The Association of International Graduate Admissions Counselors (AIGAC) was invited to present the findings of its 2009 MBA Prospect Survey to assembled representatives from many of the world’s top business schools as part of the annual Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) conference, which took place in Baltimore last week.
The presentation, delivered by AIGAC President and Clear Admit Co-founder Graham Richmond, outlined some of the major findings of the survey, which was designed to share with the schools AIGAC’s unique perspective on a specific segment of the overall MBA applicant pool, namely those who choose to work with graduate management admissions counselors.
This unique pool of applicants, most of whom are targeting highly competitive programs at business schools with extremely stringent admissions requirements, trends toward the top tier of business school candidates and represents a segment that leading business schools are very much interested in coming to better understand.
GMAC welcomed the opportunity to have AIGAC present at its annual conference, where representatives from more than 175 member schools gather each year to examine trends and developments in graduate management education. The schools paid close attention to the survey’s findings, which provided information about who AIGAC’s applicants are, how they make the decision to go to business school, what sources of information they use to gather facts about the schools they consider and what impact the current economy is having on their application process.
The AIGAC survey findings were presented for comparison alongside the findings of a broader GMAC survey of overall MBA prospects. The joint presentation helped showcase the particular attributes that distinguish AIGAC’s signature applicant pool.
Among the AIGAC survey findings that schools seemed to consider most notable were the following:
• Three-fifths of surveyed AIGAC prospects (59 percent) scored 700 or higher on the GMAT exam.
• Almost half (44 percent) were international students.
• A majority of prospects (52 percent) cited school websites as the most valued source of information in the application process.
• School viewbooks and brochures were considered far less effective sources of information. (Only 5 percent of surveyed applicants rated them as highly valuable.)
• The overall applicant pool is trending younger than in the past. (Thirteen percent of prospects were under 24, and two-thirds of prospects were between the ages of 25 and 29.)
• While more than a third of respondents (37 percent) reported that the economy influenced their decision to apply to an MBA program now, this factor was still secondary to career advancement.
In a brainstorming session that followed the presentation, GMAC conference attendees examined the ramifications of the AIGAC survey findings. Among the topics of discussion were how best to reach younger applicants, whether producing expensive printed viewbooks and brochures continues to make sense for schools and, as more prospects influenced by the economy enter the application pipeline, how their concerns and interests may differ from those focused first and foremost on advancing their careers.
Richmond, elected to serve a two-year term as AIGAC’s president this past spring, set as one of his goals while in the role to strengthen the organization’s relationships with top business school representatives. He approached GMAC with the idea for the prospect survey and was pleased that the council showed immediate interest in having its findings presented at the conference.
“It’s a real milestone that AIGAC was invited to present at the schools’ annual gathering,” Richmond said. Of course, the high caliber of AIGAC prospects makes them an audience schools are very interested to target, Richmond pointed out. “The schools seemed really interested in the data we were presenting and grateful that we were sharing it with them.”
To learn more about AIGAC, click here. For more on the 2009 GMAC Annual Conference, click here.
