School Q&A

Welcome to another edition of our series, Admissions Director Q&A!  This week, we are excited to feature Soojin Kwon, the Managing Director for Full-time MBA Admissions and Program at the Michigan Ross School of Business. Kwon has led MBA Admissions since 2006 and, since 2016, the student experience and academic advising of the MBA programs. Before joining Ross, Kwon was a Manager in Deloitte’s Strategy and Operations practice. Prior to consulting, she served as a Presidential Management Fellow, doing rotations with the Senate Budget Committee, House Appropriations Committee, and Department of Commerce. Kwon holds an MBA from Ross, a Master in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, and a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from Yale. She has served on the boards of the Forte Foundation, Greenhills School, and ETS’ Business School Advisory Council. Clear Admit was thrilled to sit down with Kwon to discuss the brand new +Impact Studio, Michigan Ross’s unique interview process, reflections on 15 years’ of admissions essays, and more. Clear Admit: What’s the single most exciting development, change, or event happening at Michigan Ross in the coming year? Read more

We continue our Admissions Director Q&A series with the Assistant Dean for Admissions at the Yale School of Management, Bruce DelMonico. He has been at the school for close to 15 years, and has been running the Admissions Office for roughly 13 of those years. During that time, he has seen the school grow both in size and in stature, and looks forward to its continued momentum under the leadership of incoming Dean Charles. DelMonico says he was drawn to Yale because of its mission to educate leaders for business and society and has stayed because the school is one where the mission really matters, which is an uplifting and inspiring place to be. If you are pursuing your MBA at Yale, you will want the scoop from DelMonico on the new Dean Kerwin Charles, the integrated curriculum, the role essays play in admissions, and more.  Happy reading! Clear Admit: What’s the single most exciting development, change, or event happening at Yale in the coming year? Read more

There are so many new and exciting developments at the Texas McCombs School of Business, Rodrigo Malta couldn't name just one.  He's joined us for this Admissions Director Q&A to fill us in on the changing scenery and curriculum at the school, what he wishes more applicants knew about, how the admissions process works, what you may face in an interview and more. Malta, the Managing Director of MBA Recruitment and Admissions at Texas McCombs, was born and raised in Brazil and moved to the United States in high school. After earning his bachelor’s degree in management from Missouri State University and working for a large telecom company in Kansas City, he pursued an MBA at Texas McCombs. During his time as an MBA student, Malta was very involved in the McCombs Ambassador Committee – the volunteer group that assists the admissions team with campus visits, interviews, and helping prospective students learn more about Texas McCombs and the MBA application process. This passion for MBA admissions eventually led Malta back to the school and to his current Managing Director role, which he describes as his "dream job." Prospective MBA applicants dreaming of earning a Texas MBA would do well to read on for Malta's insights into the program. Clear Admit: What’s the single most exciting development, change, or event happening at Texas McCombs in the coming year? Read more

This edition of our Admissions Director Q&A series takes us to the Kellogg School of Management of Northwestern University.  We first met Renee Cherubin this past summer when she stepped into the role of Senior Director of Full-Time MBA Admissions.  Prior to Kellogg, Cherubin spent nine years in strategy consulting and talent at Deloitte Consulting. She earned her MBA from Kellogg in 2006 and had also graduated cum laude with a bachelor’s in business from Miami University.  Now, she is an active member of the admissions leadership team focused on attracting the best and brightest candidates to Kellogg’s full-time degree programs (including Two Year, One Year, MMM, JDMBA, MD-MBA programs) as well as the M.S. in Management Studies (MSMS) program. Cherubin has so much to share about Kellogg's extensive opportunities–both internationally and on-campus–as well as how MBA hopefuls should approach the Kellogg admissions process.  Read on for rich details about the MBA program and their admissions process. Clear Admit: What’s the single most exciting development, change, or event happening at Kellogg in the coming year?  Read more

We continue with our Admissions Director Q&A series in the ever-bustling New York City.  Lisa Rios, executive director of MBA admissions at the NYU Stern School of Business, fills us in on exciting new developments at the school, what applicants should consider about the application process and plenty more.  Lisa has been a member of the admissions team since 2008 and works with the Full-time MBA programs. Prior to Stern, she worked in industry at JP Morgan Chase and Liz Claiborne. She earned her MA in Higher Education Administration at NYU Steinhardt and her BS in Business Administration from the University of Richmond. Read on for her insights into the NYU Stern full-time MBA program, what IQ + EQ mean in the admissions process, and other MBA program options at school. Read more

Are you dreaming of attending the Stanford Graduate School of Business?  With an acceptance rate that generally hovers around five percent, it can certainly feel like a fantasy.  Fortunately, Kirsten Moss is here in our latest Admissions Director Q&A to explain how you can make your Stanford MBA dreams a reality. Prior to her current role as Assistant Dean of MBA Admissions and Financial Aid at Stanford GSB, Kirsten developed tools to assess leadership potential as a consultant with Egon Zehnder and coached senior executives in the technology, private equity, entertainment, healthcare, and manufacturing sectors.  Earlier in her career, she was the Director of Career Services and the Director of Admissions and Financial Aid at Harvard Business School. Kirsten has an AB in economics, government, and sociology from Harvard College and an MBA from Harvard Business School. She has a Doctorate of Psychology from William James College where her research examined how to assess transformational leadership during selection interviews. Following our conversation earlier this year, Kirsten offers more insights into what makes admissions essays stand out, how the interview process works and who the program is looking for, along with a lot more. Clear Admit: What’s the single most exciting development, change, or event happening at Stanford in the coming year? Read more

It's hard to believe that the Round 1 deadline for Harvard Business School is next week!  Before you submit your application, you'll want to read our Admissions Director Q&A with Chad Losee, the Managing Director of MBA Admissions and Financial Aid.  He walks us through the life of admissions, new and exciting developments at Harvard, the interview process and more. Losee applied to business schools in the Fall of 2010 and feels grateful to have been admitted to HBS. While a student at HBS, Losee developed his interest in higher education leadership as an admissions ambassador, through an internship in a university president’s office, and by completing a one-year fellowship at HBS after graduating in 2013. Losee remembers vividly what it feels like to go through the process of applying to business school. He and his team aim to make applying to HBS as simple, fair, and transparent as possible for all applicants. Read on for some rich details about the MBA program and more. Clear Admit: What’s the single most exciting development, change, or event happening at Harvard in the coming year? Read more

Next up in our ongoing Admissions Director Q&A series, we hear admissions insights from Shari Hubert, Associate Dean of Admissions at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business.  Hubert is responsible for overseeing recruitment and admissions for Fuqua's Daytime MBA, Weekend Executive MBA, Global Executive MBA, and four Specialty Masters’ Degree Programs. Shari Hubert, Associate Dean of Admissions at Duke's Fuqua School of Business Prior to Fuqua, Hubert was in charge of admissions for the Full-time and Evening MBA programs at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business. She has extensive experience in the private, public, and nonprofit sectors, and entered higher education after working for the Peace Corps as director of recruitment within the Office of Volunteer Recruitment and Selection. In this capacity, she was responsible for the strategy to attract and recruit over 4,000 volunteers annually and managed the operations of nine regional recruitment offices across the United States. Prior to joining the Peace Corps, Hubert was the senior vice president of campus recruitment for Citi’s Global Bank in North America, overseeing the recruitment of analysts and associates.  She also worked for GE in their corporate headquarters, where she served as manager of campus relations in corporate recruiting and staffing. Hubert also ran an executive leadership and civic development program named in honor of David Rockefeller at the Partnership for New York City, a business advocacy association focused on public and private partnerships. Immediately after receiving an MBA from Harvard Business School in 2000, Hubert was a consultant for The Boston Consulting Group. Finally, she began her career in sales and marketing at Merck and Co., Inc., after graduating with a bachelor's degree in French from Dartmouth College in 1992. Now, she wants to know your story and what makes you a good fit for the Fuqua MBA.  As you'll see in her account below, Durham is a dynamic place to be, the culture of Fuqua is driven by teamwork and  so much more.  Read on for what stands out in an MBA application to Fuqua, what you should consider when drafting your essays, what to expect from the interview process and why you shouldn't hesitate to re-apply, along with much more. Read more

Clear Admit’s Graham Richmond recently sat down for an interview with Virginie Fougea, the global director of admissions and financial aid at INSEAD, to catch up on their MBA admissions and more. Virginie Fougea, Global Director of Admissions and Financial Aid, INSEAD Though its name is an acronym for the French “Institut Européen d’Administration des Affaires” or European Institute of Business Administration, INSEAD has long since outgrown its European confines and today calls itself “the business school for the world”—with good reason. It is one of the most diverse business schools in the world, with 93 nationalities represented Read more

We are thrilled to continue our  Admissions Director Q&A Series with Danielle Richie, the senior associate director of full-time MBA admissions at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School. Danielle Richie began at UNC Kenan-Flagler in April 2018. She has more than 12 years of higher education experience within admissions and student recruitment with a primary focus on the MBA. Previously, Richie worked at Syracuse University and Bentley University recruiting MBA candidates from around the world. At UNC Kenan-Flagler, Richie oversees the full-time MBA admissions team and overall recruiting process. She is a co-chair of Empow(H)er for women, male allies and advocates, advisor to UNC Kenan-Flagler MBA Student Ambassadors, a liaison with The Consortium and a mentor for Dean’s Fellows projects. Read on for her insights into the MBA program and the admissions process at UNC Kenan-Flagler. Read more

While you may have recently enjoyed her podcast with Clear Admit or her Real Humans profile, Blair Mannix, the director of admissions at the Wharton School, has plenty more to share about the leading MBA program. While she has been a member of the Wharton MBA Admissions team and admissions committee for seven years, her career in university admissions spans fourteen. She started her career in the undergraduate admissions office at the University of Pennsylvania working with international students, and finished her time with Penn undergraduates as the Associate Director of Evaluation and Selection thinking deeply about the process and ideology of admissions decisions.  In 2012, she transitioned from Penn Undergraduate Admissions to join the Wharton School. She held the title of Director of Operations and Evaluations in the Wharton MBA Admissions office for nearly four years, focusing on the daily operations of the admissions committee and the philosophy and training behind evaluation and selection of applicants. In 2018, Mrs. Mannix was named Wharton MBA Director of Admissions.  Now she's here to dish on a few exciting developments at Wharton, the lifecycle of an application, Wharton's Semester in San Francisco, and more. Read more

"You do an MBA because you want the ROI; you ultimately want to gain your ideal career," says Shelly Heinrich, the associate dean of MBA admissions and director of marketing at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business.  She joins us for our ongoing series, Admissions Director Q&A, to reveal how the Georgetown MBA delivers on that investment—and how you can be successful in the application process. Heinrich leads the MBA Admissions team in both its marketing and operational strategy to build awareness, recruit, yield, and retain the Full-time and Flex MBA programs. She also develops the integrated marketing strategy for the team and manages the internal marketing team and external marketing firm in its execution.  Heinrich is a senior marketing professional with over 13 years of experience in the higher education, corporate, and nonprofit sectors. Her responsibilities have included marketing, recruitment, business development, event planning, and public relations. With experience in five business schools, Heinrich brings a strong and tested knowledge of the business school industry and changing market trends.  She earned her master's degree in education from the University of Texas at Austin and a bachelor's degree in business administration from Texas Christian University. She recently completed a certificate of marketing from Georgetown University and the Executive MBA Program in the McDonough School of Business. Read on for her account of a few unsung aspects of the Georgetown McDonough program, tips to knock your interview out of the park, and more. Read more

We are excited to kick off our Admissions Director Q&As for the 2019-2020 MBA admissions season!  Admissions committee members will be shedding light on the admissions process, program changes and new developments in the dynamic field of graduate management admissions. This year, we start the series with insights from Margaret O'Neill, Head of MBA Marketing, Admissions, and Careers at Cambridge Judge Business School.  She has spent the past 18 years in business education, working with post-graduate business school professionals across projects, careers and programmes at both Cambridge Judge and London Business School. Read on for her insights into the MBA journey, from the moment candidates first engage with the school, to the time they leave to embark upon their post-MBA careers. Clear Admit: What is the one aspect of your program that you wish applicants knew more about? Margaret O'Neill: I have heard Cambridge Judge Business School alumni say they can always spot a Cambridge MBA – in short, someone who gets excited by working with others, and actively looks for opportunities to do something different and make a difference. Read more

Blair Mannix, Director of Admissions, The Wharton School Just a few weeks ago, we had the pleasure of getting to know Blair Mannix, the Director of Admissions at the Wharton School.  Working in admissions for 13 years and counting, Mannix took on the mantle of Director of Admissions in the fall of 2018.  In our Admissions Q&A, she walked us through life in the admissions office, what happens with your written applications and during the Team-based Discussions and more.   She also took the time to address some fun Real Humans questions, and we hope that in reading her responses, you get to feel as much like you know her as we did in speaking with her. Read on to learn a bit about Mannix’s personal side and don’t forget to catch up on the podcast if you want to hear more about admissions at the Wharton School. Coffee or Tea? Coffee. I am a coffee fiend. I probably have 4 cups a day, even through the afternoon. Beach or Mountains? I was lucky enough to grow up in the beaches of South Carolina. And one of the other virtues of Philadelphia is that we’re very close to the Jersey Shore, so my husband and I pop down to the Jersey Shore every summer. So I would say beach.  But I burn—I’m Irish in nature, so I turn very red and I burn often. So, beach, but only for a couple of hours a day. Read more

Do you have your sights set on a career in international business?  Do you want to polish your language skills and spend your MBA experience immersed in other cultures?  Wharton offers a joint-degree program—the MBA with an MA in International Studies—with Penn’s Joseph H. Lauder Institute of Management & International Studies that puts the MBA experience on a global scale, as the program concentrations focus on a region of the world—or the world itself. Wharton Lauder Director of Admissions Marketing and Communications, Kara Keenan Sweeney Clear Admit’s Graham Richmond sat down with the Director of Admissions Read more

Clear Admit recently sat down with Kirsten Moss, who leads MBA admissions at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Our conversation was both insightful and incredibly wide-ranging–covering topics like leadership, application essays, admissions interviews, and financial aid. What follows is the transcript of our conversation. Moss starts by covering the importance of assessing leadership and by extension, leadership’s importance for candidates applying to the Stanford MBA Program. In the subsequent pages, Moss tackles essays, interviews, and financial aid. Read more

Yale School of Management (SOM) Admissions Director Bruce DelMonico has been leading the charge at the New Haven business school since 2006.  This past summer, Clear Admit’s Jeanette Brown had an enlightening conversation with the admissions gatekeeper.  Read on for more about the ins and outs of admissions at Yale SOM, advice on essays, the application and interview processes, and more.  The interview has been transcribed from a recording. Bruce Delmonico, assistant dean for admissions  Clear Admit:  Please tell us a little bit about your background. How long have you been at Yale? Read more

Clear Admit is delighted to share admissions insights from Judi Byers, the Executive Director of Admissions & Financial Aid at Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management. This past summer, Clear Admit’s Jeanette Brown had an enlightening conversation with Byers.  Read on for more about the ins and outs of admissions at Johnson, the application and interview processes, and more. CA: Can you tell us when you came to Johnson, where you have been before, and how you got into the career of MBA Admissions? JB: I have been with Cornell Johnson now for about three and a half years. Prior Read more

Clear Admit is delighted to share admissions insights from Morgan Bernstein, the Executive Director of Full-time MBA Admissions at UC Berkeley / Haas.  Bernstein was part of the admissions team for five years before stepping into her current role, and she knows things from the other side as well. A successful applicant herself, she graduated from Haas with her MBA in 2009. This past summer, Clear Admit’s Jeanette Brown had an enlightening conversation with Bernstein.  Read on for more about the ins and outs of admissions at Haas, determining your fit with the program, Read more

We began interviewing admissions directors at leading business schools back in 2008, and we circle back regularly to capture changes and new developments in the dynamic field of graduate management admissions. We are thrilled to continue the Clear Admit’s Admissions Director Q&A Series with Soojin Kwon, who has led MBA admissions at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business since 2006. She’s familiar with “non-traditional” MBA candidates, as she was one herself when she got her MBA at Ross. Prior to b-school, she used her MPP from the Kennedy School of Government to work as a budget and policy analyst on Capitol Hill and at the Department of Commerce. She’s also familiar with the private sector as she spent her post-MBA years as a consultant in Deloitte’s Strategy and Operations practice. Read more

Anyone anxiously awaiting an interview invitation from Duke’s Fuqua School of Business? Well, we can’t make them roll out any sooner—but we can offer you something you should read while you wait. Shari Hubert, who had been in charge of admissions at Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business since 2013, choose to move south last fall to North Carolina to lead admissions at Fuqua. “Shari stood out in an incredibly talented and competitive pool of candidates,” Russ Morgan, Fuqua senior associate dean for full-time programs, said announcing her hiring. “Shari is a terrific fit within our culture. She Read more

Are you anxiously awaiting an interview for Harvard Business School (HBS)? I’m going to let you in on a secret. Chad Losee—who leads admissions for HBS and conducts a portion of the interviews with applicants himself—is nervous, too. For real. He told me as much in our latest Clear Admit MBA Admissions Podcast. Losee, for those who haven’t been following MBA admissions or HBS for long, is a bit of a special case. Not only does he now lead admissions for one of the most selective business schools in the world, he was a student at that Read more

We got to catch up with Judi Byers, executive director of admissions and financial aid at Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management, earlier this year for an in-depth interview on the admissions process she oversees. Today, we’re delighted to share a recording of that conversation as the latest episode in the Clear Admit MBA Admissions Podcast series. Judi Byers, Cornell Johnson executive director of admissions and financial aid Byers joined the Johnson admissions team in January 2015 from American University’s Kogod School of Business, where she began her admissions career following her own undergraduate studies. By the Read more

This week we’ve got two new voices joining us on the Clear Admit MBA Admissions Podcast, Gareth Howells and David Simpson of London Business School. Howells is executive director for the MBA and Master in Finance (MiF) programs at LBS, and Simpson heads up admissions for both. Not only that, both men have been with LBS for more than two decades. In our exclusive interview, the two share how LBS is a dynamic enough place to keep things interesting for them both for more than 20 years. More than anything else, it’s the incredible array of applicants and students Read more

We are thrilled to bring you Part II of our wide-ranging interview with Luke Anthony Peña, executive director of admissions and financial aid, on the admissions process at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business. In Episode 16, Peña shared about his transition to Tuck from Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB). He also talked in great detail about Tuck’s recently revamped admissions process, including several shifts designed to make it more transparent and applicant friendly. Without further ado, we’re pleased to now present you with Part II of our interview with Peña, including valuable insights into Read more