to the world. Booth '15 Pru celebrated the anniversary of her initial 'crash and burn' R1 applications. HBS '145 2YHBS found himself very busy and discussing the required curriculum. Read more
Published: September 11, 2013
Career Services Director Q&A: Yale School of Management’s Julia Zupko
Julia Zupko joined Yale School of Management (SOM) as assistant dean and director of the Career Development Office in March 2012, bringing with her more than a decade of career services expertise honed at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. At Chicago Booth, Zupko helped expand career services into several sectors, including nonprofit and government work, and directed career management operations at Booth’s campuses in London and Singapore. In her first full year at Yale SOM, Zupko restructured the organization of the Career Development Office in an effort to improve efficiency and strengthen recruitment. Under her helm, the school’s annual SuperWeek in January drew a record 11 investment banks to campus. The overall number of companies coming to recruit Yale SOM students throughout the year also increased. Read on to learn from Zupko herself about how Yale SOM teaches “career skills for life,” how her team helps students steer clear of the “herd effect” and more.  Read more
Published: September 11, 2013
The Top 5 Strategies for GMAT Problem Solving (Part 1)
Today’s GMAT article comes from Manhattan Review Asia, a provider of GMAT Prep courses in Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, and Singapore, among others. In this article, they reveal Manhattan Review’s best 5 strategies how to tackle GMAT Problem Solving questions. In fact, the article is so detailed that we had to split it into two parts. As with every type of question on the GMAT, the biggest challenge to answering Problem Solving questions is figuring out how to get to the right answer in the minimum amount of time. If we had half an hour for each question, we would all be scoring in the 99th percentile. We don’t have half an hour. So forget pride. It doesn’t matter how good you think you are at math. If you can get to the right answer without crafting elegant equations doing fancy algebra, go for it! At some point in the test, a question will stump you. That’s when you’ll be thankful for all of those precious seconds you saved by skipping elaborate calculations. Here are five tips on how to improve your Problem Solving skills and have fun on the test: 1. Go slower in order to go faster It is absolutely essential that you take the time to read the question very carefully. Don’t make assumptions; don’t jump to conclusions; don’t take it for granted that the question is asking the same thing as similar questions asked you in the past. Draw a diagram; write out as clearly and as free of confusion as possible who did what in the past and who is doing what at the moment. It may seem as if you are losing time, but you are not. You are saving yourself precious minutes that you would lose by failing to read the question properly and answering what you haven’t been asked. The strategy is: Get the right answer on the first try, not on the fourth try. Before test-day, practice sketching problems out. Read more
Published: September 10, 2013
UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business Opens New Innovation Lab
The Haas School of Business at the University of California at Berkeley is home to a new 2,700-square-foot Innovation Lab where students can participate in more team-based and experiential learning, primarily as part of the school’s innovative leader curriculum. The new I-Lab, located inside Berkeley’s Memorial Stadium, was made possible thanks to a gift from alumnus Michael Gallagher, BS ‘67, MBA ‘68, former Haas Board chairman and retired CEO of Playtex Products. Haas Lecturer Clark Kellogg and Senior Lecturer Sara Beckman, who teach the school’s “Problem Finding Problem Solving” course, taught the first class in the new labratory space on Read more
Published: September 9, 2013
Shifts in Global Healthcare Increase Intersection between Medicine and the MBA
Entrepreneurship, innovation and cost cutting are increasingly important amid shifts in global healthcare systems, presenting important opportunities for business schools offering healthcare-focused MBA programs, the Financial Times reports. “The healthcare system is about much more than just treating patients,” Steve Chick, head of INSEAD’s Healthcare Management Initiative, told the FT. “The coordination of care is critical and that’s where business schools can play a big role.” Read more
Published: September 9, 2013
Trivia Tuesday: MIT Sloan’s First-Year Class
In this week’s instalment of Trivia Tuesday, we turn our focus to the Clear Admit School Guide to MIT Sloan, examining how the school creates first-year teams and how these teams impact students’ experiences. “Each first-year class of approximately 400 MBA students is divided into six smaller cohorts, or “oceans” (Atlantic, Baltic, Caribbean, Indian, Mediterranean and Pacific), which help to give shape to the core curriculum experience.  Oceans are comprised of approximately 65 students each, and the students in each ocean take all seven of their core courses together.  As a result of this shared academic experience, students within each Read more
Published: September 8, 2013
Harvard Business School Tackles Entrenched Issues of Gender Inequity
Harvard Business School (HBS) Dean Nitin Nohria has, for the past two years, been leading a school-wide effort to foster greater success among female MBA students by making changes to the school’s curriculum, rules and social rituals, according to a recent front-page story in the New York Times. HBS for years has seen women enter the school with the same test scores and grades as their male counterparts, only to quickly fall behind. The school has also struggled to attract and retain female professors. So in 2010, the Times reports, Harvard’ first female president, Drew Gilpin Faust, appointed Dean Nohria, who pledged to address the gender relations issue head on. Two years in, the school reports remarkable gains among women, though some of the changes implemented by the administration have met with opposition and hostility. Read more
Published: September 5, 2013
Wharton Start-Up Expands to Lend to MBA Students at 20 Top Schools
A company launched last fall by students at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School experienced success in its pilot phase, during which it served as a lender to Wharton MBA students and recent graduates, and so this fall will launch nationally to lend to MBA students at 20 top MBA programs in the United States, the Financial Times reports. Wharton student David Klien is chief executive and co-founder of CommonBond, which last year lent $2.5 million to 40 MBA students and recent graduates from Wharton using funds raised primarily through crowdsourcing. Now, the start-up has raised more than $100 million through debt financing and selling equity. It will expand to offer low-interest loans to MBA students at business schools throughout the country, including Harvard Business School, Stanford Graduate School of Business, Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business, Columbia Business School and others. Read more
Published: September 5, 2013
Fridays From The Frontline
Hello and welcome to Fridays From The Frontline, Clear Admit's weekly blog post focusing on the lives of the b-school blogosphere. This week many an applicant discussed the GMAT, while first and returning students happily got involved on campus. BSchool Admit responded to a series of questions posed to her through the Liebster Award and then sent her own set of questions forward to 10 blogger friends. Domotron made a series of changes to his resume to make it a more reader-friendly length and style.  ExpectingMBAMILF checked in on an online Haas admissions chat and wondered who exactly would need to ask what the GMAT was in such a forum. GMATToMBA recounted the process and lengths he went to prepare for and retake his GMAT and the very satisfying results of all his work. Sarah began to strategize on how she would handle moving to a new apartment while simultaneously studying for and taking the GMAT. McCombs '15 Raghav introduced himself to the McCombs blogging community and shared some of his greatest passions. Harvard '15 Keima wrote a short post about the first official day of the program, which included meeting her section mates. McCombs '15 Charlie also introduced himself to his new readers with a dose of humor and a photograph of his dog. Read more
Published: September 4, 2013
Career Services Director Q&A: INSEAD’s Mary Carey
~ A CLEAR ADMIT EXCLUSIVE ~ American-born Mary Carey stepped into her current role as director of the INSEAD Career Development Center in September 2012, but she was not new to INSEAD nor to France. Before last year, she was executive director of INSEAD’s Global Leadership Center, and before that she worked in career development at another leading European business school, HEC. She began her professional career in southern California, working as a CPA with KPMG as well as in financial services before heading back to school to study leadership development and career development. When she had the opportunity to come over to France, she jumped at it because she wanted the international experience. “It really opens your eyes to the world,” she says. That was seven years ago, and she’s still there. Read more
Published: September 3, 2013
U Michigan Alumnus Gives an Additional $200 Million to Ross School of Business, Athletics
Real estate developer and alumnus Stephen M. Ross will give $100 million to the University of Michigan business school that already bears his name and another $100 million to U-M Athletics, the university announced today. His most recent gift is the largest in the university’s history from a single donor. With lifetime giving of $313 million, he is the third-largest donor to a United States business school.  Ross, who earned his bachelor of business administration in accounting from the University of Michigan School of Business, as well as two subsequent law degrees elsewhere, made an earlier gift of $100 million in 2004 toward construction of a new building and endowed operations for the business school. That building, which was named in Ross’s honor, was completed in 2009. Read more
Published: September 2, 2013
UNC Kenan-Flagler School of Business Appoints Former Dean to Serve Third Interim Dean Role
Jim Dean, former dean of UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School, was appointed in May to become UNC executive vice chancellor and provost, leaving the business school in need of a leader. Dean turned to Jack Evans (pictured), asking if he would serve as interim dean. With more than 40 years of experience at Kenan-Flagler, Evans came out of retirement to answer Dean’s call. In addition to holding the Kenan-Flagler deanship from 1979 to 1987, he served two subsequent terms as interim dean. He first came to Kenan-Flagler in 1970, as a professor of operations. Read more
Published: September 2, 2013
Career Services Director Q&A: Doreen Amorosa of Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business
~ A CLEAR ADMIT EXCLUSIVE ~ Three years ago Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business convinced Doreen Amorosa to take over as associate dean and managing director of career services, despite the fact that she lived in New Jersey, not Washington, DC, and didn’t plan to move. Now she keeps a small apartment in DC and commutes back and forth each week, returning to spend the weekends with her husband. Until that point, Amorosa had spent all of her career working in New York City, including the first 22 years with Merrill Lynch. In her later years at Merrill, she migrated into running recruiting and retention for the firm, discovering that was what she really loved. She went on to head recruiting for a range of other firms, including American Express, traveling to the McDonough campus in that capacity to recruit MBA students. And that’s how the school recognized her talents and eventually wooed her to its side of the fence. Read more
Published: September 2, 2013
Trivia Tuesday: Teaching Methods at Duke / Fuqua
Welcome to another edition of Trivia Tuesday, in which we examine individual program elements that differentiate the leading MBA programs from their peers. Today, we’re taking a look into the Clear Admit School Guide to Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business in order to share with you some insights about the program’s teaching methods. “Most classes at Fuqua meet twice a week, either on Mondays and Thursdays or on Tuesdays and Fridays. No classes are held on Wednesdays, a system designed to give students a mid-week break that can be used to schedule job interviews, attend campus events or catch Read more
Published: August 29, 2013
McDonough, ESADE, EBAPE Launch New Corporate International Master’s Program
Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, together with Spain’s ESADE Business School and Brazilian Business School EBAPE/Fundação Getulio Vargas, has launched a new year-long master’s program with an international focus for experienced business executives. The new Corporate International Master’s (CIM) Program welcomed its inaugural class of 27 students to McDonough’s Washington, DC, campus earlier this month. Designed for experienced professionals and executives who want to obtain a master’s degree while continuing to work, the CIM program includes four in-person sessions at locations around the globe augmented by online classes in between. The internationally focused curriculum was created to help students expand their understanding of business practices in the United States, Europe, Latin America and China. Read more
Published: August 29, 2013
Fridays From The Frontline
Greetings! Welcome to Fridays From The Frontline, Clear Admit’s weekly blog post dedicated to bringing you the latest from b-school bloggers. This week, applicants, first years, and second years alike were nervous, some about admittance and many about everything that comes after admittance. HammO answered the question, "What if I don't get in anywhere?," with a definitive, "I have to get in somewhere this year." MBA Girl Journey is dealing with the nerve-wracking stress of application short answer questions (where there's no room for error) and essay revisions (you have to have the X factor). MBA Reapplicant84 was one of four winners in Haas's Facebook Value of an MBA Essay Contest and was pretty happy about the Modify watch prize. Kellogg '12 Jeremy filled his blog with advice about how to be a stronger person who doesn't run from pain and how to make deeper connections with friends and even strangers. He asked readers to think about venturing out of well-established, safe career paths and into more inspiring, yet uncertain career opportunities.  HBS '15 TwoYears wrote about feeling retrospective, anxious, and excited all at once and lamenting the fact that she wasn't eligible to attend the Analytics Pre-MBA Program. She spent the summer building her HBS professional network and traveling, and now she's looking forward to meeting her 900 HBS classmates while somehow also managing to sift through 100 case studies. INSEAD 14' Jason prepped for his arrival in Singapore by renting an apartment, meeting his new roommates online, and even getting to know a few Toronto-based INSEAD classmates. Read more
Published: August 28, 2013
Career Services Director Q&A: Michael Malone (Formerly) of the Kellogg School of Management
~ A CLEAR ADMIT EXCLUSIVE ~ Editor's note: In the time since we conducted this interview, Malone has returned to Columbia Business School, where he currently serves as associate dean for the school's MBA program. But because he shared so much valuable insight into the Kellogg School of Management career services process, we're running his interview here. We will update this series with an interview with Kellogg's new head of the Career Management Center in coming weeks. Michael Malone came to Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management to serve as managing director of the Career Management Center in January 2012 after serving as director for career education and advising at Columbia Business School (CBS) for six years. Describing himself as a “lifelong student-focused professional,” he explains that he has spent the past 20 years in higher education in roles that have helped him understand the different pressure points faced by both student and employer. “I am able to bring a level of understanding from both the student and employer sides to help them understand the other’s needs and build empathy between them,” he says.   Read more
Published: August 27, 2013
Columbia Business School Launches Redesigned Core Curriculum Emphasizing Entrepreneurship, Leadership
Incoming first-year MBA students at Columbia Business School (CBS) will discover a redesigned core curriculum, part of the school’s efforts to keep pace with a changing business marketplace. The school unveiled 12 new videos today explaining the changes, which include a greater emphasis on entrepreneurship and leadership. Students in the Class of 2015 will encounter one of the most significant changes to the core beginning in orientation. As part of the redesign, the core’s leadership course will be pushed forward, to take place in the weeks before regular classes start, rather than in the first semester, as has been the case in the past. Students will also have more electives to choose from during the first year, a shift intended to give them greater ability to customize their MBA course to fit individual career goals and better prepare for summer internships. Read more
Published: August 26, 2013
Consortium for Graduate Study in Management to Host MBA Application Preparation Seminars
Are you an African American, Hispanic American or Native American who is considering business school? If so, mark your calendars for the Consortium for Graduate Study in Management’s MBA Application Preparation Seminars (MAPS), which will take place in cities around the country over the next month. The Consortium is a nonprofit organization committed to increasing the representation of African Americans, Hispanic Americans and Native Americans in American business schools and corporate management Through its MAPS series, the Consortium aims to provide prospective applicants with “insider” knowledge to help them navigate and excel in the admissions process for both the Consortium Fellowship and MBA programs at the Consortium’s 18 member schools. Read more
Published: August 26, 2013
Career Services Director Q&A: Sheryle Dirks of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business
~ A CLEAR ADMIT EXCLUSIVE ~ This week we’re learning about career services at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. We had a great interview with Sheryle Dirks, associate dean of career management, who leads Fuqua’s Career Management Center (CMC). Dirks has been at Fuqua since 1998 and in her current role as associate dean since 2005. She came to career services from the MBA admissions world, having worked in MBA admissions in the Chicago area. “I loved the intermingling between the corporate world and the education world” that career services offered, she says, so when she landed a job in career management at Fuqua she was thrilled. Dirks manages the CMC’s 30 full-time staff members, as well as a small group of executive coaches and more than 90 part-time student career counselors. The CMC provides career services to all of the degree programs that go through the business school, which include the full-time MBA program as well as three executive-style programs in which students continue to work while in school and a one-year degree program for slightly younger students. Read on to learn how the CMC was reorganized last year to better align with the school’s strategy and resources. Dirks also shares her perspective on how the recruiting process has become less linear and more fragmented in the wake of the economic crisis, why passion is one of the most crucial elements of the job search process and more. Read more
Published: August 25, 2013
Columbia Business School Hosts Two Fall Series for Prospective Applicants
Columbia Business School will launch two on-campus event series this fall for prospective MBA applicants looking to learn more about what CBS has to offer. The first series – “Why an MBA?”  – will feature a panel of CBS alumni and students sharing what led them to pursue either a full-time or executive MBA. The second “Spotlight On:” series will convene professors, alumni and current students to provide a view of CBS and its opportunities in several different areas of study. The events, which will take place on CBS’s Morningside Heights campus, are free to all, but RSVP is required. Two “Why an MBA?” panels will be held as part of that series, each on Tuesday evenings at 6:30 p.m. in CBS’s Uris Hall. The first will be held on September 17th and the second on September 24th. Read more
Published: August 22, 2013
MBA Graduates from U.S. Business Schools See Rise in Wall Street Job Offers
MBA graduates from U.S. business schools this summer are landing more interviews and more job offers from Wall Street firms – particularly investment banks – than in recent years, according to the newest survey by a company that provides corporate training to Wall Street firms and business schools. As part of its latest annual MBA Employment Survey, Training the Street (TTS) interviewed 200 students over the past few months, discovering that 19 percent of students had more than 10 first-round interviews. Another 12 percent of surveyed students had more than eight interviews in the first round, 40 percent had between four and seven interviews and 23 percent had between one and three, according to the TTS survey. Read more
Published: August 22, 2013
QS World MBA Tour Commences North American Fairs on September 7 in Toronto
In case you missed our earlier post, the QS World MBA Tour is kicking off its 2013 tour of North American cities in Toronto on September 7. During each of this year’s 21 fairs, attendees have the opportunity to meet admissions directors and alumni from top business schools around the world. Additional features of the QS World MBA Tour include: $1,200,000 (USD) of exclusive scholarships available for attendees Workshops designed to help improve GMAT scores Careers panel with MBA recruiters and alumni Women & leadership forum Here is the full schedule of September event dates and locations: Read more

MBA Livewire

February 28, 2025 8:11pm ET
Interview Invite to Stanford GSB
Round: Round 2
Received via email February 28, 2025
Standardized Test: GMAT
GPA: 2:1 (UK)
GMAT: 695
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Application Location: Korea
February 28, 2025 7:29pm ET
Accepted to NYU Stern
Round: Round 3
Received via email February 28, 2025
Standardized Test: GMAT
GPA: 3.4
GMAT: 735
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Finance
Application Location: United States, New York
February 28, 2025 5:55pm ET
Accepted to Georgia / Terry
Round: Round 2
Received via phone February 28, 2025
Standardized Test: Granted Waiver
GPA: 3.45
Program Type: Traditional Two-Year
Target Career: Consulting
Application Location: Nashville, TN
Note:

App submitted Jan 1, 2025. Interviewed during campus visit prior.
February 28, 2025 4:21pm ET
Accepted to Oxford / Saïd
Round: Round 4
Received via portal February 28, 2025
Standardized Test: GRE
GPA: 3.8
GRE: 327
Program Type: One Year Program
Target Career: Consulting
Application Location: United States
February 28, 2025 3:10pm ET
Interview Invite to Indian School of Business
Round: Round 3
Received via email February 28, 2025
Standardized Test: GRE
GRE: 323
Program Type: One Year Program
Target Career: Consulting
Application Location: India, Bangalore
View or Submit Entries
Live
Wire