Well, its been a few weeks since I last posted, and so much has happened...
First, the good news - I was admitted to NYU! This means that after months of stressing, I'm definitely going to business school this year - woohoo! I'm also really excited about New York - after visiting Stern's campus for interview it looks like a great place to spend two years.
I've also been interviewed by Wharton and UCLA and am still awaiting news (keep your fingers crossed!)
Now for the less good news - after interviewing at Berkeley, I've been waitlisted :-( I'm gutted as I really got a good feeling from the interview and thought that my application was pretty strong. Realistically I cannot wait too long before applying for my US visa so it doesnt look like Berkeley's going to happen. Today's email was actually the first piece of bad news that I've had in this whole app process, and it's hit me harder than I thought.
Oh yeah, mustn't forget the big S - no word as yet. I've basically given up hope (the bulk of interview invites have gone out already), but until I get the final word, I cant help obsessively checking my email for news! Looks like sunny california is off the cards for the next couple of years.
Roll on March 31 (final decision day).
Wednesday 17 March 2010
Thursday 4 February 2010
Nearly, but not...
Just received an email from Berkeley.
My heart skips a beat as I open it (without registering the subject line). Berkeley have been eerily silent since I submitted my app in December, so I figure I must be getting an email decision from them reasonably soon.
Inside the email: eNews from Berkeley
What? eNews? Where's my decision?
Sometimes I think Adcoms are cruel.
My heart skips a beat as I open it (without registering the subject line). Berkeley have been eerily silent since I submitted my app in December, so I figure I must be getting an email decision from them reasonably soon.
Inside the email: eNews from Berkeley
What? eNews? Where's my decision?
Sometimes I think Adcoms are cruel.
Monday 25 January 2010
One more thing...
Congrats to LBS, who just nabbed the top spot for the second year in a row in the FT's 2010 b-school rankings
I only applied to US schools, but its good to see the UK in good form...
I only applied to US schools, but its good to see the UK in good form...
Empire State of Mind
The New York schools are playing tricks on me, I swear...
Last week I got some great news - Stern want to interview me! This means my application can't have been too far off the mark! Unfortunately, Stern only interviews on campus, so cue a frantic search for cheap transatlantic flights and a short notice vacation request at work. The upside - I get to spend a weekend in New York (I'm hoping the big lights will inspire me) and poke around Stern, as well as another school on my list - Columbia.
Here's where it gets weird. I've been trying to finish off my Columbia application for a while now, but have been slightly put off by the school's attitude to international students. Firstly, international students are not allowed to apply until after January 6th - effectively a 'round 3' application. Secondly, they do not provide loan facilities for international students, saying
It's from Columbia.
This is so weird, and coincidental, that I'm compelled to ask - are Stern and Columbia sharing info about applicants? All I know for sure is - they're messing with my mind!
Anyways, I'm off to do some Stern prep. Will report back on how it goes. Wish me luck...
Last week I got some great news - Stern want to interview me! This means my application can't have been too far off the mark! Unfortunately, Stern only interviews on campus, so cue a frantic search for cheap transatlantic flights and a short notice vacation request at work. The upside - I get to spend a weekend in New York (I'm hoping the big lights will inspire me) and poke around Stern, as well as another school on my list - Columbia.
Here's where it gets weird. I've been trying to finish off my Columbia application for a while now, but have been slightly put off by the school's attitude to international students. Firstly, international students are not allowed to apply until after January 6th - effectively a 'round 3' application. Secondly, they do not provide loan facilities for international students, saying
Most international students rely on family funds, personal savings, government or company sponsorships and/or loans secured in their home countriesSeriously? No loans? Poor show, Columbia. Despite this, its a great course, in a great place, with a great reputation. So I'm just on the verge of biting the bullet and finishing off my app (bugging recommenders, etc.) when an email lands in my inbox.
It's from Columbia.
Are you interested in an MBA from Columbia Business School, and want to learn more about the various options available?...While we recognize that the distance may be too great for some of you to travel for this information session, we wanted to extend the invitation to all in case you happen to be in the area during this time.In case I happen to be in the area? I live in the UK, so the chances of me being "in the area" of New York, on a different continent, are pretty slim. But here's the thing - I AM in the area! The session is on the same day as my Stern interview.
This is so weird, and coincidental, that I'm compelled to ask - are Stern and Columbia sharing info about applicants? All I know for sure is - they're messing with my mind!
Anyways, I'm off to do some Stern prep. Will report back on how it goes. Wish me luck...
Saturday 16 January 2010
Monday 11 January 2010
I dream of GMAT
Another day of waiting is nearly over for me (b-schools - will you ever call??), but to prevent any further obsessive checking of forums, I thought I'd mention a bit about the GMAT
I studied for about 6 weeks in total: around 4 hrs per day at weekends and an hour in the evening a couple of times per week. That amount of revision worked pretty well for me, and I felt I was fully prepared by the time I sat in the exam.
First thing to note is that I am a native English speaker in an analytical job, so both the quant and verbal sections probably came easier to me than many people. That said, here's my study schedule, in case it helps:
I started by reading the Princeton Review, on a recommendation from my boss. I like the down-to-earth chat in the book, and its a good intro to the GMAT exam (especially for people, like me, that had never heard of computer adaptive testing before). I do think its aimed more for people in the mid-tier though - some of the tips were common sense to me, and their methods often slowed me down on the quant stuff. The verbal was good though. I confess to skipping most of the practice questions...
The best advice from Princeton is to write down ABCDE for each question on your rough paper, then cross off each choice as you discount it (there's more to it than that, but you should read the book if you want the detail!). This worked really well for me on all sections.
I also had a copy of McGraw Hill's GMAT: I did not get along with this book at all, or the accompanying CD-ROM! The tips were not as clear as princeton, and the practice tests had questions with errors in (plus the scores in practice exams were not representative of the real thing). Not what you want in your revision!!
The one book you MUST use is the GMAT Review (the official guide). If you even think about doing the exam before you have completed EVERY question in this book (except the essay ones - I'm not THAT crazy!), you need your head examined. I wasnt sure if they were ordered by difficulty, so I used to practice doing 20 questions at a time, but picking every tenth one (e.g. 1,11,21 etc). On reading comprehension, I just did all the questions relating to one or two of the passages in each sitting. I timed myself, but not obsessively - just wanted to check that I was roughly going at the right speed (there is a great GMAT timer iPhone app for that)
Key thing here is to produce an error log - I had a traffic light system when I marked my answers: Green if I knew it, Amber if I took an educated guess but got it right, Red if I got it wrong. I'll come back to this later...
For the essays, I developed a first sentence e.g. "The argument that...is flawed as it stands..." in the way that the books tell you (but not copied word for word!). I also made sure I had lots of signals in there e.g. firstly, secondly, finally etc., but didnt have a defined structure for the middle part. I also had an idea of how my conclusion would work (but no firm template). I basically practiced one of each essay (from the Review book) each weekend for 6 weeks. That was enough. My main issue was that I used to get fired up by the questions, and would end up going over time, or spend too long trying to refine my points. In fact, this happened to me in the actual exam - the issue question basically said that computers had not been a good thing for the world, and I got so passionate in my argument against this, I almost forgot I was in the middle of the GMAT and that I needed to conclude in a specific way etc.! Watch out for that one.
Three weeks before the exam, I did the first test on GMATPrep. This software is your friend - use it well, young Skywalker. I did the first exam under timed conditions, but then went back a week later and took that same exam - the questions were different (not sure how many are actually contained in the software). These are actually real questions, and the layout is EXACTLY the same as the exam. Use it as much as possible. I did the 2nd test, twice, on the weekend before the exam, and it gave me a lot of confidence. My only issue is that it doesnt save your essays for review after you have written them (at least I couldnt find it if it did!)- be warned!
In the evenings of the week before the exam, I went through every question in the book that I had flagged amber or red, and made sure I could do it (even if I had to refer to the answers). This made sure that the topics I was not great on were at the front of my mind on exam day (I assumed the rest of it would take care of itself!)
On test day, I started well on the essays (with the minor blip that I got far too involved in my second essay, as described above!). Then I hit the quant. And I mean hit. First couple of questions, no prob, I was ahead of time, but then one came up that stumped me. Worst thing was, I knew it was an early question (ie. important!) and I couldnt let it go. I ended up spending 5 mins and still semi-guessed it. Aaargh! I'd hit a wall. Panic set in, but I soldiered on. I finished the section bang on time (although had to guess the last question with 10 secs to go). My advice - try not to let an early question stress you! I'm pretty sure the examiners throw a tricky one in there early to see how you cope!
I'd been completing the verbal section with lots of time to spare, so was less worried about timing on this one. However, on the verbal questions it is less easy to 'work out' the answer than on the quant, so the extra time wasnt necessarily that helpful! Again there were a few guesses, but I got to the end and felt I'd scored solidly.
Then it asked whether I wanted to see (and therefore record) my results. Suddenly I had an urge to cancel the exam - where did that come from? This was the worst part of the exam for me! Nightmare. Finally, I sucked it up and checked my score: 780 - phew! Stage one, over.
Hope that helps any prospective GMAT takers out there...I'm off to watch Glee.
If you have any questions that you think I can help with - drop it in the comments!
I studied for about 6 weeks in total: around 4 hrs per day at weekends and an hour in the evening a couple of times per week. That amount of revision worked pretty well for me, and I felt I was fully prepared by the time I sat in the exam.
First thing to note is that I am a native English speaker in an analytical job, so both the quant and verbal sections probably came easier to me than many people. That said, here's my study schedule, in case it helps:
I started by reading the Princeton Review, on a recommendation from my boss. I like the down-to-earth chat in the book, and its a good intro to the GMAT exam (especially for people, like me, that had never heard of computer adaptive testing before). I do think its aimed more for people in the mid-tier though - some of the tips were common sense to me, and their methods often slowed me down on the quant stuff. The verbal was good though. I confess to skipping most of the practice questions...
The best advice from Princeton is to write down ABCDE for each question on your rough paper, then cross off each choice as you discount it (there's more to it than that, but you should read the book if you want the detail!). This worked really well for me on all sections.
I also had a copy of McGraw Hill's GMAT: I did not get along with this book at all, or the accompanying CD-ROM! The tips were not as clear as princeton, and the practice tests had questions with errors in (plus the scores in practice exams were not representative of the real thing). Not what you want in your revision!!
The one book you MUST use is the GMAT Review (the official guide). If you even think about doing the exam before you have completed EVERY question in this book (except the essay ones - I'm not THAT crazy!), you need your head examined. I wasnt sure if they were ordered by difficulty, so I used to practice doing 20 questions at a time, but picking every tenth one (e.g. 1,11,21 etc). On reading comprehension, I just did all the questions relating to one or two of the passages in each sitting. I timed myself, but not obsessively - just wanted to check that I was roughly going at the right speed (there is a great GMAT timer iPhone app for that)
Key thing here is to produce an error log - I had a traffic light system when I marked my answers: Green if I knew it, Amber if I took an educated guess but got it right, Red if I got it wrong. I'll come back to this later...
For the essays, I developed a first sentence e.g. "The argument that...is flawed as it stands..." in the way that the books tell you (but not copied word for word!). I also made sure I had lots of signals in there e.g. firstly, secondly, finally etc., but didnt have a defined structure for the middle part. I also had an idea of how my conclusion would work (but no firm template). I basically practiced one of each essay (from the Review book) each weekend for 6 weeks. That was enough. My main issue was that I used to get fired up by the questions, and would end up going over time, or spend too long trying to refine my points. In fact, this happened to me in the actual exam - the issue question basically said that computers had not been a good thing for the world, and I got so passionate in my argument against this, I almost forgot I was in the middle of the GMAT and that I needed to conclude in a specific way etc.! Watch out for that one.
Three weeks before the exam, I did the first test on GMATPrep. This software is your friend - use it well, young Skywalker. I did the first exam under timed conditions, but then went back a week later and took that same exam - the questions were different (not sure how many are actually contained in the software). These are actually real questions, and the layout is EXACTLY the same as the exam. Use it as much as possible. I did the 2nd test, twice, on the weekend before the exam, and it gave me a lot of confidence. My only issue is that it doesnt save your essays for review after you have written them (at least I couldnt find it if it did!)- be warned!
In the evenings of the week before the exam, I went through every question in the book that I had flagged amber or red, and made sure I could do it (even if I had to refer to the answers). This made sure that the topics I was not great on were at the front of my mind on exam day (I assumed the rest of it would take care of itself!)
On test day, I started well on the essays (with the minor blip that I got far too involved in my second essay, as described above!). Then I hit the quant. And I mean hit. First couple of questions, no prob, I was ahead of time, but then one came up that stumped me. Worst thing was, I knew it was an early question (ie. important!) and I couldnt let it go. I ended up spending 5 mins and still semi-guessed it. Aaargh! I'd hit a wall. Panic set in, but I soldiered on. I finished the section bang on time (although had to guess the last question with 10 secs to go). My advice - try not to let an early question stress you! I'm pretty sure the examiners throw a tricky one in there early to see how you cope!
I'd been completing the verbal section with lots of time to spare, so was less worried about timing on this one. However, on the verbal questions it is less easy to 'work out' the answer than on the quant, so the extra time wasnt necessarily that helpful! Again there were a few guesses, but I got to the end and felt I'd scored solidly.
Then it asked whether I wanted to see (and therefore record) my results. Suddenly I had an urge to cancel the exam - where did that come from? This was the worst part of the exam for me! Nightmare. Finally, I sucked it up and checked my score: 780 - phew! Stage one, over.
Hope that helps any prospective GMAT takers out there...I'm off to watch Glee.
If you have any questions that you think I can help with - drop it in the comments!
Sunday 10 January 2010
The decision process
I thought I'd finish my initial posts with a quick chat about how I came to the decisions that I did on which schools to apply to:
First of all, the easy bit - I knew I wanted to study in the US. I've done some work over there and like the idea of studying there. Plus I like the sound of a 2 year course better than most of the European single year courses. But which schools to choose?
I did make use of the rankings as a start point. My ranking ranking is here:
1. Financial times
Defo considered the authoritative source here in London. The methodology seems pretty comprehensive (although there are flaws). My view is that they are possibly a bit keen to place non-US schools higher up in the ranks!
2. Business Week
As far as I can tell, this one is probably the most authoritative in the US. Has slightly more info on each school than the FT, too.
3. US News
Basically sensible, but I dont hear people talking about it much
4. The Economist
Truly crazy rankings, in comparison to the above sources. This is slightly strange, as otherwise I pretty much consider The Economist as gospel on most subjects. Someone famously said "I don't have an opinion any more, I wait for The Economist to tell me what to think". I know that feeling! The rankings on this one are pretty strange and, as far as I can tell, not generally trusted. However, the fact sheets that go along with the rankings do give some good opinions on the schools.
From the rankings, I narrowed down my target schools to the top 20, and began to dig around their flashy websites a little.
Once I had a feel for each school, I tried to get opinions from as many alums as I could. Discounting the natural bias to always recommend their own school(!), I did get some great advice.
I heartily recommend that everyone asks as many alums as possible. I was given advice on the schools with the best reputation in the sectors that I want to go into post-MBA (This is hard to find out from websites alone - each school says its great at everything!). I was also given advice on the learning style that people think would best suit me - this came from people that know me well.
I think its also good to look at the personality of alums that went to each school, and see how they match with your own personality. I was quite lucky, in that I had contacts from most of the top business schools around. However, where I didnt, I used linked-in and other 'friends of friends' to connect.
Another good way of accessing alums were the school presentations and MBA fairs that came to London. Again, I'm quite lucky that all the top schools tend to take a trip to my home city sometime in the autumn. Yet another unintended consequence of the change in my job situation in the summer was that my plans to visit US schools were cancelled. I therefore had to rely on these tours more than I thought I would.
My last tip for anyone still deciding is to check the stats of the industries that recruit at each school. When job sectors are given as percentages (e.g . "16% technology"), it really does show the different ways that schools can skew.
My decisions:
East coast: NYU, Columbia, Wharton
West coast: Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA
No Harvard, despite the fact its probably got the best global rep. That was a tough decision, but I just dont think its right for me. Equally tough was discounting MIT. However, I know Boston well and am keen to experience a different American city.
Where are you applying, and what tools did you use to make your decision? Comments welcome!
First of all, the easy bit - I knew I wanted to study in the US. I've done some work over there and like the idea of studying there. Plus I like the sound of a 2 year course better than most of the European single year courses. But which schools to choose?
I did make use of the rankings as a start point. My ranking ranking is here:
1. Financial times
Defo considered the authoritative source here in London. The methodology seems pretty comprehensive (although there are flaws). My view is that they are possibly a bit keen to place non-US schools higher up in the ranks!
2. Business Week
As far as I can tell, this one is probably the most authoritative in the US. Has slightly more info on each school than the FT, too.
3. US News
Basically sensible, but I dont hear people talking about it much
4. The Economist
Truly crazy rankings, in comparison to the above sources. This is slightly strange, as otherwise I pretty much consider The Economist as gospel on most subjects. Someone famously said "I don't have an opinion any more, I wait for The Economist to tell me what to think". I know that feeling! The rankings on this one are pretty strange and, as far as I can tell, not generally trusted. However, the fact sheets that go along with the rankings do give some good opinions on the schools.
From the rankings, I narrowed down my target schools to the top 20, and began to dig around their flashy websites a little.
Once I had a feel for each school, I tried to get opinions from as many alums as I could. Discounting the natural bias to always recommend their own school(!), I did get some great advice.
I heartily recommend that everyone asks as many alums as possible. I was given advice on the schools with the best reputation in the sectors that I want to go into post-MBA (This is hard to find out from websites alone - each school says its great at everything!). I was also given advice on the learning style that people think would best suit me - this came from people that know me well.
I think its also good to look at the personality of alums that went to each school, and see how they match with your own personality. I was quite lucky, in that I had contacts from most of the top business schools around. However, where I didnt, I used linked-in and other 'friends of friends' to connect.
Another good way of accessing alums were the school presentations and MBA fairs that came to London. Again, I'm quite lucky that all the top schools tend to take a trip to my home city sometime in the autumn. Yet another unintended consequence of the change in my job situation in the summer was that my plans to visit US schools were cancelled. I therefore had to rely on these tours more than I thought I would.
My last tip for anyone still deciding is to check the stats of the industries that recruit at each school. When job sectors are given as percentages (e.g . "16% technology"), it really does show the different ways that schools can skew.
My decisions:
East coast: NYU, Columbia, Wharton
West coast: Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA
No Harvard, despite the fact its probably got the best global rep. That was a tough decision, but I just dont think its right for me. Equally tough was discounting MIT. However, I know Boston well and am keen to experience a different American city.
Where are you applying, and what tools did you use to make your decision? Comments welcome!
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