Chicago’s essay questions are now available for the 2005-06 season. As many of our readers know, the Chicago GSB has traditionally been famous for having quirky essay questions (about elevator rides with the dean, mascots for the school’s facilities, childhood heroes, etc). This year, there are substantial changes of note – suggesting that the days of quirky essay questions are now gone. As you will see from our brief analysis below, our guess is that this may relate to Rose Martinelli’s influence as the new director of admissions. Without further ado, here are the questions:
Essay 1: To complete, we require that you answer all parts of A, B, and C below. (1500 words maximum total):
A. Explain the path that has led you to pursue an MBA as the next step in your professional/ personal development. What steps did you take and how did you reach your decision?
B. What or who has influenced your choice of schools? What criteria will you use to decide where you will attend? What is it specifically about Chicago GSB that is going to help you succeed?
C. Describe your short and long term post-MBA career goals. What steps will you be taking in order to achieve your goals?
This is basically an expanded ‘career goals/why MBA’ essay, requiring applicants to cover their career path to date, interest in the MBA, specific interest in the GSB and the details surrounding their short and long-term post-MBA career goals. In fact, essay #1 is fairly similar to what has traditionally been Wharton’s essay #1…
Essay 2: Choose one of the following two questions to answer (500 word maximum for this essay)
A. Describe the most challenging team environment in which you have been involved. What role did you play? What impact did you have? What did you learn from this challenge?
B. Describe a time when you exhibited leadership skills even though you were not the designated leader. What was the situation? What skills did you utilize?
Both options for this essay focus on teamwork and the applicant’s ability to work with peers and make an impact/move things forward, etc. Options A and B are actually comparable to Wharton’s essays 2 and 3a from last season.
Essays 3 & 4: Choose two of the following five questions to answer (500 word maximum for each).
A. How have you used your personal characteristics and resources to improve the lives of others?
B. Describe a time when you felt a strong sense of purpose in your life. What motivated you? What changes did you make personally and professionally to achieve that purpose?
C. What would you consider the biggest failure or disappointment in your life? How did you adapt your plans or move past that failure or disappointment?
D. If you can spend one day as someone else, who would it be? Why? What would your day look like?
E. To be successful in life, you must be able to distinguish between a fleeting trend and a permanent development. Tell us of a time when you had to make such as a distinction. What, if anything, would you have done differently?
These topics obviously cover a great deal of ground, but they are essentially designed to get at the applicant’s passions, personality and outside interests. In order to properly select and address these questions, applicants will need to analyze their responses to Essays #1 and #2 and make choices that allow them to ensure that the essays all work together in presenting a balanced portrait of their candidacy. In fact, balancing the subject matter across a set of essays is a critical aspect of the MBA application process in general. Far too often, we see candidates who fail to use these kinds of short essays to add breadth to their candidacy – instead opting to draft yet another essay about their accomplishments in the work place.
Link to questions on the school’s site: http://www.chicagogsb.edu/fulltime/admissions/essay.aspx
Thanks to fellow blogger Sghama for calling our attention to the official publication of the new topics on Chicago’s site!
