MBA360.. formerly Journey to my MBA: 03/01/2006

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MBA '07 Deadlines

Chart form : (Includes '05-'07 deadlines) Web-- Excel
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*Babson(R1)Nov 15(R2)Jan 15(R3)Mar 15(R4)Apr 15
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*Boston(R1)Nov 15 (R2)Jan 15 (R3)Mar 15
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*Chicago(R1)Oct 18 (R2)Jan 10 (R3)Mar 14
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*Columbia(EA)Oct 11 (R2)Apr 18
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*Darden(EA)Oct 19 (R2)Dec 5 (R3)Jan 11 (R4)Mar 1
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*Emory(R1) Nov 1 (R2) Dec 15 (R3) Mar 1
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*Fuqua(R1) Nov 1 (R2) Jan 8 (R3) Mar 21
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*Goizueta(R1)Nov 1 (R2)Dec 15 (R3)Feb 1 (R4)Mar 1
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*Kelley(R1)Nov 15 (R2)Jan 15 (R3)Mar 1 (R4)Apr 15
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*HAAS(R1)Nov 6 (R2)Dec 11 (R3)Jan 31 (R4)Mar 12
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*HBS(R1) Oct 12 (R2) Jan 3 (R3) Mar 7
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*INSEAD(R1)Oct 18(R2)Dec 6(R3)Jan 31(R4)Mar 28
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*Kelly(EA)Nov 15 (R2)Jan 15 (R3)Mar 1 (R4)Apr 15
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*Kellogg(R1)Oct 20 (R2)Jan 5 (R3)Mar 9
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*LBS(R1)Oct 20 (R2)Jan 5 (R3)Feb 23 (R4)Apr 27
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*Marriott(R1)Oct 1
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*McCombs(EA)Nov 1 (Int)Feb 1 (Final)Apr 1
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*McDonough(R1)Dec 1 (R2)Feb 9 (R3)Apr 20
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*Mendoza(R1)Nov 15(R2)Jan 15(R3)Mar 15(R4)May 1
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*Merage(UCI)(R1)Nov 1(R2)Dec 15(R3)Feb 1(R4)Apr 15
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*Michigan State(R1)Nov 1
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*Notre Dame(EA)Nov 15(R1)Jan 15(R2)Mar 15(R3)May 1
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*Rady(R1)Nov 17(R2)Jan 5(R3)Feb 9(R4)Mar 16
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*StLous(Olin)(R1)Nov 6(R2)Jan 8(R3)Mar 12(R4)May 1
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*Rice(R1)Nov 1 (R2)Jan 22 (R3)Mar 26 (R4)May 14
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*Ross(R1)Nov 1 (R2)Jan 7 (R3)Mar 1
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*Simon(EA)Nov 1(R1)Dec 1(R2)Feb 1(R3)Apr 1(R4)Jun 1
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*Sloan(R1)Nov 1 (R2)Jan 10
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*Smith(R1)Nov 1 (R2)Dec 15 (R3)Jan 15 (R4)Mar 1
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*Stanford(R1)Oct 25 (R2)Jan 10 (R3)Mar 14
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*Stern(R1)Dec 1 (R2)Jan 15 (R3)Mar 15
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*Tepper(R1)Nov 6 (R2)Jan 8 (R3)Mar 19 (R4)Apr 30
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*Tuck(EA)Oct 12 (R1)Nov 30 (R2)Jan 11 (R3)Apr 5
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*UCLA(R1)Oct 25 (R2)Jan 3 (R3)Feb 21 (R4)Apr 25
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*UNC(EA)Oct 27 (R1)Dec 1 (R2)Jan 5 (R3)Mar 2
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*USC(EA)Nov 1(R1)Dec 1(R2)Jan 15(R3)Feb 15(R4)Apr 1
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*Vanderbilt(R1)Nov 14 (R1)Jan 15 (R2)Mar 1
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*Wharton(R1)Oct 12 (R1)Jan 4 (R2)Mar 1
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*Yale(R1)Oct 25 (R1)Jan 10 (R2)Mar 14

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The perception of which Rankings matter most

According to a survey by GMAC, PROSPECTIVE students clearly showed a ratings perception bias. The sampling was from approximately 15000 respondents.

From GMAC...
The importance of published rankings in forming the school’s image and in the decision-making process of prospective students is evident. Prospective students in the October, 2004, mba.com Registrants Survey were asked to rate the credibility of a list of publications that rank graduate business schools.

2 Comments:

i_will_make_it said...: Now it would be interesting to see what rankings are most important to employers and their recruiting processes. Cheers!; 11:15 AM
Dave for MBA said...: Correct me if I'm wrong, but I have taken B-Week to be the one that is most highly referred to. But they're not perfect. That's why Wharton, HBS chose to not report numbers in last years rankings for B-Week.

Wall Street is well thought of. Financial Times is a primarily finance oriented rank.

Overall, there isn't a difference between the GMAC finding and how recruiters and the like pursue students.

There are other factors though that rankings don't include such as distance from school to companies. You don't often get companies flying out a whole lot of people in cross-continental or international interviews.; 10:06 PM

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US News & World Report 2007 B-School Ranking Out Today

Hot off the press, this ranking was just announced this morning. Note my other journal entry today about how US News & World Report Ranking is valued compared to other B-School Rankings out there.

Here it is: (I've included the top 30 - The list goes up to 50)

1. Harvard University (MA)
2. Stanford University (CA)
3. University of Pennsylvania (Wharton)
4. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan)
4. Northwestern University (Kellogg) (IL)
6. University of Chicago
7. Columbia University (NY)
7. University of California–Berkeley (Haas)
9. Dartmouth College (Tuck) (NH)
10. University of California–Los Angeles (Anderson)
11. Duke University (Fuqua) (NC)
11. University of Michigan–Ann Arbor (Ross)
13. New York University (Stern)
13. University of Virginia (Darden)
15. Yale University (CT)
16. Carnegie Mellon University (Tepper) (PA)
16. Cornell University (Johnson) (NY)
18. Emory University (Goizueta) (GA)
18. University of Texas–Austin (McCombs)
20. University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill (Kenan-Flagler)
21. Purdue University–West Lafayette (Krannert) (IN)
22. Ohio State University (Fisher)
23. Indiana University–Bloomington (Kelley)
23. Michigan State University (Broad)
23. University of Minnesota–Twin Cities (Carlson)
26. University of Rochester (Simon) (NY)
26. Washington University in St. Louis (Olin)
28. University of Illinois–Urbana-Champaign
29. University of Southern California (Marshall)
29. University of Washington

>See the Rest

In order to see the details, you've got to pay 9.99 for the printed version or 14.99 for the online searchable database environment.

======================================
B-Schools are always given advance notice when these rankings come out. HBS and UCLA were quick to release their PR announcements about how proud they are of their rankings. With HBS at number one and UCLA moving into the top 10, why wouldn't they be proud? As of 10am PST, no other schools in the top 50 as far as I can tell took the time to issue parallel PR announcements like UCLA and HBS did.
=====================================

How was this ranking done and what criteria were used?

All 399 master's programs in business accredited by AACSB International were surveyed (347 responded, of which 240 provided the data needed to calculate rankings based on a weighted average of the quality indicators described below). All 399 schools appear in the directory.

Quality Assessment (weighted by .40)

* Peer Assessment Score (.25)
In the fall of 2005, business school deans and directors of accredited master's programs in business were asked to rate programs on a scale from "marginal" (1) to "outstanding" (5). Those individuals who did not know enough about a school to evaluate it fairly were asked to mark "don't know." A school's score is the average of all the respondents who rated it. Responses of "don't know" counted neither for nor against a school. About 50 percent of those surveyed responded.

* Recruiter Assessment Score (.15)
In the fall of 2005, corporate recruiters and company contacts who hire from previously ranked programs were asked to rate programs on a scale from "marginal" (1) to "outstanding" (5). Those individuals who did not know enough about a school to evaluate it fairly were asked to mark "don't know." A school's score is the average of all the respondents who rated it. Responses of "don't know" counted neither for nor against a school. About 31 percent of those surveyed responded.

Placement Success (weighted by .35)

* Mean Starting Salary and Bonus (.14)
The average starting salary and bonus of 2005 graduates of a full-time master's program in business. Salary figures are based on the number of graduates that reported data. The mean signing bonus is weighted by the proportion of those graduates that reported a bonus, since not everyone who reported a base salary figure reported a signing bonus.

* Employment Rates for Full-time Master's Program in Business Graduates
The employment rate for 2005 graduates of a full-time master's program in business. Those not seeking jobs or for whom no job-seeking information is available are excluded. If the proportions of graduates for whom no job-seeking information is available and who are not seeking jobs are high, then the information is not used in calculating the rankings. Employment rates at graduation (.07) and three months after graduation (.14) are used in the ranking model.

Student Selectivity (weighted by .25)

* Mean GMAT Scores (.1625)
The average Graduate Management Admission Test score of students entering the full-time program in fall 2005. Scores on the test range from 200 to 800.

* Mean Undergraduate GPA (.075)
The average undergraduate grade-point average of those students entering the full-time program in fall 2005.

* Acceptance Rate (.0125)
The percent of applicants to the full-time program in fall 2005 who were accepted.

Overall Rank: Data were standardized about their means, and standardized scores were weighted, totaled, and rescaled so that the top school received 100; others received their percentage of the top score.

Specialty Rankings: These rankings are based solely on ratings by business school deans and directors of accredited master's programs from the list of schools surveyed. They were asked to nominate up to 10 programs for excellence in each of the areas listed. The schools receiving the most votes appear here.

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Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Low GPA stories

Here is a compilation of low GPA stores from BusinesWeek.

Hey, my GPA was considerably less than yours (around a 3.0) and I still was accepted to Kellogg. I had a high GMAT score and I broached the subject during my optional essay. About me -- I was also a math major and took graduate level classes as an UG. I also had steady extracurriculars while participating in ROTC training all four years of school. I only had one bad academic year and my GPA for the other three was around a 3.3. Still, I am not "proud" of my GPA and was honest about the issue in my essay -- specifically I stated that I just don't identify with the person who performed to that level anymore. I used my subsequent GMAT score, quant background, and work experience to show that I have the brains and the discipline to excel in any future academic endeavors. I also pointed out that following graduation from UG I was recognized as an honor grad during army officer training, etc. Hope this helps. FYI, I would be happy as a pig in sh*t if I had a 3.2 -- it's all relative :)
2/15/06 Brewskind

I have 2.6 in engineering and I will attend Wharton in August. I did not build alternative transcript, but I did write an optional essay explaining why my UG record is not a representative of my potential and intellectual ability. mid 700 GMAT, 3.5 WE in 2 countries, speaking 4 languages, almost non existent EC 2/15/06 teladan

I wasn't even close to a 3.0, and I got in several top-10 schools. You'll need to show that you've done a lot of other significant activities, have a good leadership history, and that you can bring a unique background to the school. A high GMAT can also compensate for a low GPA, assuming your undergrad was at a really good school. Personally I feel like the GMAT is more important to most schools than GPA, but in my case, they definitely looked at my complete application. Just recognize that your GPA is a weakness, and focus your essays on your strengths. 2/15/06 Itcolt1
Got a 3.3 GPA. Lousy transcript. C- in Intro to Calc. The only Math or Econ Class I took. 720 GMATs. At Wharton now as a 1st year. Got a summer job offers at Mck/Bain in San Francisco office, two multi-billion $ hedge funds, and 1 large PE shop. Incredible recruiting year with all my friends with multiple offers. The Wharton name carries tremendous clout to recruiters. Mck and Bain asked for my GPA and still gave me offers. Go figure! They really don't care about GPA, once you get in. 2/15/06 Whartonite07

I had a 2.8 (and 1 failing grade) and I just got into Ross. Here is what I did to mitigate the negative effects of my GPA;
1. got a high GMAT (710)
2. Developed an alternate transcript (took 3 business classes and got A's)
3. Addressed in the addtional info essay (explained that my GPA is nobody's fault, but my own, and said that XYZ proves that it will be better this time)
Of course, this is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to an application, but I think these above points (among other things) serve to mititgate a low GPA. I had a 2.8 and a failing grade and I just got into a top 10. It can be done. 3/7/06 cdubya

Hi, I have a 2.8 GPA 690 GMAT and got accepted in Columbia.-3/7/07 mjd903

I got into Wharton with a less than stellar GPA. And have a job at Goldman for the summer so it can be done (I did have a high GMAT and took 4 extra classes and got As to build an alternate transcript)... 3/7/06 natashaMBA

I had a 2.8 undergrad GPA. I balanced this out with a high GMAT and high MS GPA. I am in at Kellogg and Chicago. 3/8/06 Westernkhan

Currently in at Darden, interviewing at Yale, waiting from Tuck and Haas. Due to failing not one but two (!) classes freshman year, I sport a very odd 3.2 from a good but not great small college. I stressed in the optional essays that I learned from my failures, and put up an increasing GPA each year after that. (Had something like a 3.6 the last two years.) I also scored solidly on the GMAT (ever so slightly above median top-10 scores), and, I believe, most importantly, completed a four-course certificate program at Columbia while working full-time last year. Hopefully the 3.8 I racked up there makes a convincing case that I'm no longer a volatile undergraduate hippie who can't be bothered to attend class. 3/8/06 KeithHScott

Not really a success story, but I think I'm a pretty strong applicant despite a 3.04 GPA in CS at a good engineering school. First 2.5 years I had a 2.7, then for the last year and a half I had a 3.5. Had 740 GMAT. Also some really cool work experience, as I crewed on a yacht that crossed the Pacific after college. My dings stem more from the 2 yrs W/E in corporate america rather than gpa. 3/9/06 110th st

Another low GPA success story....I got into Kellogg with a GPA of 2.7 (Ivy league school). GMAT was around the average for Kellogg. 3/21/06 hekmatyar

2.9 gpa. downward grade trend. major gpa something like a 2.3 (obviously did not highlight) econ (which apparently for everyone else was an easy major) no alt transcript. 730 gmat (gave up a few months of life to study for it) Accepted at wharton. is it just me? seems like wharton's the way to go if you have low gpa but story to back it up. all i can say is... there's hope! at the end of the day, you want them to look at who you are, not what your stats are. i was really discouraged when i started out, specially from reading all these forums. but at the end of the day it's really letting what you're all about shine through, not about contorting yourself to fit what you think they want. of course you do that strategically, but really, the process is not as fake and superficial as people on these boards make it out to be. they really do want to get to know you! 3/21/06 akanelo

Hi everyone, I fit in this category, I had just below a 3.0 from a solid undergrad school. I have almost 4 years of work experience and I took courses at a nearby community college to make up for my transcript. My quant score on the GMAT was good too. I am in at Darden and currently waitlisted at Chicago. I was waitlisted at Cornell but I'm going to take myself off. I think that it is definitely something you can overcome, but you need to act on it outside of the workplace in my opinion. My biggest piece of advice is that you can make up for weaknesses in the past, but you cannot make up for sloppy essays. Do not take the writing aspects of the application lightly, it will hurt you more than poor stats. 3/22/06 ScoobySteph

I haven't finished my quest yet, but I have had some success thus far, so figured I'd share... 2.46 ugrad Ivy CompSci, 710 GMAT (77% Q)
My work experience has been really strong (I'll have 7 yrs upon enrollment) with 2+ years of management experience. Been doing volunteer work for last 2 years and have been an electronic music DJ as a hobby for last 6. Start picking up extracurriculars ASAP if you don't have any. They make great essay topics, too, IMHO. Interviewed at Wharton, Columbia, and MIT in R1. Was really hoping for the MIT one, but got the ding. I took 3 classes (calc, accting, stat) and got A's and A+'s in them prior to applying. I think this was what prevented me from being "dead meat" (gotta love Sandy). I HIGHLY recommend you do this if you had a poor GPA. Also spent a ton of time on my essays and really tailored them to the specific schools. You really need to show you are extremely interested and knowledgable about the school, but its even more important if you're not one of those 800 GMAT / 4.0 braniacs who work at McKinsey and climb volcanos in their spare time. Just found out I was waitlisted at Yale (with no interview....weird) and so now I am enrolling in another class (econ) at UCLA Extension (online) to show that I'm still committed and that I am still going to do well in my classes. And who knows, I might get some love from HBS (although it hasnt happened yet), this whole process is such a black box I don't know what to expect any more! Hope this helps someone out there. And don't give up hope w/a low GPA. You absolutely should apply, but plan on working twice as hard as aforementioned brainiacs :) The way I look at it, they worked harder than me as a ugrad, and now I am paying for it. As a side note, having to bust my butt also made me constantly confirm that I really wanted to do this. 3/22/06 shifter0

40 Comments:

Anonymous said...: Ok, just to add one more-2.6 GPA and in at Chicago, CBS and LBS.; 3:21 AM
Anonymous said...: I'm a first-year at Columbia College, have a GPA of 2.65, but have only taken the hardest classes possible in the Physics department. Am i fucked?; 9:06 PM
Anonymous said...: How can you take the hardest classes in first year?; 1:45 AM
Anonymous said...: I'm a 2.6 gpa from Tulane. I started engineering and then went finance. I accept that I have a low gpa, it is no ones fault but my own, and I know it is not an accurate reflection of my performance...I had a very hard time adjusting to college and dealt with several personal issues.

It is definitely a negative mark, but I think it can be overcome...I want to go to a good graduate school, so I have my work cut out for me.; 6:12 PM
Anonymous said...: To all who have posted stories... THANKS!!! Feeling better about my chances already.; 3:27 PM
Anonymous said...: Thanks everybody. Can you please let me know how to take courses and build an alternate transcript to overcome the low GPA?
Which courses are most suitable?; 11:28 AM
Anonymous said...: Hi I would like to throw a twist out there... I have a 3.55 GPA but a very low GMAT score and it's deadline time. I have already submitted apps with the low GPA what are my chances at UCI?; 4:50 PM
Anonymous said...: Help here!!

School: Rochester Institute of Technology
Major: Electrical Engineering
GPA: 2.8
GMAT : (Haven't completed)
Work experience: Approximately 1 year (Consulting as a business analyst on a project with Abbott - private consulting firm)

My Question > I know I have several years to go and what steps do I need to take to beat the 'low gpa'. I will crack the GMAT with +750, but then what then? Is the consulting firm more important than the projects as a consultant?; 11:51 PM
Anonymous said...: What is the best way to develop an alternate transcript? Feedback would be great; 11:26 AM
Anonymous said...: I'm trying to get into the MBA program but a very low GPA, 2.2! Yuck-I know! But what are my chances!? High GMAT score? Anything else? I hold a great career, working for a high tech firm as a manager for the Engineering Services Dept., making nearly 6 figures! I graduated in 2005 with an undergrad degree in Bus. Management and now want to go back to school. How badly will that GPA hurt me?; 5:13 PM
Unknown said...: Hi guys, I really need some help here. First, I just graduated from Stony Brook University(Econ Major) with a 2.66 GPA. I know I really should have studied a lot harder than partied a lot harder.... I have been looking for a finance related job, but no luck. I feel like I really need to go back to school to do well and get my MBA. But just look at my GPA, no school will accept me, and I cannot get a decent job to back me up. what should I do?; 5:54 AM
Carol said...: Are you guys with low gpa's all engineering majors?; 12:31 PM
Anonymous said...: Low Undergrad GPA's, from top engineering schools don't hurt as much, i.e. 2.5 from MIT, CMU, Berkeley, Cal-Tech, Stanford or a place of that caliber.
You MUST have a damn strong essay (don't be afraid to talk about your GPA. but don't dwell on it) especially if it was like 5 years ago. Well above averages test scores, a 700+ doesn't hurt. Take a couple classes at full time colleges if you can. Stay away from community college, you have a 4 year degree, why would you go to community college. A strong post college resume will help too. Stuff like promotions at work. O, and if you climbed everest, I would definitely talk about that, the would eat that shit up. Key is to be ruthless, prove to them that you can hack it, that you have a hell of a lot more offer more that that 4.0 number cruncher who is socially inept. May sound like a broken record, but its true. You have to suck their eyes away from the G.P.A..; 1:49 PM
Anonymous said...: hey

i am at georgia tech with a gpa of 2.8
do u think i can get into wharton for mba; 3:14 PM
Petar Zelic said...: when a few of your said "alternate transcript" what does that mean?

i'm a comp sci major who just completed a bachelor degree and have a low GPA... if i take an extra term to improve it -- can i take any courses? can i take only 3 (min for full time)... do they have to be upper year courses? etc.; 10:57 AM
Anonymous said...: Thanks for the bit of hope you offer here.; 3:43 PM
Anonymous said...: I'm starting at Ross this year, and I had a 2.9 GPA undergrad including a semester on strict academic probation where I failed a class and received two Ds in my others.

The answer to your questions is YES you can get in to any school, but in order to do that, you have to be able to overcome the concern about your lower GPA and pair that with a well-written application that is strong in all other areas. B-schools expect flaws in people's backgrounds....that's how we all learn lessons, after all, and they love seeing that you've grown and have something solid to offer.

Have faith in yourself, work hard, and good luck!

-dew; 2:24 PM
Anonymous said...: guys, i'm in the middle between two options, i'm majoring in Marketing with a 2.7 GPA but i'm sure if i stay in marketing, i'll raise it up (the classes seems to be easy); from the other hand i scared i wont get a good paying job and i want to switch to Finance, but that will make me work harder while having a familly to take care of, and this will lower my GPA. what are my chances a fair gpa in marketing that show good grades at the end of my degree or a Fin with low gpa and creepy grades at the end. also, i'm North african (Morocco), will that help?; 1:31 PM
Anonymous said...: alternate transcripts????how ??
business classes???
Can you please throw some light on it.......Please; 7:11 AM
Anonymous said...: i'm from india with 3 yrs bachelors in business background and i got below 3.0 gpa at pre-mba i.e 3months foundation course of 9 credit hours from US.Is there chances to get mba admission?; 7:49 PM
Anonymous said...: I have a declining gpa from Kelley School of Business undergrad. Starting from 3.7 to 2.8. I was the VP of many organizations and on the board of several others. Now I'm on the board of directors of one of their alumni chapters. I am looking to get into an IVY league school starting fall 2010. Would it be beneficial to get a Masters first (certainly do extremely well) and then go back and apply with an IVY? or would it be sufficient enough to apply with a 700+ GMAT?

Thanks; 9:45 PM
Matthew said...: – I have a GPA of 3.1 from a top 100 school. My Bachelors is a BFA in graphic design of all things. Hardly any math in college. I did this while working 30 hours a week in my last two years of school, married, with a toddler. My BFA program was highly competitive.

– I have a 630 GMAT (93 percentile in Verbal!)

– I have international experience, I lived in South America for a few years serving as a community ambassador.

– I am a native English speaker with a fluency in Spanish.

– My work experience has been narrow. I have worked as a Graphic Designer/Art Director for 8 years. The last year of which I started up my own business. I published a magazine and website, sold advertising and managed a creative, editorial, and sales team. This experience is what got me thinking about an MBA.

– I am involved in community youth sports, I have coached baseball, basketball and soccer for three years.

– I have ecclesiastical leadership experience.

I live in Arizona and since I now have more kids, I am only considering local MBA's ASU's Carey, and Thunderbird.

I am wondering if my case would be a competitive one at a top tier school. I have noticed that UNC's GMAT's are slightly lower for a top tier school. Also curious about Fuqua and HAAS.; 12:01 PM
Anonymous said...: I recently graduated with an economics degree and a 2.3 gpa from the University of Texas at Austin. I could not have cared less about school when I was 18 years old and failed every class except for one D my first semester. Looking back now it is hard to imagine how I could have been so irresponsible, but I honestly don't regret it all that much. However, it does stink that I have to compete against people that made good grades all through college when thinking about getting a MBA. I feel like my ONLY chance to get in a good program would be to dominate the GMAT and have excellent experience. Of course I have to find any kind of job before I can gain excellent experience, stupid economy. I am studying for the CFA right now so I am hoping that will help me find a job and the rest will be history.; 6:48 AM
vinay ramakrishnan said...: k all you guys who made in to the ivy league schools I have something to ask u.how exactly is our GPA calculated ?i stay in India and i feel that education here is waay tougher than education in the US .I have a 70% in my first 2 years in under graduation but i feel that if i had studied the same course in the US i would have scored a better GPA ..i mean getting a 70% in my engineering course here is tougher than getting 70% in an engineering course in the US so if i convert my percentage to GPA it comes to around 1.5 which is reaaaly baaaad but i cant help that because the course here is grinding and the highest anyone can get is 89% so there..what am i supposed to do is my mark good or bad?; 12:40 AM
Anonymous said...: I have a 2.8 GPA from an engineering school. Yes, I screwed up.

I've come to realize that after reading the posts and the questions, I'm not concerned about my pathetic GPA.

With 4 years of work experience in great firms, speaking 3 languages, being an endurance athelete, a social life, volunteer experience, a failed business I tried to start, AND knowing where my short/mid/long terms goals are, getting into the top US or OUS schools can be done!

Oh...that GMAT! I'm going to make it happen.

Good luck to all of you!; 10:53 AM
Anonymous said...: I have you all beat. I had a 2.29 GPA and my major was Geology. Later in life I returned to graduate school. I was allowed in the graduate school but I only graduated with a MS in environmental geology with a 3.25 overall graduate GPA. I never found a job as a Geologist, even to this day, some companies request my 1985 transcripts and I am rejected for the jobs because I flunked Calculus II, foriegn language, mineralogy, and regional geology the first time I took the courses. I enedede up with Ds in foreign lanugauages and calculus II. I am now 51 and feel as if I am a failure in life, even though I did graduate with a BS and MS, but I have always been underemployed.; 5:29 PM
Anonymous said...: How about a 4.0 GPA and a 740 GMAT, but I probably won't get in because of all of the accepted washouts? Remember your luck could be another's misfortune.; 7:13 PM
Anonymous said...: 2.25 GPA and 11 years of great experience including management. What can I do?; 6:09 PM
Unknown said...: Hi,
like many others, I have a low undergrad GPA and I have my own kind of reasons for that. I hated my major, which was chemcial engineering but in my country you can not change ur major easily. after graduation I changed my job to sales and marketing including getting a degree in Marketing. I took GMAT and I got 530, I'm planning to retake. I dont want to go to top 20 programs, any suggestion for me?I have no chance to make an alternative transcript either.; 9:12 AM
Anonymous said...: you all realize no one has answered your questions. allow me.

get a gpa 4.0 or better.

become a CEO.

start a business school that admits students with terrible grades, excuses, and no work experience.; 5:10 PM
Kenneth Weinberger said...: I've spoken with admissions directors at a few schools, and they all tell me that taking extra classes after your undergrad is a waste of time. Personally, I have a 2.6 from Tufts and a 750 GMAT. I spoke with ppl at Stern and mentioned the extra classes idea and they said not to even bother. GPA was 3+ years ago. they are more interested in what you've done since. It's not like law school, its less of a numbers game. They are looking at it more qualitatively than quantitatively.; 8:53 PM
Unknown said...: I scored 60% in B.Tech in Information Technology in year 2004. What score in gmat would help me to enter in some business school.; 4:07 AM
ahmed said...: I have gone through this blog. I found it very interesting and helpful. Nowadays I am completing my online degree course from home.
So this blog really doing great for me.

Bachelor,s Degree; 11:39 PM
Low GPA MBA said...: I've summarized my experience with having a Low GPA and applying to MBA Programs on this website:

http://lowgpamba.blogspot.com

Hopefully, people will find it useful!; 1:21 PM
Anonymous said...: I applied and got into Berkley, Chicago, UCLA. 2.9 undergrad gpa from ivy school, econ major. I also took 5 classes at UCLA after undergrad and maintain an A average. I highly recommend using the optional essay to explain. Btw, I didn't get a spectacular gmat school (below 700), but I tend to write well, so I think my essays helped. I have 7 years work experience, so I think at that point, it's more effective than the undergrad gpa.; 11:19 PM
Anonymous said...: Low UG GPA, strong work experience.

Q: I am currently taking a 9 week GMAT prep course and it has been a tremendous help. Would anyone suggesting getting an adviser such as MBAmission? They're pricey, but I'm more motivated than ever to get into a top MBA program.; 7:38 AM
Anonymous said...: Not going for an MBA, but...I graduated from ECU in 1996 with a 2.04 GPA; dropped out the last semester and four Incompletes turned into four Fs (still had enough credits to graduate). Took the GRE last year (2009, actually), 740/710/5. Wrote my ass off in a Statement of Purpose, explained the low GPA from 15 years ago. Between then and now, I've spent the entire time in the US Army and I've published three articles in professional philosophy journals. I'm in the MPhil program at Columbia right now. It is possible.; 5:58 AM
Anonymous said...: Hey everyone, I just want your input. I am an undergraduate student right now majoring in Finance. My GPA is 3.17. I was initially premed and received C's in only my chemistry courses.

However, this semester was awful for me. I suffered from depression which I am still overcoming. I lost my grandmother not too long back as well as suffered a terrible break up with a bf of 7 years who I loved with all my heart.

My attendance this semester was very poor, and while I am getting A's in some courses this semester I received a D in a Marketing course because it was largely based on attendance and I had trouble just getting out of bed this semester. I received A's on all the exams for this course and still received a 71 percent in it but the professor grades based upon all the other students scores. I do own up to the fact that the D is my fault, but I sunk into a state of isolation.

In the future, I do intend to apply to grad school. I currently attend a third tier school. I am also the program coordinator of a large association consisting of 350 families. I am the sole program coordinator, there are supposed to be three, but two dropped out. I have undertaken a huge challenge being the sole program coordinator. I was also chosen to be the president next year of a campus organization dealing with diversity at one of the most diverse higher education institutions. Furthermore, it is for a honors college organization, and I am not a part of the honors college. I have two more years left to raise my GPA. I attempted to find a summer internship this summer, but was unable to. Do I have a shot at a top grad school? This grade has really got me down. Also prior to this year, I held the positions of youth coordinator and chair of finance in both organizations. Thank you for your help; 1:58 AM
jim said...: Hello Guys,

I wanted to get opinion in regards to my situation. I am graduating this December from a top 3 engineering school in the nation where my particular engineering program has been rated top in the world for past 10-15 years. I am graduating with a 2.8 GPA and an F on my transcript. I already accepted an offer with a consulting firm. My goal is to get into top MBA school after couple of years of experience. I wanted to know what I can do now so that I can make a compelling story and that my GPA would not be to my disadvantage.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated; 9:27 AM
Anonymous said...: You guys really do give us hope. I have a 3.3 GPA at the University of Maryland UG majoring in Finance and IS.

I plan on getting over a 700 and hopefully 760 on the GMAT... will that be good enough for the Harvards or the top IVys? at the point of my application I hope to have the CFA levels 1, 2, and 3 all done, and stuff dealing with leadership and humanitarianism before i apply. what do you guys think?; 7:44 AM

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Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Lectures to be recorded on digital web accessible Video for Chicago GSB-but only for students

I wonder if they'll hookup with Apple and do the iTunes thing like Ross did.

VideoBank captures and streams lectures at University of Chicago
28th March 2006
By Staff Writer
University of Chicago Graduate School of Business is using VideoBank technology to make recordings of classroom lecturers and guest speakers available to students online.

VideoBank, a software development company that focuses on media asset management, says twelve classrooms at the University's GSB Hyde Park Center now include integrated cameras for classroom recording. The Center is said to be using the VideoBank Encode / Logger as well as the VideoBank Web-Express VideoBank, to capture the lectures/speeches and make them available on the internet.

The technology vendor explained that video from the cameras is captured in MPEG format by the VideoBank Encode / Logger and then transcoded, usually to Windows Media format, for the web playback application. Video file storage is provided by a Dell server, with 500GB online storage and a terabyte offline.

Chicago GSB associate director of audio visual, David Gulbransen, said, "The system is incredibly easy to use, with a straightforward Web interface to schedule recordings. And the online Web interface that students use for viewing the lectures is so intuitive that it has never been necessary to offer any formal training."

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Georgetown - McDonough getting a new building

Groundbreaking Scheduled for McDonough School of Business Site

Washington, D.C. -- The long awaited McDonough School of Business site blessing and groundbreaking ceremony will take place at noon on March 31st. On-site in Lot T, McDonough School of Business Dean George Daly and President Jack DeGioia will commemorate the day along with more than 150 donors in attendance. The new building for the McDonough School of Business is an $82.5 million dollar venture, which is scheduled to be completed in the spring of 2008.

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GMAT Scores in Europe - Part 6 of 6

In my continuing review of GMAT scores, I decided to cover Europe this time. Guess who leads Europe for GMAT test taking?

If you're from the UK, you'll either be glad or sad to know that the following schools are the most popular ones that UK citizens send their GMAT scores too.

The rest of Europe competes for the following schools.

Because Europe is a country that has a vast reach, it would probably do you good to look up the more details stats. The source of these charts and numbers contain GMAT trends and a ranking of the the most popular schools or citizens of the following countries:

Swiss
Turkish
French
German
Russian
Greek
Spanish
Italian
Netherlands
Portuguese

Here's the download for document that contains the data for these countries.
Download

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Monday, March 27, 2006

The MBA Tour sign-ups started today.

The MBA Tour

There are two roaming group MBA tours where a huge number of schools gather to meet prospectives. Not all schools go to both. So to meet students, alum and admission directors at all top 10 schools, one must attend both. It's better to attend each individual schools info session, but these MBA Tours serve as good appetizers. To get an idea of what to expect, you can review my review

The biggest pro-con advice I can give about the info session of each school vs the group MBA Tour is as follows:

1) You can meet a lot of school staff, alum and students in a very short period of time at a Tour. It may be easy at these events to get an idea as to which individual school info sessions one will attend in the future.

2) Can gather all the literature one wants of all the schools at the Tours

3) Have to wait in long lines to ask your personal questions only to have 10-12 people listen to your story as you ask your question.

4) There is very little time to chit-chat with school reps. You are only able to ask a few questions.

5) You have but a few moments to make an impression. On the other hand, they too have only a few moments to make an impression on you.

6) The reps at the Tour are mostly good, sometimes bad. I've met some really good reps who proved very helpful. On the other hand, I've met some reps that turned me off because they either didn't know the answers to my questions which weren't that detailed or I was talked down to. In this case, you have to be very careful about letting that one person influence your opinion of the school. The golden rule with any school is to have multiple contacts. Sometimes, you'll get a poor representative. That's life. But, if you meet 3-4 people of a school, then you'll have a far more accurate idea about the culture of the school.

Sign-ups started today. Check it out.

July 2006

Asia
Beijing, Shanghai, Seoul, Tokyo
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
September 2006

Asia
Tokyo, Seoul, Beijing, Shanghai, Taipei, Bangkok, Singapore

India
New Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
October 2006
Latin America
Mexico City, Lima, Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Buenos Aires, Santiago, Quito, Bogota

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
November 2006
Canada
Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
January/February 2007
India
Upcoming!
================================================
Notable schools that will be at the MBA conference
Michigan - Ross
Wharton
USC
Yale
UC Berkeley - HAAS
University of Virginia - Darden
UCLA - Anderson
Univ. of Chicago
MIT
NYU - Stern
Duke - Fuqua
Columbia
Cornell-Johnson
Dartmouth - Tuck
INSEAD
IESE
London Business School
Oxford
IMD
Australian GSM

1 Comments:

MBABlogger said...: Thanks Dave for the info.. I attended one last year. It sure was very helpful..; 12:32 AM

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TOPMBA latest news for March 2006

Here's another source for news about B-Schools. When you sign up for the topmba world tour, you just keep getting their newsletters. This is the March issue.

by the way, here's the topmba.com schedule over the next few months. Now's probably a good time to go sign up and get alerts for the event. If you're applying.. you NEED to go. It's poor work and prep on your part not to go to one of these at some point.

Africa - Spring 2006
Johannesburg

Indian Summer Tour - Summer 2006
Mumbai (Bombay) New Delhi

Asia Pacific Summer Tour - Summer 2006
Manila Shanghai Beijing

Latin America - Fall 2006
Sao Paulo Buenos Aires Santiago Lima Bogota
Caracas Mexico City

North America - Fall 2006
Miami Atlanta New York Boston Washington DC
Los Angeles San Francisco Houston

Tuck and Pepperdine – Two of the USA’s leading schools have developed business education programmes specifically targeted at women. Pepperdine’s ‘Morning MBA’ programme, will take place at the school’s two campuses, in Los Angeles and Irvine, California. Linda Livingstone, dean of the Graziadio school at Pepperdine, says there are tens of thousands of women with a bachelor degree and several years of business experience who left the workforce to start a family “The Morning MBA programme will enable these women to re-enter the workforce with their MBA and a new skill set focused on leadership and addressing real-world business problems. We also will be providing significant career resources support including personal executive career coaching throughout the programme.”

At Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, Tuck has launched its latest executive programme, “Back in Business: Invest in Your Return” which it believes will be particularly attractive to mothers returning to work. The programme comprises four modules taught over an 11-day period in Hanover, New Hampshire, and New York City. Career planning and facilitating the process of re-entry into the workforce will be important aspects of the programme, which will take place in October 2006.

London Business School - Lehman Brothers, the global investment bank, has agreed to a five-year sponsorship commitment to establish and develop the Lehman Brothers Centre for Women in Business at London Business School. The Centre will seek to transform business education and practice, as well as serve as a springboard for the launching of new ideas and act as a forum for debate and discussion. Most importantly, it will aim to provide solutions for the challenges that businesses face in attracting and retaining talented women. The research agenda for the Centre will begin with a benchmarking exercise on the topic of women in business in Europe.

LBS has also announced four new Deutsche Bank Women's Scholarships for women on full-time MBA and Masters in Finance programmes. Women students with an interest in the financial services industry, who are successful in their application for the scholarship, will be awarded £20,000 towards their fees. The first scholarships will be awarded to students enrolling from September 2006.

Rotterdam School of Management - Every year the Executive MBA class at RSM selects a charity and aims to raise money for that charity to coincide with their graduation. This year, the class has chosen the Dutch children’s charity KIKA (acronym for Kinderen Kankervrij - cancer–free children) as their recipient charity and aim to have more than € 10,000. Fundraising activities include EMBA 05 candidate Maarten Post cycling 80 Kilometres to his own Executive MBA graduation and the whole class selling the special KIKA Teddy Bears to friends, family and colleagues.

Stanford - George Habash, a militant and former secretary-general of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, once characterised terrorism as a "thinking man's game." Using mathematics, researchers at Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) have made fighting terrorism a thinking man's game as well. CISAC affiliate Lawrence M. Wein of the Graduate School of Business and CISAC Science Fellow Jonathan D. Farley are both applying mathematical models to homeland security problems, such as preventing a nuclear detonation in a major U.S. city and determining whether terrorist cells have likely been disrupted. Wein, who teaches operations classes about different business processes used to deliver goods and services, has focused his research on bioterrorism and border issues. He has performed, he says, the first mathematical analyses of hypothetical botulism poisoning, anthrax outbreaks and smallpox infections. "One overriding theme of my work is that all these homeland security problems are operations problems," said Wein, the Paul E. Holden Professor of Management Science. "Just as McDonald's needs to get hamburgers out in a rapid and defect-free manner, so too does the government have to get vaccines and antibiotics out and test the borders for nuclear weapons or terrorists in a rapid and defect-free manner."

Manchester - The distance learning arm of Manchester Business School has launched an MBA specifically designed for professionals working in the construction industry.

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GMAT by Major - Part 5 of 6

So let's see how this affects our GMAT assessment. First, we need the overall Global GMAT average.

So here's how the college degree affects ones' GMAT competitiveness.

*** Wharton GMAT score was taken from their 2007 class profile.

Don't freak out. Remember, this is only part of the picture. But, this clearly shows the gap in expectation of scores between majors. Ask any Admission's committee member and they'll all say that the your undergraduate major does play a role in what they expect your GMAT score to be.

The section below will clearly show how the multiple factors come together to form a more reasonable GMAT score that is closer to what an admissions committee member would expect of your GMAT score.

Putting the past weeks data together, you should be able to see how to formulate your own customized competitive GMAT score.

*** Wharton's GMAT score was taken from their 2006 class profile.

The combination of background scores in the chart above is far closer to the actual competitive score than any of the GMAT charts that I've presented over the last week. Nevertheless, it's still too simplistic. Your gpa, resume background, life achievements, quality of essays also affect your competitive GMAT score. Other than the gpa, these othe qualities are nearly impossible to quantify. These non-quantifiable factors are what I call the X factors.

DISCLAIMER-DISCLAIMER-DISCLAIMER-DISCLAIMER
I do not recommend using this formula template as the end-all solution to identifying your exact competitive GMAT score. It's merely a strong foundation.

2 Comments:

Anonymous said...: Althought the GMAT is used for "admissions purposes" I feel it to be a poor judge of one's abilities to master Qualitative and Quantitative topics.

Some people are very good diagnostic test takes, while others are not, despite hours of study and review.

How does one, who is not a good diagnostic test taker, but acheived high marks in college, honestly explain a low GMAT score?; 8:11 AM
Dave for MBA said...: Chris, Actually the GMAT is a pretty good assessment of ones Quantitative abilities. It shows your ability to use logic with known information.

With regard to gpa, refer to my posting of http://daveformba.blogspot.com/2006/03/dealing-with-low-gpa.html
to see what I wrote about dealing with a low gpa.

In several days, I will be posting a compilation of people who were accepted with low gpa's at top 20 MBA schools. Watch for it.; 8:19 AM

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Sunday, March 26, 2006

European clocks advance one hour today

From Boing Boing
Hey Europeans! Remember that today's the day to roll your clocks forward for British/European/Irish Summer Time. Hey everyone else: Europe is now one hour in the future until Daylight Savings kicks in -- that means that London is 6 hours ahead of New York and 9 hours ahead of San Francisco. Paris is 7 hours ahead of New York and 10 hours ahead of San Francisco. Link

Update: Stewart sez, "Be aware that the eastern seaboard of Australia (Melbourne, Sydney, etc) NORMALLY end DST today, but this year it's delayed one week because of the Commonwealth games. Some folks may get caught out by that."

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GMAT Scores by Race - USA - Part 4 of 6

GMAT by Race

2 Comments:

Dave for MBA said...: Boy Wonder, 664 was the mean on a remote area of the UCLA website. I was looking at something this morning

http://www.anderson.ucla.edu/documents/areas/prg/mba/UCLAAnderson_Profile_2007.pdf

And the most recent data has the GMAT mean at 700. But the data I showed is correct for what you said about just adding 19 points.

Anyway, although numbers are bit off, the concept of the formula is exactly right.

BUT!!!!!! I need to remind you that you SHOULD NOT use this info to dictate a desired score. It's FAR more complex than this.

Looking at the data seperately merely shows you how one characteristic impacts the GMAT score compared to any other fact.

In fact, in tommorrows GMAT score series posting 5 of 6, you'll see a chart where I start to put these varous data points together. That will make far more sense of all this information for everyone.; 12:09 PM
Dave for MBA said...: Boywonder to, answer you second question, you would add 19 to 700 instead of 664 because of the correct mean score that I found from that PDF file. Therefore, the new competitive score would be 719 for Asian-Americans. In other words, being Asian vs White in America means that Asians as a whole tend to score 12 points higher on the GMAT than white-Americans. That's all these numbers are showing.; 12:40 PM

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Saturday, March 25, 2006

GMAT Scores by Country of Citizenship for 2001-2005 - 3 of 6

Refer to the GMAT and Age post to find out how to interpret the impact of this data on yourself.

The other day, when I wrote out how to interpret the age data, I was incorrect on my approach and my presentation was rather confusing. I've re-written the review and added some graphs. When you re-read my interpration formula, you'll find it easier to see how scores above the mean are almost required by certain races, majors and even age.

Note: this is a 100% compilation of all numbers of individuals based on citizenship. This means that if your in the US on a work visa and your from Taiwan, then these charts include your test.

If you have US citizenship, then the GMAT numbers that include you are included on tommorrow's Blog entry that includes American Only stats.

Countries from A - Bul (click on the chart below to enlarge)

Countries from Bur-Eth (click on the chart below to enlarge)

Countries from Fiji-Japan (click on the chart below to enlarge)

Countries from Jordan-Micronesia (click on the chart below to enlarge)

Countries from Moldova-Rwanda (click on the chart below to enlarge)

Countries from Somoa-Turkey (click on the chart below to enlarge)

Countries from Turkmenistan-Zimbabwe (click on the chart below to enlarge)

Tommorrow, in part 4, I'll be publishing GMAT scores that show how ones race influences the scores.

3 Comments:

Anonymous said...: I thought the title said that the table is based on citizenship?; 4:05 PM
Anonymous said...: Please Can you explain, Is the number in this data amount of persons which had taken the test ? Or is there all atempts that were taken in the country ?; 9:16 AM
Dave for MBA said...: This is the total number who had taken the test as citizens of each country. These are not limited to tests taken within each country. The GMAT score is the average score for each group of citizens of each country.; 12:34 PM

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Friday, March 24, 2006

USC Marshall School of Business students swindled

I'm still shaking my head after reading this article.

So Barry Landreth, a USC Marshall part-time lecturer in real estate finance and development talks up a storm in class about how he purchased land in Las Vegas and Chicago and that reselling the properties would bring returns of 190 percent within 30 to 45 days. The guy never owned the land!

Not only does this guy swindle people that are working for him, but he takes the money of a handful of USC Marshall students who wanted to make a quick buck.

Absolutely scandalous.

Authorities said Landreth's business was actually a Ponzi scheme, in which any money paid to investors comes from money put in by other investors. They said many of those who invested were USC business students who also worked briefly for Landreth but did not earn the salaries they were promised.

Source article

3 Comments:

Anonymous said...: more details on the arrest:

http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/news/local/article_1071756.php

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-me-professor25mar25,1,925958.story?coll=la-headlines-pe-california; 2:23 AM
Dave for MBA said...: It's really weird how Dean Gupta left in Jan-Feb time frame and Dean Gilligan took over in Feb. And this date coincides with when the scandal started in Jan as well. The timing of this couldn't have been any worse.; 10:40 AM
Anonymous said...: great detail article on Daily Trojan (USC Student Newspaper)
http://www.dailytrojan.com/home/index.cfm?event=displayArticle&uStory_id=db45cf4a-83cb-4f1b-820e-38dc36f554d2
FBI report details web of lies
Former USC adjunct professor Barry Landreth claimed to have properties in Chicago and Las Vegas for investment.
Ashley Archibald
Posted: 3/29/06
Former USC adjunct professor Barry Landreth was arrested Friday by the FBI after allegedly embezzling $1.5 million in a real estate investment scam. Some victims were USC students.

Landreth offered investment opportunities in Chicago and Las Vegas through Webster Realty Investors Inc., a group for which he is both founder and chief executive officer, according to the FBI's case affidavit.

The projects, called Discovery Opportunity Chicago and Discovery Opportunity Las Vegas, were hyped to investors as high-yield investment opportunities with potential returns of 190 percent within 30 to 45 days, according to the affidavit.

No investors ever received the profits of their investment, and only a few "persistent" investors were able to recover their principal investment.

The biggest individual loss was $700,000, FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller said.

The Chicago project was represented to both investors and employees of Webster Realty as a "$50 million real estate development project in downtown Chicago," according to the affidavit.

Landreth claimed to have sold the Chicago property to the Cendant Corp., a real estate and travel firm, rather than develop it.

Cendant claims in the affidavit to have no record of any dealings with Landreth or the DO projects.

When profits failed to materialize for the supposed sale of the property, Landreth reportedly blamed the delays on "the USC Credit Union, Paul Hastings law firm, an in-house accountant, third-party vendors and an escrow company," according to the affidavit.

The Las Vegas project was purported to be a development project for 130 acres of land near McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas. Landreth raised $780,000 for the project, though the land was not for sale, said owner Theodore Lee in the affidavit.

Landreth maintained his con by telling investors that he had dealings with various financial and law firms, falsely claiming to be involved with Cendant, Chicago Title Insurance Co. and Paul Hastings, according to the affidavit.

He also assumed the identity of Christine Shipp, his supposed attorney of seven years, in his dealings with investors. It has since been verified in the report that Christine Shipp does not exist.

Of the $1,473,000 that Landreth allegedly stole, $718,000 was transferred to Landreth's USC Credit Union account. Another $22,000 was deposited into Merrill Lynch accounts. The remainder was spent on Webster employee salaries and refunding principal investors, according to the affidavit.

Landreth spent embezzled funds on a 2005 Cadillac Escalade, show horses stabled at the Coto Valley Equestrian Center in Trabuco Canyon, Calif., and two racehorses in Oklahoma, in addition to the various financial accounts, Eimiller said.

The show horses alone cost $500,000, Eimiller said.

No money was ever used for the original purpose of land development.

Landreth employed several USC students from his business classes. Though some were promised salaries of $100,000 per year, eventually paychecks stopped coming, the students said in the affidavit.

They were also told they had health insurance benefits that never materialized.

Webster Realty was operated out of the homes of Landreth and his employees. Though he claimed to have leased office space, Landreth told employees that "he never occupied the office space because he wanted to be closer to his corporate jet in Orange County," according to the affidavit.

During the course of FBI agent Brad Howard's investigations of Webster Realty, Howard discovered that there are no earnings records for the company with the California Employment Development Department other than those from Landreth's legitimate income from USC.

"Based on my experience investigating fraud cases, I would expect that if Webster were a legitimate business, there would be records at EDD demonstrating Landreth's or other employees' wage information from Webster during this time period," Howard wrote in the affidavit.

"Landreth nor Webster had any significant assets other than income from the victims," according to the affidavit. At one point, there was "little more than $200 in the Webster account."

In a tape-recorded conversation with an employee and former student identified as Greg S., Landreth claimed that the Webster Realty Investors Inc. was worth $3 billion.

This is not the first time Landreth's honesty has been called into question.

Landreth was involved in the planning of the Myrtle Beach Pavilion Amusement Park from May 2004 until Jan. 2005, when Burroughs and Chapin Company, Inc. removed him from the project after Landreth was accused of questionable business practices, according to Knight Ridder.

To secure the position, Landreth faked letters of reference and earning statements. It was also discovered that his Los Angeles-based company is registered offshore in Bermuda, according to the article.

Rumors of bad checks and undisclosed investors also followed Landreth into the Myrtle Beach project, although none of this was revealed in his original background check by Dave Sebok, executive director of Myrtle Beach's Downtown Redevelopment Corp.

At the time of the Myrtle Beach project, Landreth was employed by USC as an adjunct professor and had been conducting his DO Las Vegas business since Jan. 2004.; 12:17 PM

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GMAT and App Trends - Asia and India - Part 1 of 6

This is part I of 6 in a GMAT Series of score vs background overview.

On a daily basis, I face a whopping amount of e-mail because of the Blog. I interact and try my best to stay up to date with my fellow Bloggers. But compared to 2 years ago when there were less than 20 MBA related Blogs, it's become impossible to stay on top of things. My biggest regret is that I don't always get around to finding out about B-School acceptances. I'm truly happy for all my fellow Bloggers who have received acceptances; especially when the acceptance comes from a school of their strongest desire.

Speaking of a lack of time, staying on top of trends is a real challenge. When I provide feedback to others or provide pointers as to where to find particular information, I try to speak from experience or factual information. The one area that is often difficult to be factual about is the growing trend of Indians that are drastically changing the face of Business School education today. So it was a pleasant surprise to run across some charts that helped me to see appears to going on with GMAT trends and MBA applications.

First of all, take a look at the GMAT trend over the last 3 years: It's turning around as you can see. In January of this year, there were 12,000 GMAT tests taken worldwide. It's still too early to tell yet what the GMAT trend will be for 2006 at this point.

Now take a look at the last 10 years. This one doesn't show a split of the US and non-US numbers, but it's still a good graph to see the trend. The problem with this graph is that it incorrectly reports GMAT number still going down from 2004 to 2005 which is incorrect.

Going back to the non-US numbers, I'd like to show you where the Asian trend is going

A lot of data isn't it? The two most significant conclusions that I got from the two graphs above are:

1) The number of GMAT test takers that took the test in India versus those who are of Indian citizenship is at a 2:1 ratio. My point is that, we might talk about the increasing number of Indians in India who are taking the GMAT, but the reality is that half of them aren't even in India. Many of them are in my backyard here in the U.S.

2) Secondly, of all the Asians in the world, the number of Indians who have taken the GMAT has more than tripled over the last 5 years. In fact, Indians (Globally) have come to dominate the total number of Asian GMAT test takers so much so that the total number of GMAT tests taken by Indians is two times the Chinese who are the next highest ranking group of Asian GMAT test takers.

It's now easy to see why those from India are constantly seeking to find out if their 700 GMAT score is really enough. A 700 score is enough, but the increasing numbers of Indian peers that are competing for the same spots has created such a disillusioned frenzy.

The final bit of data that should interest Asians and Indians is what schools Asians as a whole and Indians are sending their GMAT scores. Note: this doesn't mean that this is these number parallel the actual applications. But these do show what is clearly on the mind of prospectives as to what schools they are seriously considering applying to.

So, if you're Indian, you can now say with 100% accuracy which schools are THE most competitive for Indians and Asians as a whole.

My eyes were opened as to what is really happening in the growing trend of Asian applicants to Business Schools. And I gained more compassion for Indians.

Why the frenzy and why now? I'm leaning towards a conclusion that India is Westernizing very quickly. Perhaps too quickly. It can't be easy to have families pitted against one another because of social jealousy because of the financial bounty that one family has and the other does not. India is a culture of social closeness and traditions; so it's easy to see jealousy(or lack of the sharing of blessings) could become a big issue. I think this quick cultural change to "go, go, go" over "family, family, family" is going to really hurt India. Over the next 10 years, I think that Indians will find that it will become easier and easier to make the decision to not want to go back to the homeland. It's changing fast and the sudden rise of B-School applications is evidence that India is in the middle of an Industrial revolution.

15 Comments:

Meru SAVARNI said...: One of the reasons why you find that most of these GMAT test takers who are not even in India numbers rising - most of these guys are IT people...who get sent on onsite assignments to US...and these guys develop GMAT / MBA dreams after spending that time in US.

A decade ago there was not that much participation by Indians..and it is indeed closely reflected by the fact that IT industry and Onsite assignments were relatively few. SInce the time these have seen an upswing, numbers in GMAT and MBA have also seen a similar trend.

It's a pity that most of these test takers cannot putup strong enough applications. The number of Indians in US b-schools would otherwise be even much much big.; 7:00 AM
Dave for MBA said...: It's quite amazing just how many people from India left to work abroad. It's completely changed the landscape of competition at B-Schools. There are many countries who have had similiar "work abroad" options. I'm always fascinated about how or what it is about Indians of all races that has catapulted them into the Business World and B-Schools.

In other words, I think this underlying point is worth understanding because it has the makings of a poignant and insightful series of points for MBA essays. I'd like to see more Indians comment on this point.

A lot of people comment on what they think is happening, but I still haven't seen clear succinct points about the cultural, religious, social or economical reasons why this is happening. Or is this simply about money?; 10:18 AM
Anonymous said...: Hi Dave,

I'm an Indian Software Engineer working in San Jose. I'm 29 and I have a MS in CompSc from the US, and a BS in CompSc from India. To me, applying for an MBA is the logical conclusion of what my mother instilled in me in my young age, which is, a love for education. You see, for most middle class people, education, particularly in engineering, siencne, and business
is more of a survival strategy, first and foremost.(Brother, i' talking about 1.1 billion people, out of which more than half are competing for the limited jobs). As a process of getting educated, (and really my mom wouldnt allow me to settle for anything less thana PhD. But, i got so much bitten by the cold in virginia that i swore i'll either live in San Jose or go back to B'lore and ditched my PhD ideas after my Masters). Anyway, now i feel a void in terms of learning something new. I cant do a PhD now, and the MBA program seems liek something new and interesting that can keep my love for learning continue and who best to learn it from, than the ingenious and masters
of education - The Americans. Plus, my theory is that, If i do go back
to India (i think i will), I dont want to end up as a software dude doing C programming for the rest for my life. U see, in the US, my collegeaue, an American, who I respect very much is aroun 70 years old and he is a hardcore software engineer. he is just a total guru. But, i cant envision such a thing back in India. In India if u are a software engineer after 40, you are doing it 'coz you couldnt do anything else :-) U see where i'm trying to get to ? So, it becomes a social/prestige issue (although i'm the philosophical type and couldnt care too hoots what my neighbor or uncle down the street thinks of me.

Anyway, your blog is jsut amazing bro. You should write a book of your own on this whole MBA application/strategy process. I will definitely buy your book.
regards.; 1:18 PM
Meru SAVARNI said...: "but I still haven't seen clear succinct points about the cultural, religious, social or economical reasons why this is happening"

It's ALSO about money, NEVER ONLY about money.

Actually, the topic warrants a more elaborate discussion.

I think there are two common factors that run across all these reasons you've mentioned -

1. the irrepressible need for respect, recognition

2. adaptability to surroundings.

I think these two factors make Indians go through all kinds of struggle, hardship to achieve what they have set out to do.

Now when a people given to such skill and value system have to work in an environment (read Indian Political, Social and Economical institutions) that is dysfunctional, free-wheeling and not open to change - it is only natural for them to reach out to other societies/countries where their skills are in demand and their life is comfortable.

Couple with this, the fact that there are a million people waiting in wings to do the same thing - competition is bound to make one constantly wary and hence that much more skillful.

These factors run across all those speheres of life you had mentioned.

1. Cultural - Some people have called it the Brahminical bias in our education - thoughts are considered more important than actions. Achievers are always supposed to focus more and be good at thinking while implementation can happen "somehow". Hence we are selling our minds, our great ideas to people in foreign countries who are good at implementing them. As thought leaders, most Indians are happy to see their work realized and recognized.

2. Religious - I do not personally think there is any religious reason why an INDIAN who would go abroad and make name. There is no better religious, spiritual country than India, for Indians.

But the values of live and let live that every religion of India preaches,must have had some influence in the way many Indians carry their lives, particularly when they live in foreign societies.

3. Social - A rigid class, caste, region, status based hierarchy of the society means that merit is the exclusive prerogative of only a few, who anyway find it to be less usefull for, the other group who have NO INCENTIVE to be meritorious & efficient because of reservations, continues to live at the expense of Indian state's wealth, contributing nothing back.

4. Economical - 50 years of protectionism and socialist mindset has only shackled the brain power of so many hardworking people. 1991 proved a beginning and gave a lot of options to anyone with a mind-based skill. I think most people have utilised those options and went places. A related factor is that those same options do not exist inside India as much as they do outside, which is why so many have gone abroad.

Purely from an MBA application and essay perspective, I think most Indian applicants do not have the luxury of the wide creative career pursuits that most applicants from other cultures do. I think this point was made earlier. Many adcom find our backgrounds, achievements, essays etc. pretty much saying the same thing - i'm an Indian..i have 750+ score 3.5+ GPA, i went to IIT, I was an IT CODE JOCKEY...and so using all the "I"s i've gathered so far - i want to go to another place with an I - IB..; 3:35 AM
Dave for MBA said...: I'm humbled by the responses. Your guys responses will be read by many and educate quite a few.

My opinion about all this starts with the oppressive Caste system where creating a life for ones family or ones self has four key channels 1) Lucky opportunities 2) Crime 3) Education 4) send a family member out to bring money in.

The level of growth in higher education(IIT etc), the amount of money used for private tutoring to do well in school has hit a huge fruitful result over the last 5-7 years. For 10-15 years, the entire country seems to have done a huge push to get as many kids as possible to get educated as engineers, doctors, lawyers and the like.

The bad side is the amount of judgement that comes from not doing well in school. It must be quite demoralizing for kids who don't do as well.

Anyway, education just seems like a universal equalizer to get opportunities in life that one would not otherwise have. When I was growing up, the talk was always to be a doctor or lawyer as a kid. At some point.

The millions of parents in India merely want the best for their kids and it seems that education has become the primary channel for parents to push their kids to do well in. It's no different from Korea, China or Korea. In fact, these are the top three Asians groups who comprise the thsoe who have taken the most GMAT's. As a Korean, I think this is a big reason why I relate to Indians well. I understand the struggle and the talk talk talk from family and parents who push children to do well in school in order to have a lucrative career.; 8:38 PM
Anonymous said...: Hi!

Where did you get the data from?

Daniel; 1:46 AM
Dave for MBA said...: Anonymous. The data came directly from GMAC.com. You can go there yourself and download the data for free. This info is freely available. I just took the time the time to go through it, pull info that I thought was relevant and post it.; 5:38 AM
Amateur Blogger said...: Interesting statistic to note is that score reporting, among Indians, is highest to the Indian School of Business.

For this chunk of people, it's not the American dream pulling them, it's the desire for education, resulting from one or more of the factors already discussed.

However, based on my interactions with a lot of prospective applicants to ISB, for most of them that is the only school they apply to.

Therefore, although it rightfully contributes to the number of Indians desiring a business education, it skews the number of Indians craving a foreign MBA.; 3:22 PM
Dave for MBA said...: Amateur Blogger,
Not sure if your comment was agreeing or disagreeing with a particular point. You seem to draw a conclusion from your interactions with ISB's. Perhaps in your circle of people... nevertheless, these are comprehensive numbers reported from GMAC. Therefore, I really doubt anything could be said against these numbers. Let's be careful about how we compare opinion vs fact. If this is an incorrect conclusion on my part about what you're saying, then please explain for other readers. As I've said before, I'm not trying to be right or wrong here. I want myself and all the readers of any Blog entry to clearly see what is the truth.; 3:35 PM
Anonymous said...: I'm not contesting the numbers themselves. I'm just using additional information to interpret them a little differently.

I look at Table 7 and see that ISB is the school that most test takers in India send their scores to.

Like you said "these do show what is clearly on the mind of prospectives as to what schools they are seriously considering applying to."

All I'm saying is that although the number of Indians who want a business education has gone up significantly, not all of them wish to pursue their MBA outside India.; 9:53 AM
Anonymous said...: The increase in applications to Indian B-Schools like the ISB [which recieved around 3000 applications this year] is 46% CAGR [from the GMAC data] while the increase in the applications to global B-Schools by Indians have increased at 7% CAGR [again from the GMAC data]. If the trend were to continue, [there are now 7 programs in India which accepts only the GMAT score compared to just an ISB 3 years back] the number of Indian GMAT takers applying to Indian schools will overtake the global applications from India by the year 2009.

The IIMs have not increased the seats in the last 10 years, while the number of applicants have increased from around 50k to 2 lac. Logically, good candidates will look at programs like ISB, which accepts the GMAT score pushing the Indian GMAT test taker number.

One more piece of data which might be of help. The IIMs accepts the CAT score, but if you are an Non-Resident-Indian, it accepts the GMAT score. Therefore if an Indian abroad wishes to go for any top Indian MBA program will necessarily have to take the GMAT.

There would be social, cultural impact on the increase of GMAT applicants of Indian citizenship but I think the real reason something else!; 2:16 AM
Anonymous said...: One main reason for this trend is lack of options for the experienced professionals for MBA in India. IIM's and other top tier schools usually have lot of competition from freshers w.r.t entrance scores. And Executive MBA is'nt widespread yet.; 10:32 PM
A random sweet guy said...: Great data. I was looking for just the kind of data. Amey; 11:36 PM
Anonymous said...: A little late to be commenting, but here is my 2 cents anyway. I am an Indian engineer working in the US, thinking about an MBA and here's why I think Indians in the US tend to gravitate towards an MBA. The typical Indian engineer has a number of cultural differences from a typical American engineer. For instance, he is not comfortable in a bar, does not enjoy talking about football or baseball, and has a sense of humor that is just different. These tend to arrest his career progress beyond a certain point. For these reasons, it is not very common for an Indian engineer to be able to talk his way to the top. The MBA is seen as a shortcut, or a way to compensate. There are a number of Indians who do not match the above stereotype, but I honestly admit that I do and that is why I want an MBA.; 9:41 PM
Anonymous said...: Another thing that should not be ignored as well is the numbers. It is my belief that IQ distributions are the same in all countries of the world. So, the top 1% of Indians would be of a similar quality as the top 1% of Frenchmen or Chinese. But since India has a billion people, that top 1% of people is 10 million people. Thus the competition among Indians at business schools is often tougher.
Meanwhile, thanks Daveformba for the original post. This information is exactly what I was looking for.; 9:47 PM

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GMAT Scores and Age - Part 2 of 6

Over the next 6 days, I'll be releasing a series of charts and statistics of the mean GMAT scores in the areas of age, race, sex, country, and undergraduate major. Yesterday, I released Part I.

It's very difficult to ask people what GMAT score is necessary for you to gain acceptance into a top 10 or 20 school. It's a complicated answer because it depends on a combination of your age, race, sex, your academic background and gpa. And these are just a few of the factors. By combining these factors, one can get a FAR better idea of what an ideal score is for ones particular situation.

Wondering about age and GMAT scores? When B-Schools look at your GMAT score, they have an idea about what impact your age has on your capabilities of getting a good score because of their experience that is supported with statistics like the following chart. Remember, the scores should be used to only show trend and not dictate to you the actual score. Look for the global mean score and correlate it to the mean score at XYZ school.

Here's how to assess these numbers for yourself. First of all, you have to know the mean score of the most recent year for all GMAT test takers that correlates to the numbers below. Here's the chart:

Next, find your age bracket and Male/Female bracket score. Let's take a male and female who are 26-27 years old. The Mean score for males was 555 whereas the mean score for a woman was 514.

Next, find the mean score of the school that you are interested in.
Kellogg had a mean GMAT score of 700 in 2005
UCLA had a mean of 664 in 2005

Here's how you'd make the calculations for UCLA

Using this formula/template, it's easy to see how ones age impacts your competitiveness. When I use the word "competitive", I'm merely saying that your score is in no way a liability. If your 26-27, scoreing above the mean GMAT score would mean that your "highly competitive". Get it?

Ladies and gentlemen, this is not hocus pocus, mumbo jumbo stuff. The trend of these numbers is something that seasoned admission directors know all about. They don't have the numbers memorized, but they know what to expect of certain majors or people with certain kinds of profiles. Take these numbers seriously. But only pay attention to the trends in comparison to other areas.

Obviously this example is overly simplistic as I didn't taken into account the person's background, race, major, work history, achievements and etc. Understanding this will also help clear up the anxiety of not knowing where you stand.

This is why it's quite unfair to just ask an Alumni what GMAT score they think will be competitive without first telling them about your profile.

Having said this, if I hear about how you went to an info session or mba conference and you ask the GMAT question without giving a bit of your profile... the admissions committee members, students and Alum have my full endorsement to ring your neck on the spot. I know they wouldn't do it, but nobody really likes this question very much.

Here's Part 2 on Age and the GMAT scores.

Again, it's never this simplistic because there are never situations where it's this simple. Moreover, the applications are reviewed by people who assess on more than just scores. So don't let the numbers defeat you. This is only a mean score statistic and not an encompassing one that shows the 35 year old who was accepted with a 610 GMAT score. You get the point right?

M = Men
W = Women

Here's the age and GMAT score difference.

Tommorrow, in part 3, I'll be publishing GMAT scores that show how various countries compare on mean GMAT scores. You'll see what the mean GMAT score in India is compared to the mean GMAT score is in China, Italy, Japan or Germany. The list contains over 100 countries.

5 Comments:

Benny said...: wow.
interesting info.
how do you get all this?; 6:29 PM
Dave for MBA said...: Good question Benny. These are all from ETS/GMAC. They are from documents that they produce but haven't been widely visible. I'm merely taking some key data points and crafting a message with this info that I think is profoundly important to have access to.

I live by the credo that data is only as good as the interpretation. So the graphs and charts that I point out in this 6 part GMAT series should be the kind of info that could change the way they view their application stats from this point on.

Put simply, because of this data, prospective students can now answer the questions, "what are my chances if....." for themselves.

Because all these numbers are from GMAC, they are 100% accurate.

When I'm done with this series, I'll reveal link addresses of the downloadable articles so that people can go over the extensive data for themselves. That is if people haven't found them already and figured this out on their own.; 8:58 PM
Anonymous said...: Hello Dave...
I got a GMAT score of 550 , i was getting in 600+ in the practice tests but got this low score..should I apply or not i am very confused and dishearten.. please suggest; 5:33 AM
Dave for MBA said...: E-mail me directly for an answer on your GMAT issue anonymous for a better answer. Please provide more detail when you do e-mail me. Nobody can possibly answer your question without more info.; 8:20 AM
Anonymous said...: These appear to be screenshots/jpgs of the GMAT Profile and the associated charts on the GMAT Profile website. http://www.gmac.com/gmac/researchandtrends/gmatstats/profileofcandidates.htm What you are saying about the data is not erroneous because you are just providing people with the mean GMAT® score info, but you should source the data since you copied it directly and it is copyrighted.; 10:16 AM

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Thursday, March 23, 2006

Job Market Growth

A few days ago, Jeffrey over at BusinessWeek had an article published about the growth of the Job market. It was a little disorienting because the article started out with a comment from a Business School student, but the article was primarily about the growth in job offers and salaries of Undergrads.

Nevertheless, Jeffrey's research revealed some good points to take into account that trickles into an indirect impact on B-School grads.

Jeffrey wrote:

"Undergraduate hiring is expected to increase by 14.5% this year over last, according to a September, 2005, survey of 256 companies by NACE."

This percentage is too high to be ignored. This is not a blip to be ignored. It's a sign that the economy is growing and businesses are thriving. That means that those who are graduating in the next two years have a high likliehood of seeing some real payoff for their B-School education.

How much are jobs really being impacted?

I think Gulamali says it best which is why Jeffrey ended the article with this quote.

"There are just a lot more jobs right now," says Gulamali. "I've heard the war stories from my friends in the Classes of 2003 and 2004, talking about how hard it was to get a job." Of his 12 offers, Gulamali says he can directly attribute four to the strong economy. The rest he'll take credit for himself.

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Tuesday, March 21, 2006

7 Comments:

Benny said...: This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.; 4:36 PM
Benny said...: + 2 fun videos:
http://gprime.net/video/therealsimpsons/
http://gprime.net/video.php/bennythesupercop; 4:37 PM
Anonymous said...: Good job with the blog(except the fun videos part.) "These guys have no shame"...that dig, and the subtle reference to Indians, not cool at all. It's just a bunch of guys doing stuff...similar to what you'd expect from most people that age, mind you, from any coordinate of the globe. I sense a bitter feeling toward Indians(from a few of your older posts as well). I hate to preach, but I feel you could be a much better person by being tolerant...and by recalling 'shameless' acts from your past.; 4:27 PM
Dave for MBA said...: hbs_ind,
I think if you look at my post a few days later, you'll see that I'm not biased against Indians, but rather curious about the growing trends of Indians.

In fact, 1/2 my peers are Indian and I've had a lot of positive comments about the funny video.

Like I said, the video "curry-n-...." shameless and I genuinely found it funny. I see myself as an Indian insider rather than an outsider. I'll watch my tone in the future... thanks for that, but I'm allowed to poke fun at the people are talk to and work the most with aren't I?

I'll take whatever criticsm. It can only help me be more sensitive to others feelings... which I consider important.; 5:16 PM
sorebrek said...: Lighten up kids. It is a fun video; my only peeve is that it could've been done more creatively. Parts of it was monotonous, but hey they get an A for trying.

Dave is an India hater - as much as he is a martian.; 7:13 PM
Anonymous said...: You've displayed your maturity and honesty through your response. I guess I was too quick to judge.
Peace!; 2:44 PM
Anonymous said...: Hey Dave,
I'm Indian-American and thought the video was hilarious! Where are you in your MBA application process? I have been reading your blog for over a year now, and hope you get into a great school. I'm an older applicant also (32). I applied to 13 schools and was rejected by all of them except one - a top 15 school. All it takes is one school to like you!; 8:30 AM

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Monday, March 20, 2006

Dealing with a low gpa

I've received quite a few e-mails on this posting. I've posted a general response.

From XXXXXX,
Recently you ran a GMAT marathon thingy where people posted how they got into business school despite a bad GMAT. Maybe you can run a GPA marathon as well where people can post strategies to overcome a low gpa. It'd be mighty helpful.

Dave's response:

When I compile enough info on GPA info, I'll post it. For now, here's my perspective on addressing the gpa in applications. A GPA of 3.1 or lower is of concern so you'll need to explain it. You'll need to clearly express why you need the MBA and how you have a trail of activities that make it clear that a good school should partner with you as you continue to achieve your career goals. Show that you accept responsibility for your actions and show by the story of your life in your other essays that you have moved on. Perhaps you could take classes in accounting, business concepts, math or show higher degree type of classes with good grades. This certainly helps, but don't kill yourself doing it.

A GMAT score of 650 or lower could definitely benefit from the strategy I mentioned above, but it's a very small piece of the application presentation pie. The goal of your essays is to get noticed for the great candidate that you are. Then the admission committee's spend time looking closer by noticing your work ethic and achievements like the extra classes. In other words, don't make the mistake of spending 40 hours of class and study time only to suffer and end up putting a mere 20 hours of time into your essays. If your essays or GMAT prep are suffering for any reason due to the classes or extra work at your daytime job... then don't hesitate to drop the class. Say you took the class at Bart Simpson School. You don't have to report your grades from classes you dropped... even if you get a negative mark for withdrawing beyond the drop date as defined by that schools policies. This is because the class was not directly related to your undergraduate or graduate degree. This is just being strategic. Using all the resources you can to legitimately and ethically leverage your best application package while sustaining a focus on the application task priorities is perfectly reasonable. By the way, classes don't have to be taken at top schools.

Just be honest about why you didn't have the focus during the time you went to school. The truth of the matter is that a low gpa shows a lack of maturity, focus and discipline. The admissions committee wants to know if you have grown out of it and if it was just a stage that can be easily overlooked. If you don't do well, and admission committee member XYZ said "yes" to you and you don't do well academically while in school then it becomes a problem not just for the school, but for the committee member(s) who said "yes" to you. Why? Because when they said "yes" to you, they were putting their credibility on the line.

Overall, your shooting to craft an application message that clearly shows your maturity!

You'll need to be careful about how much you talk about the low gpa and focused on creatively describing the maturity and focus you have now. Your interviews and especially your letter of recommendations NEED to show this this as well. Just having good letters of recomendation won't cut it for you. You need to make sure that they clearly protray how well you can handle things and how you are focused, reliable and highly motivated.

Focus on these low gpa management techniques and you'll be able to put your best application package forward. Writing a long 200 word explanation of why you didn't focus in college is probably too much time spent on this topic. Put another way, spending too much time on the low gpa topic will slant the bigger message of your essays such that you may show how you live with excessive fear and perhaps struggle with an inability to move on from one's mistakes. In any case, I hope you get my point. Balance, Balance, Balance.

Best wishes.

Dave

5 Comments:

Marina said...: My $.02 on the topic:

I have a 3.1 from a state school (UCSB), did not explain it on the application and am in at CBS. Though I did fill out all the jobs I had while I was in school so maybe they figured that was part of the interference. Also, my GPA started out as a 3.7 my freshman year and spiraled in a downtrend through the 4 years. I did manage to graduate a quarter early by taking a full load and summer school every year.; 12:25 PM
Dave for MBA said...: Awesome comment Marina. This is a much needed comment to help create a full picture of this issue. I would add that your GMAT score would probably be important to know in assessing the impact of your GPA, what school you were at and classes you might have taken since you graduated.

I say this because a high GMAT score nullifies a lot of low gpa's the longer you've been out of school. Secondly, the school you graduated from has a big impact on your gpa valuations. For example, it is my understanding that students who received their undergraduate degrees from Ivy leagues automatically get a .2 to .4 bump in their overall gpa's when being assessed in comparison to other students.

I might add that race and what sex you are also plays a factor in this. Statistically, women tend to have lower stats than men as a whole on a per school basis. I say this lightly as there are some exceptions.

For the most part, I didn't want to get into all the exceptions and caviates when I wrote my original entry.; 4:28 PM
Anonymous said...: Funny thing is, I constantly hear about grade inflation at Ivy schools. And then adcomm add a quater of a point to that, how's that benig fair?; 11:23 AM
Dave for MBA said...: Tragically, this is evidence of the socio-economic layers in our US society. The rich can send their children to private schools where they receive an incredible education. One private High School in San Jose, California for example two years ago had 117 graduating seniors. 105 of them received perfect SAT scores. This is one of the best schools on the west coast. Many of these students had strong candidancy for Ivy League colleges or other colleges of their choice.

Over the last several years, the more I learn about our top 20 MBA US Schools and the people that go through them, the more I see the bitter reality of how a great education seperates people. God bless those who studied hard and had great intelligence genes and achieved great academic success regardless of their financial upbringings. More often than not however, those with money have a clear advantage in getting into top MBA Schools.

I haven't really heard mention of this hard reality of our society in my fellow Blogger postings or mainstream media that focus on Business Schools. I rather think it's an understood issue by most trying to get into a top school.

Having said this though, I clap for schools like Wharton, Ross, Kellogg, Tuck, and Johnson who have a reputation for giving those with less than stellar stats a more wholistic review.; 12:06 PM
Anonymous said...: You mention that writing a 200-word essay explaining your low gpa is overkill. Could you explain why? Many schools offer an additional essay specifically to address weaknesses in ones application (such as a low gpa) and usually allows 2-pages. How would you recommend someone use this 'optional' essay to address a low gpa?; 8:25 PM

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Blog status

From Blogger support.

Saturday, March 18, 2006

A clarification about the filer we restored yesterday: This machine is indeed up and functioning again, so the affected blogs are no longer entirely inaccessible. However, it is still not in great shape and we are in the process of moving all the data off of it and on to better machines. So over the next few days there may still be lingering and intermittent problems for some blogs. This includes the "forbidden" errors we're all getting tired of, as well as occasional publishing errors, or incompletely published pages. If you get an error viewing a blog, refreshing the page once or twice should clear it. For publishing problems, simply wait a few minutes and republish, and that should take care of it. Thanks for your patience while we work on clearing all this up.

Posted by Graham at 08:22 PST
Thursday, March 16, 2006

The filer that we have been having trouble with in the last few days failed again. Those blogs that are stored on the bad filer are temporarily not available for publishing and viewing. We are working on replacing the filer and restoring access to the blogs affected.

Update (10:40 am, March 17): The filer has been restored. All affected blogs are available for publishing and reading.

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Friday, March 17, 2006

Funny Videos

I just have to archive the links of these videos here. I want to go back and watch them on occasion to get a good laugh.

The first one is a "Whose Line is it Anyway" Episode. My whole family came into the room when I was watching this because they thought I was dying or something. I was......... of laughter. I had to be picked up off of the floor. This video reminded me of how good it is to laugh that hard. I honestly couldn't breath because I was laughing so hard. I haven't laughed like that in a while. I really needed it. Anyway, I hope I didn't raise the expectation of the video too much. Just think how bad a video it will before starting it.

1) Whose line is it anyway?

The second is a brokeback mountain manipulation of the movie Back to the Future. I was so impressed that a movie trailer could be manipulated in such a way.

2) Brokeback to the Future

This is a Robin Williams snippet on the invention of golf.

3) Golf invented

1 Comments:

Popcorneyes said...: Those were funny! My favorite funny clip right now is this one:

http://grouper.com/GlobalMedia/MediaDetails.aspx?id=461188; 12:06 PM

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Blog was down and locked last night

I received a flurry of e-mails regarding the "lock-down" of the Blog last night and this morning. From 4:30pm PST last night till this morning, the Blog has been mostly down and inaccesible because this Blog is located on a series of bad File Servers at Blogger.

It was rather frustrating for me as well because there was information that I wanted to look up, but I was unable to access my own site.

For now, the Blog is up, buy may go down again.

Various error messages such as "unauthorized access", "access forbidden", "you do not have permission to access this site", and "404 http errors" were reported.

Here are the blogger status messages:

Thursday, March 16, 2006

The filer that we have been having trouble with in the last few days failed again. Those blogs that are stored on the bad filer are temporarily not available for publishing and viewing. We are working on replacing the filer and restoring access to the blogs affected.

Update (7 am, March 17): we are still in the process migrating data off of the bad filer. We sincerely apologize for the continuing problems.

Posted by Pal at 21:14 PST

Currently photo uploading is not working for FTP users. We are aware of the problem and should have a fix within a few hours. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Update (4:10pm) : This has been fixed. Thank you for your patience.

Posted by Steve at 15:38 PST

Unfortunately, we have to do some maintenance on one of our filers today from 9 am to 9:40 am PST. Some blogs will be inaccessible while this is going on. Everyone is able to publish, however, regardless of whether or not the blog is down for maintenance.

We apologize to those blog owners who are affected by this.

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Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Ross and iTunes

Normally, I wouldn't comment on minor cirriculum adjustments within a Business School, but this change is worth noting. Today, Ross announced that they will now have four podcast channels that the Ross business school community will have access to for events, seminars and news content. The Podcasts will also include content related to Positive Organizational Scholarship, the William Davidson Institute, Dividend magazine and the Monroe Street Journal.

This content is only for those who have an iMpact login account. In other words, you have to be a student, Alum or staff/prof of the school.

There is absolutely no content being offered to the public.

So what's the big deal? Well, this is the first time that a school is using iTunes as the distribution channel for their internal class audio material. It's a shame not to see that it's so locked up though.

This whole Podcasting thing is very new to Ross. It's quite new to any B-School really. Eventually, someone will have to take this technology integration to the next level. I'm of the opinion that the next stage should be to provide the general public with access to say one in every 5 seminars and a few rotating samplings of audio class material. Giving away a portion of the content will have long-term exposure of the school that will allow us to see just how good the education is. It's sort of like wine tasting. You can give a taster the standard wine tastings, but give them the occasional "special tastings" of the stuff you consider your best stuff and you increase the liklihood of hooking them in. Podcasting/Videocasting would be a "special tasting" of the program that would make me want more.

The Podcast explosion is only about 1 1/2 years old. Moreover, it's only been in the last 6-8 months that Podcasts have seen a major explosion in number. Many try it and fail. Others don't really know what to do with it. For example, Haas has a handful of public "info-session-ish" Podcasts and they are well done. They need another 5-7 more to round out the topics, but they've stalled. It's a good start for HAAS so far. On the other hand, Kaplan tried something with GMAT stuff and they killed it last month. Now, they have one on the status of MBA recruiting for 2006. They don't quite have a unified front on how to present it very well or how to put it together yet. Somebody help their marketing/PR department.

Anyway, I look forward to seeing how Business Schools and MBA related vendors utilize Podcasts in the next 6 months. As far as I'm concerned, it can only get better.

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Monobo - news for MBA's

I want to highlight a new MBA news service web site. The news articles that show up are a little Business school slanted, but frankly, I don't quite see the difference between this service and the Wall Street Journal. I didn't see any articles from BusinessWeek or anything mentioning the recent Fuqua Dean situation.

The thing that makes the web site a bit different from other news sites is the MBA forum and facebook.

I imagine that over time, the articles hits will improve. It's in beta right?
Matt and Brent... I'm looking for better hits on articles that show the changes going on in Business Schools that directly reflect future business practices. Good start so far. Keep it up guys!

http://www.monobo.com/

3 Comments:

Catalina said...: Hi Dave, I checked this site, but if you are not in a business school or you haven´t been invited you can´t join.; 10:55 AM
Dave for MBA said...: Glad you checked it out. I didn't get that far. Guess the news thing is the only part non-MBA's we get access to? Well, it is after all "news and stuff for MBA's then" Oh well.; 11:29 AM
Anonymous said...: Hey Dave,

Thanks for checking out the site and the comments.

Brent and I are always looking for ideas on how to improve the site, so any thoughts are much appreciated!

- matt

ps- We're looking to expand the list of allowed schools and set up a non-mba invite system when i get back from break next week.; 9:07 PM