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APPLICANT RESOURCES
Admissions Director Q&A Clear Admit School Guides Clear Admit Career Guides Clear Admit Strategy Series Clear Admit Interview Guides Below are the upcoming deadlines for admission to top-tier schools. Feb 10: INSEAD R3 Mar 1: Michigan / Ross R3 Mar 3: CBS Mar 3: LBS R3 Mar 4: Kellogg R3 Mar 8: Cambridge / Judge R4 Mar 8: CMU / Tepper R3 Mar 9: Duke / Fuqua R3 Mar 9: Penn / Wharton R3 Mar 10: Berkeley / Hass R4 Mar 10: Chicago Booth R3 Mar 10: Yale SOM R3 Mar 15: NYU / Stern R3 Mar 17: UCLA / Anderson R3 Mar 19: UNC / Kenan-Flagler R4 Mar 30: Cornell / Johnson R4 Mar 31: UVA / Darden R3 Mar 31: INSEAD R4 Apr 1: UT-Austin / McCombs Apr 2: Dartmouth / Tuck R3 Apr 2: Oxford / Saїd R3 Apr 7: Stanford GSB R4 Apr 8: Harvard R3 Apr 14: CBS Essay Topic Analysis Use categories to access all that has been written on each of the topics. We have categorized by school and by subject matter.
Interview Reports MBA.com Manhattan GMAT GMAT Club Princeton Review Test Prep New York Kaplan Beat The GMAT Knewton Writing Resources Guide to Grammar and Writing The Internet Grammar of English English Usage, Style and Composition The Economist Style Guide Paradigm Online Writing Assistant School Rankings The following resources should be useful to those who want to research the careers open to them after (or before) earning an MBA. Vault.com Wetfeet
Business School Resources
If an MBA Program is not listed, please e-mail and we will be happy to list it. Berkeley / Haas Boston College / Carroll Carnegie Mellon / Tepper Chicago Columbia Concordia Cornell / Johnson Dartmouth / Tuck Duke / Fuqua Emory / Goizueta Harvard HEC Montreal Indiana / Kelley Michigan MIT / Sloan Northwestern / Kellogg New York / Stern North Carolina / Kenan Flagler Notre Dame / Mendoza Pennsylvania / Wharton Queens Stanford Syracuse / Whitman Texas / McCombs Thunderbird Toronto USC / Marshall UCLA / Anderson Vanderbilt / Owen Virginia / Darden Washington University in St. Louis / Olin Western Ontario / Ivey Yale MBA Programs: Rest of the World As there is some variety in the length of international MBA programs, we have denoted the length of the program next to its name (1 = one year; 2 = 2 years). If an MBA Program is not listed, please e-mail and we will be happy to list it. AGSM (Australia) 2 Cambridge / Judge (UK) 1 CIEBS (China) 2 Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (China) 1 Cranfield School of Mgmt (UK) 1 ESADE (Spain) 1 or 2 HEC (France) 2 Hult (UK) 1 IESE (Spain) 2 IMD (Switzerland) 1 INCAE (Costa Rica) 2 INSEAD (France) 1 IPADE (Mexico) ISB (India) 1 London Business School (UK) 2 Manchester Bus. School (UK) 2 Melbourne (Australia) 2 Oxford / Said (UK) 1 Rotterdam (Netherlands) 1 Tsinghua IMBA (China) 2 University of St. Gallen (Switzerland) 1 Additional Resources Here we link a host of additional resources available across the web. E-mail info@clearadmit.com to have resources added to this list. AACSB International Association of MBAs Beyond Grey Pinstripes EFMD gradschools.com (worldwide) Infozee International Student Loans mba.com (GMAT Scores) MBAInfo mbaleague.blogspot.com MBAzone MBA Jungle TOEFL Top MBA MBA Tipline We encourage admissions officers, students and applicants to alert us of interesting news and developments, please send an email to news@clearadmit.com so we can blog it. Blog Archive
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Get a $10 Amazon.com Gift Card! Contribute your MBA interview reports to the Clear Admit Wiki. Taking the GMAT? Download our free, independent guide to the leading test prep companies - includes coupons for savings at 10 leading test prep firms! ARCHIVE FOR FEBRUARY 2010 Saturday, February 27, 2010 GMAT Tip: Causation in Critical Reasoning Questions Today’s GMAT tip comes from test prep firm ManhattanGMAT. In this article, Chris Ryan, ManhattanGMAT’s Director of Instructor and Product Development, covers the concept of causation in Critical Reading questions: The concept of causation appears regularly on the GMAT and most people taking the exam can expect to see at least one Critical Reasoning question dealing with the issue. If you understand the concept and anticipate it, you will be much better prepared to answer the question correctly when it arises. First, in general, “causation” means that one thing causes another thing to occur. (It’s also possible, of course, for several things to combine to cause one thing to occur, for one thing to cause several things to occur, and so on.) Two problems generally crop up when the GMAT tests the concept of causation. The first is a false assumption that the causal connection is possible in one direction only. What does that mean? Causation is, as the term implies, a direct causal link: x causes y. So, what’s the problem? Well, there’s also another concept we need to know, something called “correlation.” Correlation is essentially coincidence: x and y occur together so often that a causal relationship is assumed. For example, I’ve noticed that every time people are walking around outside with umbrellas, the ground is wet. Which one causes the other?* When two things occur together, how do we know whether x causes y or y causes x – or whether neither causes the other? (* Neither – there’s a third thing that causes both of those events to occur.) Let’s look at another example: Imagine that every time a bee lands on a certain closed flower, the flower opens and the bee enters to gather pollen. It would be easy to assume that the bee’s landing somehow spurs the flower to open. It is equally plausible, though, that the flower’s opening causes the bee to come land on it. That is, the bee might know when the flower is about to open through some special bee intuition and then arrive just in time. The causal connection (between the bee’s landing and the flower’s opening) cannot be proven in either direction from this simple observation. All we know for sure is that the two events are correlated. How does this play out on the GMAT? Imagine the following Critical Reasoning argument: Researchers have noticed that people whose blood shows abnormally low levels of calcium usually develop laryngeal polyps, which can permanently damage vocal cords and result in partial or even total loss of voice. In order to prevent the polyps, the researchers recommend a diet high in calcium-rich foods such as dairy and green, leafy vegetables. Does the argument provide a clear causal connection between low levels of calcium in the blood and laryngeal polyps? Reading the above argument, we are tempted to take for granted that there is a causal connection: lack of calcium → laryngeal polyps. But it is equally plausible that laryngeal polyps → lack of calcium. How? Imagine that the polyps somehow prevent the body from processing calcium, so that it is not the lack of calcium causing the polyps but rather the polyps that cause the lack of calcium. In the latter case, increasing one’s dietary intake of calcium would likely do little to combat the polyps. (And there’s also the possibility that there’s no causal connection between these two events at all.) The second major problem with causation on the GMAT is the assumption that there are no alternate models of causality. That sounds a lot more technical than it really is. Essentially, this occurs when one assumes that there is only one possible cause of a certain outcome. For example, “The ground is wet, therefore it must have rained.” In this case, the faulty assumption is that only rain could have caused the ground to become wet. It ignores the possibility that someone could have spilled a bucket of water, someone’s sprinklers could be on, a garden hose could be leaking, etc. In the absence of direct proof of causation, one cannot assume that any particular thing is necessarily the cause of a particular outcome. How does this play out on the GMAT? Consider the following argument: The recent boom in new home construction has finally begun to taper off. Developers are not buying land, contractors are finding themselves going without work for longer periods, and banks are issuing fewer mortgages. People must not want to buy new homes as much as they wanted to even six months ago. Is this conclusion (”People must not want to buy new homes as much as they wanted to even six months ago.”) valid? It might be true, but “must” is too strong. It may be, for example, that all of the observations made in the argument were caused by a steep increase in interest rates or unemployment, so people don’t have the necessary funds to buy a home even though they want to buy a home as much as ever. If this is true, then we have an alternate cause: lack of money. Whenever a claim of causation is made in a GMAT Critical Reasoning argument, you need to consider (a) whether the relationship is causal or correlative; or (b) whether there are other possible causes for that particular outcome. 1. When you see language that indicates some kind of causal relationship, especially in the conclusion, review the argument carefully. What do the premises actually establish as far as the causal relationship? 2. Did the argument actually provide proof of the causal direction (x causes y)? Or is the conclusion assuming a causal relationship after providing evidence of a mere correlation (x and y occur together)? If the latter, then look for a choice that discusses how y might or might not cause x. 3. Did the argument actually provide proof that there was only one possible cause for the given outcome (x causes y)? Or does the argument make an assumption that there’s only one cause when there may actually be other possible causes (perhaps z causes y)? If the latter, then look for a choice that discusses how z (a different cause) might or might not cause y. For more information on ManhattanGMAT, download Clear Admit’s independent guide to the leading test preparation companies here. This FREE guide includes coupons for discounts on test prep services at ten different firms!
Friday, February 26, 2010 Deadline to Complete R2 Interviews for U Penn’s Wharton School Approaches If you received an invitation to interview from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School as part of Round 2, don’t forget that all interviews must be completed by March 5th. That’s next Friday. So if you haven’t scheduled your interview yet, get cracking! And if you’ve tried but are having trouble, Wharton’s MBA Admissions & Financial Aid Team urges you to contact its office for help. Some applicants have had questions about the various types of interviews that can be scheduled. At Wharton, you can choose to schedule an on-campus interview, a hub interview or an alumni interview. All interviews are weighted equally, and applicants are encouraged to choose based on whatever is most convenient for them. As to the difference between hub and alumni interviews, hub interviews take place at a fixed time in any of a number of hub locations, whereas alumni interviews can be scheduled for whatever time and place is mutually convenient for interviewee and interviewer. Hub interviews are generally conducted by members of the admissions committee, but in times of high demand, alumni may well conduct these interviews as well. Of course, if you haven’t scheduled your interview yet, many slots will already be taken and you’ll need to settle for whatever’s still available. But again, if you are having trouble scheduling an interview for any reason, contact the MBA Admissions Office right away and a member of the admissions team can help you set one up. If you’ve scheduled your interview and want to know how best to prepare for it, don’t miss the Clear Admit Wharton School Interview Guide, which includes Wharton-specific interview strategies, first-hand accounts from prior applicants and dozens of sample questions that are regularly asked as part of the Wharton interview. Already had your interview? Don’t forget that you can share your experience and read about other applicants’ on the Clear Admit Wiki. Best of luck to everyone!
Fridays From the Frontline Welcome back to Fridays From the Frontline! Clear Admit’s weekly round up of the latest news from MBA applicant and student bloggers. Since last week, more applicants have received news or scheduled interviews while students continue to have all kinds of experiences, from professional treks to awkward recruiting dinners. Haas ‘11 Sunnyside Up reminded her readers of the importance of taking time for oneself. Kellogg ‘11 Orlando noticed an increased interest in energy and emerging markets on campus. Goizueta ‘11 Ahembeea couldn’t believe how quickly the MBA program goes by, and discussed the challenges of finding a relevant internship as an international student. Kellogg ‘11 Shobhit encouraged readers not to dismiss Microsoft. Foster ‘11 Helen probably would agree, as she announced her summer internship with Mirosoft, and looked forward to some of the perks this position would provide. Chicago Booth ‘11 Globthink announced his intention to award a prize to the most global US company. BU ‘12 Felish helped organize a one day non-profit consulting event. Darden ‘10 Oren attended a red carpet Darden fundraiser and joined forces to bid on a basketball. McCombs ‘10 Paragon2Pieces knew her blogging had been spotty, but found a majority of her time dedicated to ‘running around like a chicken [its] head off and writer’s block.’ Marshall ‘10 Andrew began creating a presentation that will help others understand the power of social media during a job search. HBS ‘10 Gabrielle traveled to New York for a Harvard Entertainment and Media Club Trek, and visited the offices of the Food Network, HBO, Time Warner and MTV. Darden ‘10 July Dream outlined a few reasons she thought the case method worked. McCombs ‘10 Metal participated in a politically charged and slightly uncomfortable recruiting dinner, the best part of which was the dessert. Fuqua ‘10 Ian compiled a humorous list of FAQs for his classmates’ upcoming trip to China. And that concludes this week’s look-see into the lively goings-on of b-school bloggers. We hope good news continues to trickle in, and that everyone manages to keep their spirits up, even as winter drags on. Until next week, have a great weekend!
Thursday, February 25, 2010 Twitter Thursdays: News from MBA Programs Welcome to another installment of Twitter Thursdays, a weekly column in which we highlight the updates of the top MBA programs on Twitter! If you’re not following Clear Admit already, be sure to check us out on Twitter for updates, special prizes, admissions tips and breaking news. We’ve also created a list of MBA programs to ease your daily access to breaking news from the top MBA programs, as reported by admissions committee members themselves. The Assistant Dean of UCLA Anderson MBA Admissions & Financial Aid, Mae Jennifer Shores, shared several interview tips and noted that interview invitations are still being released. Also in California, Rich Lyons, the Dean of the Haas School of Business, welcomed President Clinton to campus this week and lauded the efforts of Haas alum Patrick Awuah, who started a university in Ghana. Across the pond, MBA Admissions Coordinator at Judge Business School, James Barker, is preparing to participate in the QS World MBA Tour, specifically in London and Paris. Jon Fuller, the Senior Associate Director of Admissions at the Ross School of Business, is hoping to wrap up sending Round 2 interview invitations this week. Chicago Booth hosted another Live Chat about pursuing less traditional careers at Booth. The Johnson School was featured in the Wall Street Journal for their innovative off-campus recruiting initiatives. Professors at The Wharton School weighed in on topics ranging from YouTube to housing recovery. The Kellogg School of Management celebrated the rise of an alumna, Roslyn Brock, to Chair of the NAACP National Board of Directors. That wraps up Twitter Thursdays this week! If you’re on Twitter, let us know; e-mail wiki@clearadmit.com with your user name and status as an MBA applicant, student or admissions officer so we can add you to the appropriate Twitter list. Happy updating and we’ll see you next week with some more “tweets!” What do you wish the top MBA programs would “tweet” about more? Let us know below!
Chicago Booth Admissions Director Shares Round Three Admissions Tips Rose Martinelli, the director of admissions at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, in a recent blog post tackled some myths and shared some advice for prospective applicants considering the school’s upcoming third-round deadline. She then rattled off a list of things applicants should consider when applying in R3. For starters, though Chicago Booth encourages international students to apply in earlier rounds to allow time for such a large transition, international candidates are nonetheless accepted during the third round. And because round-three decisions are released in mid-May, accepted international candidates still have plenty of time to process their visas before classes start in September. Second, she encourages applicants to consider letting the application review team know why you’ve chosen to apply in R3 if it’s relevant. “It can ease the reader’s questions about your intentions,” she wrote. “Don’t be afraid to be honest – we’ve been in your shoes,” she added. Finally, shake the “last ditch” mentality and make sure that your round-three application is as strong as it can possibly be, Martinelli advises. “We can tell if your application is rushed or if you’re just hedging your bets by throwing one more application together,” she wrote. Indeed, because there are fewer slots left by the time R3 rolls around, your application needs to be as strong and well thought through as you can make it. Applicants considering a round-three run at Chicago Booth won’t want to miss the live chat Chicago Booth has scheduled for March 3rd. To learn how to join, click here.
Campus Chronicles: The Harbus Welcome back to Campus Chronicles! This week we’ll take a look at HBS’s student newspaper, The Harbus, to see what’s been going on at the Harvard campus for b-school students. Harvard’s first “J-Term” ran from January 4 to January 22, giving HBS students the choice to enroll in an intensive seminar, join an Immersion Experience Program (IXP) trip, or take on an “independent opportunity,” an academic-based project or trip designed by an individual student. One student took a “winternship,” i.e. a winter internship, at RRE Ventures, an emerging New York venture capital firm focused on technology. During the course of his three weeks at RRE, this student had the chance to observe pitches, evaluate deals, meet with portfolio companies, and represent RRE at industry events. The IXP offers first- and second-year students a chance to gain field-based learning experiences in one of three domestic locations – New Orleans, Silicon Valley, and Boston – or six international destinations – China, India, Peru, Rwanda, UAE/Bahrain and Vietnam. Approximately 400 HBS students enrolled in the IXP during J-Term 2010. The IXP in New Orleans focused on re-building homes in parts of New Orleans where people are still recovering from the effects of Hurricane Katrina. Meanwhile, students worked with mission Schools International in Rwanda and consulted with 12 start-ups in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. The IXP in UAE/Bahrain included a visit to Mubadala, Abu Dhabi’s strategic investment company, and consulting with local entrepreneurs on a variety of issues, while the IXP in Peru offered students the chance to learn about Lima’s industries, conduct a field study on local businesses in Cusco, and experience Machu Picchu and the Peruvian rainforests. Students who took the IXP in China offered trips to Google China and Chinese flagship companies, such as Lenovo, SMIC, and Wanxiang Auto Parts, as well as JWT, a global marketing communications agency. What IXP at HBS would you want to take? Feel free to share your thoughts below!
Wednesday, February 24, 2010 GMAT Tip: What Not to Not Do with Multiple or Complex Negations on the GMAT Today’s GMAT tip comes from our friends at test prep firm Knewton. Today, they offer their advice on questions that include complex negations: Alex Sarlin, is the Lead Verbal Developer for Graduate Programs at Knewton, where he specializes in helping students with their GMAT preparation. The GMAT has a limited bag of tricks up its sleeve to disguise incorrect answer choices. Think of the test-makers as politicians caught in a fib; they can exaggerate (extreme answer choices), skirt the subject (irrelevant answer choices), twist the truth further (distortions), or draw dubious inferences to throw you off the scent. In the end, though, any politician will tell you that the most efficient way to get away with a lie is to simply confuse your accuser into submission. The GMAT usually does this by using negation and reversals in unexpected and mystifying ways. Simply put, negations are words that reverse the meaning of a sentence. They include adverbs and adjectives, such as not, cannot, unlike, or without, and verbs that negate their subjects, such as neglect, deny, reverse, refuse, or counteract. Negations can make parsing sentences into a nightmare, especially during the GMAT, when reading quickly is a key skill. Dealing with negations and reversals effectively is doubly important for non-native English speakers, for whom unraveling complicated sentences is sometimes even more difficult. Consider the following statement: Employees with children are just as responsible as those without children. That makes sense. Now, let’s throw in a reversal such as you would see on the GMAT: An employee with children at home is no more likely to neglect his or her work duties than is an employee without children at home. It’s already getting a bit ugly and difficult to parse, but after a moment, we can recognize that “no more likely to neglect his or her work duties” means the same thing as “just as responsible” does. Let’s add a few more twists: Unlike the inconclusive results of research conducted on employees with and without disabled older relatives, the results of one recent study found that employees with children at home are no more likely to neglect their work duties than are employees without children at home; however, the same cannot be said for such employees’ attentiveness to housekeeping duties. Jeez, that’s a mouthful! There are many, many negations and reversals in this sentence, all of which are there to make the core meaning of the sentence difficult to spot. Never fear! There are methods to handle negation and reversals on the GMAT that are sure to make it less stressful. 1. Train yourself not only to notice, but to physically feel any negation words that pop up in an argument, passage, or answer choice. Did you notice the “not only” at the beginning of the last sentence? We hope so. By “feel,” we mean that you should train your brain to be on high alert as soon as you spot a negation; when you read “The CEO denied the charges that his management style had sunk the company’s financial situation, but not that it was responsible for the rise in employee morale,” that very first “denied” should color the way you read the entire rest of the sentence; everything after that point is being denied, and any further reversals must fit into that framework as well. 2. When multiple negations appear in a sentence, they can, but don’t always, cancel one another out. a. Unlike Renaissance scientists, early Medieval scientists were not expected to perform impartial experiments. b. The new vaccine could not decrease the rate of infection among the antelope population. In (a) above, the negations cancel one another out; we can be sure that Renaissance scientists were expected to perform impartial experiments. In (b), though, we cannot know whether the vaccine increased the rate of infection or whether the rate of infection stayed exactly the same. “Not decrease” does not necessarily mean “increase”… but it could! Think logically! Furthermore, incorrect answer choices often play on this double negation trick; if (b) was in an argument, the GMAT would be likely to offer an incorrect answer choice that states “The rate of infection among the antelope population has increased since the introduction of the vaccine.” This is not necessarily true, and would be an invalid inference and an incorrect answer. 3. Let yourself be a ping-pong ball. The worst thing you can do is to plow through negations without noticing that they are there; instead, let them bounce your understanding of the sentence around freely, back and forth, until the meaning becomes clear. Practice on this sentence, which has no less than seven negation words or reversals: Although neither a lack of iron nor a lack of vitamin B12 is a guaranteed predictor of anemia, a condition in which the body does not have enough red blood cells, both of these deficiencies may, in the absence of other countervailing measures, cause the condition. 4. Don’t be afraid to re-read sentences with complex negations and to rephrase them in your own words. An extra few seconds of reading is always better than choosing an incorrect answer. Speaking complex sentences out loud helps many test-takers as well (but not too loudly; mind the others in the room!). Good luck, and one last piece of advice from us at Knewton: For more information on Knewton, download Clear Admit’s independent guide to the leading test preparation companies here. This FREE guide includes coupons for discounts on test prep services at ten different firms!
Submit an MBA Interview Report for MIT / Sloan, Stanford GSB, Wharton or UCLA / Anderson, Win a $10 Gift Card to Amazon! Welcome to Wiki Wednesdays, in which we set a spotlight on the latest submissions to the Clear Admit Wiki, an online repository for MBA applicants to share their experiences with admissions interviews. We’ve received a number of great interview reports this past week! Be sure to check out the latest posts for: Chicago Booth, Columbia Business School, London Business School, NYU / Stern and Wharton. We’d like to thank everyone for continuing to share their experiences in the Clear Admit Wiki! Before getting into contest details, let’s take look at a couple of the latest contributions. A candidate for Columbia interviewed with a second-year student, who asked the following questions: A Round 2 applicant to Wharton shared the following questions, as posed by an alumnus: Thank you to everyone who has shared their interview experiences this season and helped fellow applicants! If you’re eager to contribute, we’ll be awarding a $10 Amazon gift certificate to applicants that submit interview reports for MIT / Sloan, Stanford GSB, Wharton or UCLA / Anderson through next Tuesday, March 2nd! In other words, all you have to do is send us your interview field report for the selected schools for inclusion in the Wiki and we’ll send you a $10 Amazon gift certificate. You must send your interview report to wiki@clearadmit.com to be eligible; we’ll post it to the Wiki and notify the winners by e-mail (Limit: one iTunes or Amazon gift card per person). The most helpful and informative reports usually include the following information: Applicants who would like to supplement the information available on the Wiki can check out our Clear Admit Interview Guides, which provide school-specific insight about admissions interviews. Thank you to everyone who has contributed to the Clear Admit Wiki and helped fellow applicants prepare for MBA admissions interviews this season!
$2.5 Million Alumni Gift Will Endow New Faculty Chair at Tuck School of Business Impressed with the advancements at the Tuck School of Business in the past two decades and moved by the camaraderie of classmates during a recent reunion, a Tuck alumnus recently made a gift of $2.5 million to endow a new faculty chair at the school. The new Bakala Professor of Management faculty chair is named for Zdeněk Bakala, a member of the Class of 1989 who returned to campus for his 20th reunion this past fall. In enabling Tuck to expand its faculty of thought leaders, the establishment of the new chair advances one of the primary goals of the school’s ongoing Tuck 2012 initiative. A Czech native, Bakala has been involved in finance and business in the Czech Republic and the CEE since the early 1990s and is an established figure in the business community there. Among his many achievements, he established the Prague office of Credit Suisse First Boston in 1991 and founded Patria Finance, one of the largest investment banking boutiques in the Czech Republic, in 1994. He credits Tuck with helping him get to where he is today. “The skills I learned at Tuck translated into success in entrepreneurship,” he said in a statement announcing his gift. Though the recent reunion marked only his second return to Tuck’s New Hampshire campus since his graduation 20 years ago, Bakala’s ties to the school have remained strong. “The contacts I made are still important to me – they are some of the people I speak to everyday,” he said. “I want to help make sure this experience continues for Tuck students.” Bakala’s gift to Tuck is one of several sizeable alumni donations at leading business schools in recent months, signaling renewed generosity following a period of more constrained giving associated with the global economic crisis. Most notable is the $50 million gift last year to the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business from alumnus David Booth, for which the school was renamed. Even more recently, New York University’s Stern School of Management received a $20 million gift in November 2009, and the Yale School of Management received an alumni gift of almost $9 million in January 2010.
How are you Going to Break the News? Have another idea? Tell us about it in the comments!
Tuesday, February 23, 2010 MBA Applicant Reviews Clear Admit Career Guides MBA applicant blogger ‘A Beautiful Mind’ dedicated a recent post to sharing advice on how to compile a list of target schools, and, in tandem, offered his thoughts on how the Clear Admit Career Guide to Consulting helped him. When it comes to determining the schools that best suit your interests, A Beautiful Mind stresses the importance of first identifying which field you plan to enter post-MBA, and of then pinpointing schools that align with these goals. To help you narrow your list in this way, A Beautiful Mind suggests a particular tool: “A good resource for identifying relevant schools is a Clear Admit Career Guide to your target field.” A Beautiful Mind continues on to outline his experience with the Clear Admit Career Guide to Consulting, saying that it is, “helpful in identifying the best schools for consulting.” He also makes note of the specificity of this guide, and explains that, “It is not a full fledge guide for developing a career in consulting. It’s purely a guide to b schools for consulting.” In other words, this line of publications is specifically tailored to MBA applicants who need a helping hand when it comes to deciding what schools would best support their professional ambitions. According to A Beautiful Mind, the Clear Admit Career Guide to Consulting has a number of merits. He particularly cites the thorough nature of the guide as being beneficial: “The main pros of this guide [are] the details on each school. It has details on the curriculum structure, core and elective courses relevant to consulting (more specifically Management Consulting, but also has more), list of prominent faculty members at each school and more.” A Beautiful Mind doesn’t stop there; he goes on to draw attention to what other valuable information the guide offers its readers: “You can gain an understanding of what exactly the school is known for in the market, the most recent class composition, placement statistics, consulting companies that visit the school and whether the most sought after companies visit the school or not. It also has the details of relevant courses, organization of these courses (like when exactly can a student, during his/her two years, take these) and the level of flexibility offered by the school. Some details on the relevant student clubs and events sponsored by the school are also mentioned in the guide.” In the end, A Beautiful Mind summarizes his feelings towards the Clear Admit Career Guide to Consulting, asserting that, “All in all, it is a good source of information for identifying the correct school for your target field. . . a good source to begin with.” Our publications team would like to thank A Beautiful Mind for sharing his feedback! For more information on all of our publications, click here. Our full range of publications is available for immediate purchase and download on the Clear Admit online shop.
Nobel Economist, Former Stanford Dean to Join NYU Stern School of Business Faculty A. Michael Spence, a Nobel Prize-winning economist and former dean of the Stanford Graduate School of Business, will join the faculty of New York University’s Stern School of Business as an economics professor beginning in September, the school announced yesterday. Spence comes to Stern from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he is currently the Philip H. Knight Professor Emeritus of Management and where he served as dean from 1990 to 1999. Before that he spent 15 years at Harvard University, holding a joint appointment as a professor of economics and business administration in its Business School and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and serving as dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences from 1984 to 1990. A Nobel Prize winner in economics in 2001, Spence is also a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute, a Rhodes Scholar, chairman of global policy group the Commission on Growth and Development and a member of the boards of directors of several major companies. NYU Stern is happy indeed to have snagged him. “Mike, through his broad portfolio of activities, all performed at the highest level, and fundamentally propelled by deep academic expertise, embodies the kind of integrative thinking that NYU Stern continues to bring to bear on the complex problems of business in the 21st century,” Peter Henry, NYU Stern’s new dean, said in a statement announcing the news. NYU President John Sexton echoed Henry’s enthusiasm, calling Spence’s decision to join NYU’s faculty an affirmation of the school’s efforts to build its faculty. “An economist of his reputation only joins an institution where he knows that there is a robust intellectual environment and he will have colleagues of the highest caliber,” Sexton said. He added that Spence has expressed particular enthusiasm for NYU’s development as a global network university. For more on this story, click here.
Trivia Tuesday: The Entrepreneurship Initiative at Harvard Business School It’s time again for another edition of Trivia Tuesday, our weekly examination of the programs and opportunities that differentiate the leading MBA programs. This week we take a peek into the Clear Admit School Guide to Harvard Business School, and share an excerpt on HBS’s Entrepreneurship Initiative. “Harvard offers students an array of opportunities to study entrepreneurship. In addition to analyzing cases on start-up enterprises across the RC curriculum, all RC students take the Entrepreneurial Manager course. In their second year, students may choose from the 18 courses and field study opportunities offered on the topic. Over 30 of the school’s faculty members are part of the Entrepreneurial Management Unit, and more than 40 other faculty members conduct research in the area. Harvard launched the California Research Center in Menlo Park in 1997 to serve as a resource for faculty members investigating business issues in Silicon Valley. Research conducted from this base has resulted in the composition of over 150 cases on technology and the management of and investment in start-ups. In 2003, HBS launched the Arthur Rock Center of Entrepreneurship with the support of a $25M gift from an alumnus working in venture capital in Silicon Valley. The center oversees and supports many of the ongoing initiatives in entrepreneurship at HBS and also provides two summer fellowships to subsidize students who wish to pursue a summer internship at a small, entrepreneurial company. HBS students can also put their classroom learning on entrepreneurship to use in the annual Business Plan Contest. Founded in 1997, the program features Traditional and Social Enterprise tracks and allows teams of students a chance to work with a faculty advisor to formulate a viable business plan proposal. Over $60,000 in cash and in-kind services are distributed among the winning team, three runners-up, and one specialty plan award winner.” To continue reading about the Entrepreneurship Initiative at Harvard Business School, take a look at the Clear Admit School Guide to Harvard Business School. For those who are interested in pursuing a career in entrepreneurship and want to learn more about the different programs and opportunities available at each school, check out the Clear Admit Career Guide: Entrepreneurship. All Clear Admit publications are available for immediate purchase and download on the Clear Admit shop.
Monday, February 22, 2010 MIT Sloan School of Management Announces New Certificate of Sustainable Business The Massachusetts Institute of Techology (MIT) Sloan School of Management this month announced a new sustainability certification program designed to teach students how to balance economic growth with environmental sustainability. The new program is open to students in all MBA and other Sloan-related programs. To attain the new Certificate in Sustainable Business, students must complete a range of required core and elective courses designed to leverage Sloan’s strengths in process improvement, organizational learning and adaptation, entrepreneurship and other areas to promote more sustainable business practices. Among the required core classes are courses in system dynamics and sustainability strategies, as well as a sustainability lab and seminar. A special capstone course in sustainability will also be offered as part of the certification process beginning in spring 2011. In addition to obtaining a certificate in sustainability, students in the new program will have access to summer sustainability internships and become part of a special sustainability resume book. Sloan MBA students can pursue a special sustainability track in addition to the certification program. To learn more about MIT Sloan’s new Certificate of Sustainable Business and the philosophy behind it, click here.
Admissions Tip: Late Round Considerations After a relatively sleepy February, March will soon be upon us with its extensive list of application deadlines and decision notification dates. Let’s take a look at the long list of Round 3 (or 4 or 5) deadlines spread over the next two months: March 1: Michigan/Ross R3 April 2: Dartmouth/Tuck R3 While it’s always best to apply as early as possible, the difference between applying in Round 1 and applying in Round 2 is, for most applicants, a marginal one. However, the later rounds are a very different game. Because most of the seats in the incoming class will have been given away by the time round two decisions are released, the acceptance rate in the third round is dramatically lower than that for the first two deadlines of the season. To maximize your chances of a later round acceptance, demonstrating your interest in the school and submitting thoughtful and error-free written materials will be crucial. Just as applying in Round 1 is generally taken as a sign of interest in a given program, applicants submitting their materials in a later round need to work extra hard to convince the adcom that they are genuinely interested in the school and are not simply applying as an afterthought because interview invitations didn’t come through in round two. Demonstrating that you would make a valuable contribution to the community and providing evidence that you have taken steps to engage current students and alumni will work to your advantage. As always, we’d like to recommend the in-depth Clear Admit School Guides to those applicants who are targeting the later deadlines and just beginning to investigate certain programs, and to encourage those who’ve visited the campus and interviewed to share their experiences in the Clear Admit Wiki. Potential R3 or R4 applicants are also welcome to contact Clear Admit directly to discuss the strength of their later round candidacies and learn more about our one-on-one counseling services. Are you planning on sending in a late round application in the next couple of months? Feel free to share your strategies, questions, and concerns below!
Sunday, February 21, 2010 GMAT Tip: Think Like the Testmaker Series, Volume 8 Today’s GMAT tip comes from our friends at Veritas Prep. In today’s article, they present the eighth installment of their “Think Like the Testmaker Series”: Brian Galvin is the Director of Academic Programs at Veritas Prep, where he oversees all of the company’s GMAT prep courses. When you think about it, the authors of the GMAT are tasked with a pretty difficult initiative: using fairly common skills — algebra, grammar, arithmetic, logic — they need to write questions that will be difficult for large percentages of high-achieving examinees. Those taking the GMAT are already quite accomplished: college graduates, some already with graduate degrees, most with some quality post-college work experience, and all with a desire to pursue a higher level of education. Tricking this elite group of students is not easy! The question writers do have a few built-in advantages that they’ll employ to trap you, though, and one of them is the combination of a significant time limit for the exam and the tendency of multi-taskers to make time-saving assumptions to combat that pressure. How many integers x exist such that y < x < z? 1) z – y = 5 First, it is important to know what the somewhat-convoluted question is asking; essentially, it wants to know how many values of x are between y and z (if y and z were 1 and 3, only 2 would be an integer between them, so the only possible value of integer x would be 2, and the answer to the question would be 1, as there is only one possible value). Statement 1 provides a range for the difference between y and z; the two values are 5 numbers apart. Knowing this, you might plug in numbers to determine how many values are between them. If you were to use 6 and 1 (two numbers that are 5 apart), you’d find that there are 4 numbers between them: 2, 3, 4, and 5. Say you tried again with 100 and 95, there would still be 4 numbers (96, 97, 98, 99), and even using a negative number for one of the values (3 and -2, for which the difference is also 5), you’d find 4 values of x (-1, 0, 1, and 2). Based on this trial-and-error, you might be confident that there will always be 4 values of x, and you’d determine that statement 1, alone, is sufficient to answer the question. This is a common reaction to this question — but in your haste to select easy-to-calculate values of y and z, you may have forgotten that they do not need to be integers! Only x is specified in the question to be an integer, so you need to account for the fact that y and z could be nonintegers. If you do so, you could try 6.5 and 1.5, and you’d end up with 5 integers between them: 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6. This assumption that a number must be an integer is common — ask any child his favorite number, and he’ll either respond with his favorite athlete’s jersey number, or the day of his birthday, or some other common integer. No child will ever claim that his favorite number is pi, or -6! But ask that same child the rules of one of the classic childhood games — Simon Says — and he’ll make sure that you understand that nothing is official unless Simon says it! Properties of numbers that we take for granted — positive, integer — are the GMAT version of Simon Says. You can’t assume anything about a number on the GMAT unless you’re explicitly told so. To finish this question, statement 2 is not sufficient — it doesn’t even give a range for y and z. But taken together, the two statements allow us to solve for both y and z, giving us all the necessary information we would need (y is 6, z is 1, and therefore there are four possible values of x). C is the correct answer. More importantly, however, you should take note of the assumptions that you tend to make when working quickly — the authors of the GMAT will hold those over you if you’re not careful.
Friday, February 19, 2010 Reminder: Register Now for One of the QS World MBA Tour North American Events Starting this Sunday, February 21, the QS World MBA Tour is holding events in five North American cities. These events are designed to give MBA hopefuls a chance to meet with admissions officers and alumni representatives from business schools across the globe. The QS World MBA Tour events provide an opportunity to begin or continue researching target schools, regardless of where you stand in the application process. If you haven’t received good news from R1 target programs or are still waiting to receive a response from R2 applications, the tour events can help you prepare to apply to additional programs in the spring. Additionally, if you are targeting international programs with a January start date or late deadlines for the September intake, the events will enable you to meet with representatives from those programs to learn more about the application process and the school itself. Finally, if you’re a conscientious applicant looking to get a jumpstart on your research and outreach for fall 2010 application deadlines, these events can serve as a starting point. Aside from having the opportunity to meet face-to-face with admissions officers and school alumni, attendees at the QS World MBA Tour events will be able to: • Take part in a sample MBA class Below is a list of the QS World MBA Tour North American dates and locations: • Toronto: February 21 As a special offer, Clear Admit has negotiated free event registration for all of our readers. Additionally, all Clear Admit readers who attend will be eligible to apply for over $1.6m in scholarships. Register now, as these events are quickly approaching! To learn more about the events to see a list of participating business schools, click here.
NYU Stern, Chicago Booth Partner with Deutsche Bank on Risk Management New York University’s Stern School of Business this week announced a multi-year academic partnership with Deutsche Bank to expand research and education related to risk management and financial regulation, according to a recent Financial Times report. Earlier this month, Deutsche Bank announced a similar partnership with the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. At Stern, the program will be coordinated by the school’s Volatility Institute, which is directed by Nobel Laureate Robert Engle. Deutsche Bank’s funding will support research at the Volatility Institute and the Salomon Center for the Study of Financial Institutions, as well as a series of conferences and other events. At Chicago Booth, Deutsche Bank will underwrite a new speaker series for MBA students and a new summer conference for PhD students. The “Risk and Regulation in Financial Markets” speaker series for MBA students is already underway. Its inaugural event, which took place on February 9th, featured Douglas Diamond, the Merton H. Miller Distinguished Service Professor of Finance. The new PhD program, meanwhile, will consist of a multi-day summer conference focused on the regulation of financial markets. Designed to complement Chicago Booth’s existing PhD curriculum, the conference will be open to PhD students as well as invited junior faculty from other top business schools. Deutsche Bank’s decision to partner with leading business schools around risk management and regulation comes in response to the recent global financial crisis, which resulting in the collapse of major financial institutions, bail outs of other banks by national governments and downturns in stockmarkets around the world. ”The financial crisis has shown that risk management and a strong regulatory framework are critical to healthy markets and economies, so it is imperative we work together to educate tomorrow’s business leaders,” Hugo Banziger, Deutsche Bank’s chief risk officer, said in a statement announcing the Chicago Booth partnership.
Fridays From The Frontline Hi there, and welcome to Fridays From the Frontline, Clear Admit’s weekly blog post focused on the events of the MBA blogosphere. This week MBA hopefuls were sharing their good and bad news, from interview invites to admittances. Current students were deep in their current semester and enjoying a number of personal and professional development opportunities. Haas ‘11 Sunnyside Up posted a link to the Haas Tech Club blog. Stanford ‘11 Palo Alto For Awhile, inspired by the school’s recent tuition-hike announcement, talked about money, and how MBA students spend it. Harvard ‘11 Military to Business immersed himself in the search for a summer job, and reflected on how none would replicate the experience of leading others in combat. Ross ‘11 Raghunathrao shared his MAP placement with his readers. BU ‘11 Felish couldn’t understand how people found the time to date during b-school, and received her first internship invite. Kellogg ‘11 Windsor attended the Kellogg Private Equity and Venture Capital Conference and had a lot to say about it. Darden ‘10 Oren expected great things from a panel discussion during the school’s Women Leadership Week, but was disappointed. Fuqua ‘10 Randy was surprised to find that India had a wine country. Darden ‘10 Mechanigal enjoyed an evening of music, care of Joshua Bell and Jeremy Denk. McCombs ‘10 Metal also had music on his mind. Darden ‘10 July Dream went to Paris, saw her family, ate great food, and walked a lot. And that finalizes this week’s look-see into b-school bloggers’ latest news. We hope that everyone is surviving the ongoing winter months, and that more good news rolls in for applicants. Until next week, have yourselves and fantastic and fun weekend!
Thursday, February 18, 2010 Twitter Thursdays: News from MBA Programs Welcome to another installment of Twitter Thursdays, a weekly column in which we highlight the updates of the top MBA programs on Twitter! If you’re not following Clear Admit already, be sure to check us out on Twitter for updates, special prizes, admissions tips and breaking news. We’ve also created a list of MBA programs to ease your daily access to breaking news from the top MBA programs, as reported by admissions committee members themselves. The Assistant Dean of UCLA Anderson MBA Admissions & Financial Aid, Mae Jennifer Shores, doled out some interview tips, noting that candidates should “dress up” even for a phone interview. Also in California, Rich Lyons, the Dean of the Haas School of Business, celebrated a gift from Nobel Prize winner, Olly Williamson. Across the pond, MBA Admissions Coordinator at Judge Business School, James Barker, broke down the upcoming Round 3 Interview Days and doles out heaps of application advice. Jon Fuller, the Senior Associate Director of Admissions at the Ross School of Business, shared his Round 2 updates and noted that interview invitations will be extended through next week. Chicago Booth linked to this week’s Live Chat about pursuing careers in finance at Booth. Back in Boston, MIT Sloan will be hosting an information session this Friday. The Wharton School welcomed NFL players who are participating in the sport organization’s business management and entrepreneurial programs. The Kellogg School of Management announced that Soledad O’Brien will appear at the Black Management Association’s conference in March. That concludes Twitter Thursdays this week! If you’re on Twitter, let us know; e-mail wiki@clearadmit.com with your user name and status as an MBA applicant, student or admissions officer so we can add you to the appropriate Twitter list. Happy “tweeting” and we’ll see you next week with some more Twitter updates!
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MBA Twitter Index! We've created the MBA Admissions Twitter Index, a directory of applicants, current MBA students and b-schools on Twitter.Wiki MBA Admissions WikiThe Clear Admit Wiki is designed to allow b-school applicants to share their experiences through the application process. You can learn from others' experiences and contribute your own reports to the community. Below are the five most popular pages in the wiki: Wharton Interview Field Reports HBS Interview Field Reports Kellogg Interview Field Reports Chicago Interview Field Reports Columbia Interview Field Reports Discussion Boards BusinessWeek ForumsThe BusinessWeek Discussion Boards are another way to learn about the issues applicants face. Clear Admit hosts the Ask Clear Admit thread, which should help answer your questions. Here is a link to the original interface (for those of you who didn't like the recent upgrade). Also, here are the five most recent discussions taking place in the forum: Clear Admit is a featured expert in the BeatTheGMAT forums, answering questions from applicants across the globe. Feel free to ask us your questions in this forum! Here are the most recent posts: Clear Admit manages the Applying section of the StudyLink MBA discussion boards. Below are the five most recent posts to the GMAT Club message boards.
The student-2-student Discussion Boards are managed by Wharton. Here are the five most recent discussions. School-Hosted Blogs Straight from the source: aggregated posts from students and administration. Below are the seven most recent posts in school-hosted blogs. Individuals' Blogs A selection of the latest updates to MBA blogs compiled by Hella.MBA Applicants Bloggers by School The following are links to bloggers at each of the schools listed.Chicago Columbia Dartmouth / Tuck Duke / Fuqua Harvard Kellogg Michigan MIT / Sloan New York / Stern North Carolina / Chapel Hill Stanford Virginia / Darden Wharton Yale ESADE IESE INSEAD London Business School Community Blogs Bshoolers.comCommunity blog with MBA student and alum contributors. Forté Foundation MBA Diaries Video blog entries posted by women MBA students. Owen Bloggers Independent blog with content by Vanderbilt MBA students. Best of Blogging 2008-2009 Top Ten:
Best of Blogging 2007-2008 Top Ten:
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