MBA Wire Taps 309—Over-represented, but under-targeting? MBB candidate, climate focus. Super GRE, poor GPA

In this week's MBA Admissions podcast we began by discussing the upcoming Round 1 deadlines for this new season; for this week NYU / Stern, IESE, Cornell / Johnson and Chicago / Booth all have their Round 1 MBA application deadlines; Duke / Fuqua is scheduled to release interview invites for its Early Action round.

Graham highlighted our next Essay Insights series, which continues on Wednesday of this week, with CMU / Tepper, Columbia, Georgetown / McDonough, Texas / McCombs and UNC / Kenan Flagler; these events are very popular and bring together the leading MBA programs to talk about their admissions essay topics. Signups are here: https://bit.ly/cafallessays

Graham then shared some insights from a recently published Adcom Q&A from Shelly Heinrich at Georgetown McDonough.

Our final discussion focused on the recently published MBA class profile for Duke / Fuqua. Their class profile matched some of the observations we identified with the class profile of UCLA / Anderson (the class profile we discussed on last week's show). Fuqua is reporting a smaller class size, while keeping the quality of the class close to constant. We did also discuss the ranges of test scores and GPAs, but we think candidates would prefer to know the medians, or both.

As usual, for the candidate profile review portion of the show, Alex selected three ApplyWire entries:

This week’s first MBA admissions candidate is from India - and therefore is over-represented in the pool.  At the same time, they appear to have very good numbers and strong work experience, balanced by decent volunteer activities outside of work. They are not over-reaching with their target programs in the first round, and we wonder if they should have targeted 1-2 M7 level programs.

This week’s second MBA candidate is also a strong candidate, based in the U.S. An All-American athlete from a top liberal arts college, they are working in consulting (MBB) with a focus on the climate. Their only weaker area is a slightly lower-than-average-for-top-programs GRE score. Should they apply in Round 1 with this score (325) or delay to Round 2 with a higher score. We think the latter might be a good strategy, or at least split the applications over two rounds.

The final MBA candidate is an entrepreneur who has a great GRE score (333) but a poor GPA (2.9). While they have an upward trend for the GPA, they will need to use the optional essay to add context. They might also consider taking Business Fundamentals, or other similar options to show that they are prepared and committed to the academic aspect of the MBA experience.

This episode was recorded in Paris, France and Cornwall, England. It was produced and engineered by the fabulous Dennis Crowley in Philadelphia, USA. Thanks to all of you who’ve been joining us and please remember to rate and review this show wherever you listen!