Harvard Business School Application Essays and Deadline for 2009-2010

This week Harvard Business School released its application deadlines and admissions essays for the 2008-2009 season. Here they are, taken from Harvard's site. Our comments are in italics:

HBS Application Deadlines
Round 1: October 1, 2009
Round 2: January 19, 2010
Round 3: April 8, 2010

(Harvard's Round 1 deadline is two weeks earlier than it was last year. However, its Round 2 deadline is nearly two weeks later than last year's, and its Round 3 deadline is nearly a month later. The Round 3 move is especially interesting since this past year Stanford GSB's Round 3 deadline was also on April 8. This was almost certainly a move made to match Stanford in trying to grab any last-minute, high-potential applicants.)

HBS Application Essays

• What are your three most substantial accomplishments and why do you view them as such? (600 words)
  
  (This is the same question that HBS has asked for years now, and is a great opportunity for you to spell out three main themes that you want to emphasize in your application. This being HBS, at least one of your examples should highlight leadership, but don't discount stories that also demonstrate other three dimensions that admissions officers look for: teamwork, innovation, and maturity. As we always tell our clients, the "why" is even more important than the "what," so be sure to spell out why these accomplishments are so critical to describing you as an emerging leader. Also, ideally you can draw upon multiple types of experiences -- not only on the job, but also from your community involvement, your hobbies, and even, in some cases, your personal life.)


• What have you learned from a mistake? (400 words)
  
  (This question is also a repeat from last year. The key here is to not only describe what happened and what you learned, but also to show how you put that lesson to work in a later situation. That last point allows you to evolve the essay answer from being purely hypothetical to being an opportunity to discuss another achievement.)


• Please respond to two of the following (400 words each):
  
  
  1. What would you like the MBA Admissions Board to know about your undergraduate academic experience?
  
  
  2. Discuss how you have engaged with a community or organization.
  
  
  3. Tell us about a time when you made a difficult decision.
  
  
  4. Write a cover letter to your application introducing yourself to the Admissions Board.
  
  
  5. What is your career vision and why is this choice meaningful to you?
  
  
  
  (Of the above questions, the "difficult decision" and "cover letter" questions are new since last year. They replace a question that asked, "What area of the world are you most curious about and why?" which only lasted for one year, probably because it didn't help the HBS admissions committee learn much new valuable information about its applicants. For the new questions, we like how the "difficult decision" question gives you an opportunity to really show off their maturity. The "cover letter" question is similar to MIT Sloan's, and provides another good opportunity to sketch out the main themes of your application.)

If you would like more information about applying to HBS, visit the Harvard Business School information page. And for more information on business school application deadlines, and be sure to follow us on Twitter!

Columbia 2010 J-Term Admissions Essays

Recently Columbia started accepting applications for the January 2010 intake of its accelerated MBA program. There is just a single deadline -- October 7, 2009 -- on a rolling admissions basis. Below are the Columbia J-Term's admissions essays, with our comments in italics:

Columbia January Term Admissions Essays

1. What are your short-term and long-term post-MBA goals? How will Columbia Business School help you achieve these goals? (750 words)

(This is pretty much the standard "Why an MBA? / Why this school?" question, but your answer will need to be a little more focused than the answer that an applicant would submit to a typical two-year program. The J-Term is especially designed for young professionals who plan to return to their current employers or otherwise don't need the benefit of a summer internship to transition to a new career, and Columbia will closely look for evidence that you understand the what you will gain and what you will give up by attending its accelerated program.)


2. Master Classes are the epitome of bridging the gap between theory and practice at Columbia Business School. (View link.) Please provide an example from your own life in which practical experience taught you more than theory alone. (500 words)

(The key takeaway for you as an applicant is that Columbia prides itself on its Master Classes, so make sure you understand what they are and why they are important to the Columbia academic experience. Columbia, like many other top schools, has made a push to better connect the theory covered in its core classes with the practical challenges that its graduates will face, and Master Classes are the school's way of doing that. For your response, while this question doesn't specifically ask about a professional failure, such an example might provide you with rich material for a response. Just be sure to emphasize what you learned as a result, and, ideally, how you applied this lesson later on.)


3. Please provide an example of a team failure of which you've been a part. If given a second chance, what would you do differently? (500 words)

(The admissions office is most interested in what you learned from such a failure. Although the second part of this question asks a theoretical question -- What would you do? -- ideally you can describe a time when you applied what you learned to another real-life situation, thus preventing the same problem from happening again.)


4. (Optional essay) Is there any further information that you wish to provide to the Admissions Committee? (Please use this space to provide an explanation of any areas of concern in your academic record or your personal history.)

(Use this space wisely. Do not dwell on your weaknesses, go on and on with excuses about something that happened ten years ago, or unduly draw attention to a minor weakness!)

For more advice on applying to Columbia, visit the Veritas Prep Columbia Business School information page.

Update from the HBS Admissions Office

Last week Dee Leopold posted a Round One update on the HBS blog.

Leopold and her team are now in the process of reviewing applicants who have already interviewed for Round One, and they expect to continue doing so up until the school's Jan. 21 notification deadline. They are also putting some applicants onto the Round One waitlist, and Leopold says that she expects to waitlist around 100 Round One applicants.

If you're waitlisted, don't despair -- you may be invited to interview along with Round Two applicants. "Thus, you could say that a Round One waitlist decision is essentially a 'further consideration' message," says Leopold.

Given the anticipated surge in applications this year, especially in Round Two, we expect HBS and other top business schools to make heavy use of waitlists this year. They may like the looks of your candidacy, but if they're not sure just how big the Round Two wave will be, they may decide to wait until February before making a decision on your candidacy.

If you're racing to finish your HBS application before the Jan. 6 Round Two deadline, take a look at our MBA essay editing services, which offer a 72-hour turnaround time. Good luck!

Last-Minute MBA Admissions Essay Tips

This week many of our clients are working hard to finish up their Round One business school admissions essays. If you’re in that boat, then we’d like to offer a few last-minute tips to help you perfect your essays:

• Step Away from Your Essays – If you are your own primary editor, the best thing you can do is to give yourself some time between reviews of each essay. When you’ve written the prose yourself and are knee deep in it, it’s too easy to skim over a sentence and read what you know you meant to say, rather than what the words actually put down on paper. This unfortunately makes it very easy to miss basic mistakes . Step away from your essays for at least a few hours (ideally a couple of days) before reviewing them again.



• Don’t Let Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen – When it comes to feedback on your essays, more is not always better. We all have friends and relatives who are decent writers and are willing to loan you their eyeballs, but don’t feel compelled to act on every piece of unsolicited advice that you receive. Where your friends can help you the most is in catching errors that you missed or in letting you know when a certain passage in confusing. Beyond that, you should probably ignore most of their suggestions on style. It’s too late for that now!



• Recycle with Care – It’s very tempting to recycle your MBA admission essays, especially if you’re rushing to meet a deadline. And it’s okay to re-use a story in more than one application – after all, we all only have so many stories of a time when we demonstrated leadership, made a tough decision, faced an ethical challenge, etc. But, above all, make sure that the essay you’re using appropriate answers the question being asked. You’d be surprised at how often we see applicants fail to do this seemingly simple thing. And, for the love of God, don’t say, “I really want to attend Wharton” in your Stanford essay!!



• Make Sure Your Essays Fit Your Overall Application Story – You may be so focused on making each essay great that you’ll miss the bigger picture: For each school, do your essays fit in with your overall application story? Don’t get so hung up on making your individual essays so dynamic that you forget to tie them together in one overarching application theme. Are you a techie who wants to build his general management chops? A finance person who needs to get better at marketing? Ideally all of your application components will be consistent with that theme.

If you're stuck, take a look at these sample MBA essays. If you would like some more help in polishing up your essays, take a look at Veritas Prep’s MBA essay editing services. Our essay evaluators won’t write your essay for you or put words in your mouth, but they will help you clearly and concisely articulate your application story in your essays. If you need one last pair of professional eyes to look over your essay, give Veritas Prep's essay services a look.

UC Berkeley (Haas) Application Essays and Deadlines for 2008-2009

The Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley has just released its application deadlines and admissions essays for the 2008-2009 season. Note that as of 7/16/08 Haas still notes on its web site that these are subject to change for the 2008-2009 application season. Our comments are in italics:

Haas Application Deadlines

Round 1: November 4, 2008
Round 2: December 9, 2008
Round 3: January 30, 2009
Round 4: March 11, 2009

(These are virtually identical to last year's deadlines.)

Haas Admissions Essays

(Note that we have presented these in a different order than what you will see on the Haas web site.)

Required Essays:

1. Give us an example of a situation in which you displayed leadership. (500 word maximum)
2. What are your short-term and long-term career goals? How do your professional experiences relate to these goals? Why do you want an MBA from Berkeley at this point in your career? (1000 word maximum)

Short Answer:

1. If you could change one thing you've done in your life, what would it be, and how would you do it differently? (250 word maximum)


2. Tell us about your most significant accomplishment. (250 word maximum)


3. At Haas, we value innovation and creativity. Describe an innovative solution you have created to address a specific challenge. (250 word maximum)


4. What steps have you taken to learn about the Berkeley MBA program, and what factors have influenced your decision to apply? (250 word maximum)

Supplemental Questions:

(These are meant to accompany -- and explain parts of -- your Haas application data sheet, so we won't dive into too much detail here.)

1. If you have not provided a letter of recommendation from your current supervisor, please explain; otherwise, enter N/A.


2. List in order of importance all community & professional organizations and extracurricular activities in which you have been involved during or after university studies. Indicate the nature of the activity or organization, dates of involvement, offices held, & average number of hours spent per month.


3. List full-time and part-time jobs held during undergraduate or graduate studies, indicating the employer, job title, employment dates, location, and the number of hours worked per week for each position held prior to the completion of your degree.


4. Please explain all gaps in your employment since earning your university degree.


5. Please identify the course(s) you have taken or intend to take to demonstrate quantitative proficiency. Provide the course name, date, grade if any, and institution at which the course was or will be taken. If you wish, you may discuss other ways in which you have demonstrated strong quantitative abilities.


6. If you have ever been subject to academic discipline, placed on probation, suspended or required to withdraw from any college or university, please explain. If not, please enter N/A. (An affirmative response to this question does not automatically disqualify you from admission.)

(Note their comment in that last question. If you have a blemish in your past, don't try to hide it. Better to address it directly, explain what you learned and how you've changed, and move on.)

Optional Essays:

1. Please feel free to provide a statement concerning any information you would like to add to your application that you haven’t addressed elsewhere. (500 word maximum)


2. If you wish to be considered for the Haas Achievement Award (for individuals who have achieved success in spite of significant economic, educational, health-related and/or other obstacles), please use this space to address the obstacles you have overcome. (750 word maximum)

(The Haas application features a bunch of short questions that clearly hit on all of the attributes that they most look for in applicants -- especially leadership, innovation, and maturity. Interestingly, there aren't many changes from last year. The "What would you change about your life?" question is the biggest change vs. what was in last year's application. This question provides for a better opportunity to demonstrate introspection than last year's "Who would you invite to dinner?" question. The key with all of these, especially the Short Answer questions, is to answer the question asked! They hit on some big subject areas, so don't waste any of your 250 words with each.)

For more advice on applying to UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business, visit our Haas information page.

Wharton Application Essays and Deadlines for 2008-2009

Wharton has released its application deadlines and admissions essays for the 2008-2009 season. Here they are, taken from Wharton's site. Our comments are in italics:

Wharton Application Deadlines
Round 1: October 9, 2008
Round 2: January 8, 2009
Round 3: March 5, 2009

(No big changes from last year... All deadlines are within a week of the 2007-2008 season's respective deadlines.)

Wharton Application Essays

First-Time Applicant Questions:

1. Describe your career progress to date and your future short-term and long-term career goals. How do you expect an MBA from Wharton to help you achieve these goals, and why is now the best time for you to join our program? (1,000 words)
   
   
2. Describe a setback or a failure that you have experienced. What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself? (500 words)



3. Where in your background would we find evidence of your leadership capacity and/or potential? (500 words)


(Question #3 isn't new, but it's new that it's a mandatory one. Interesting question... It doesn't get much more explicit than this that they're looking for leadership.)


4. Please respond to one (1) of the following questions:
   
   a. Describe an experience you have had innovating or initiating, your lessons learned, the results and impact of your efforts. (500 words)
   
   (Question 4a is new.)
   
   b. Is there anything about your background or experience that you feel you have not had the opportunity to share with the Admissions Committee in your application? If yes, please explain. (500 words)
   
   
5. OPTIONAL: If you feel there are extenuating circumstances of which the Committee should be aware, please explain them here (e.g., unexplained gaps in work experience, choice of recommenders, TOEFL waiver request, inconsistent or questionable academic performance, significant weaknesses in your application). (250 words, maximum)

Reapplicant Questions:

1. Describe your career progress to date and your future short-term and long-term career goals. How do you expect an MBA from Wharton to help you achieve these goals, and why is now the best time for you to join our program? How has your candidacy improved since the last time you applied? (1,000 words)



2. Describe an experience you have had innovating or initiating, your lessons learned, the results and impact of your efforts. (500 words)


(As it is for new applicants, Question 2 is new. Clearly more emphasis on innovation from Wharton this year.)


3. Please respond to one (1) of the following questions:
   
   a. Where in your background would we find evidence of your leadership capacity and/or potential? (500 words)
   
   b. Is there anything about your background or experience that you feel you have not had the opportunity to share with the Admissions Committee in your application? If yes, please explain. (500 words)
   
   
4. OPTIONAL: If you feel there are extenuating circumstances of which the Committee should be aware, please explain them here (e.g., unexplained gaps in work experience, choice of recommenders, TOEFL waiver request, inconsistent or questionable academic performance, significant weaknesses in your application). (250 words, maximum)

For more information about Wharton, visit our Wharton MBA information page.And for more information on business school application deadlines, visit our MBA admissions deadlines page.

Kellogg Application Essays for 2008-2009

Kellogg applicants, look alive! The Kellogg School of Management has just released its admissions essays for the 2008-2009 application season. The questions are as follows, lifted directly from the Kellogg web site:

All applicants are required to answer questions 1, 2 and 3 in addition to 2 of the essays in question 4. For questions 1-3, please limit responses to 2 pages.

1: Briefly assess your career progress to date. Elaborate on your future career plans and your motivation for pursuing a graduate degree at Kellogg.

2: Describe how your background, values, academics, activities and/or leadership skills will enhance the experience of other Kellogg students.

3: Describe your key leadership experiences and evaluate what leadership areas you hope to develop through your MBA experience.

Choose two of the following three essays…

4: Applicants must answer 2 of the below essays. (Re-applicants must answer question 4D and 1 other essay). Please keep responses to two paragraphs.
- 4A - Describe a time when you had to motivate a reluctant individual or group.
- 4B - I wish the Admissions Committee had asked me…..
- 4C - What do others admire about you?
- 4D - For re-applicants only: Since your previous application, what are the steps you’ve taken
to strengthen your candidacy?

As Beth Flye told us at last week's AIGAC conference, there are no really significant changes from last year. Questions 2 and 3 have been reworded, but are substantially the same as last year's questions. Question 4A may appear to be new, but is similar to last year's "Describe the most challenging professional relationship you have faced" question.

What stands out the most to me is 4C -- "What do other admire about you?" I miss their old question that had applicants play the role of admissions officers and evaluate their own applications. While this isn't quite the same, and is much shorter, I'm glad to see this sort of "toot your own horn" question back on the Kellogg application.

For more advice about your Kellogg application, visit our Kellogg School of Management information page.

Stanford GSB Essay Topics for 2008-2009

Stanford has just released its application essays for the 2008-2009 admissions season:

• Essay A: What matters most to you, and why?

• Essay B: What are your career aspirations? How will your education at Stanford help you achieve them?

• Essay C: Short Essays—Options 1-4
  Answer two of the questions below. Tell us not only what you did but also how you did it. What was the outcome? How did people respond? Only describe experiences that have occurred during the last three years.
  
  Option 1: Tell us about a time when you built or developed a team.
  
  Option 2: Tell us about a time when you felt most effective as a leader.
  
  Option 3: Tell us about a time when you tried to reach a goal or complete a task that was challenging, difficult, or frustrating.
  
  Option 4: Tell us about a time when you went beyond what was defined, established, or expected.
  

It used to be that Stanford turned MBA applicants loose on just the first two questions, with absolutely no limits on word count. More recently, they gave applicants a total seven-page limit for all of their essays, with applicants free to choose how they used the seven pages. This year, they have given applicants a more traditional word limit, totaling 1,800 words across all four essays. While you are still free to allocate your words however you choose, it's clear from Stanford's guidelines that you should spend more words (and time) on Essay A than any other.

If you want more guidance on your Stanford business school application, visit our Stanford GSB profile page.

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