GMAT Bootcamp: Are you tough enough?
May 8, 2013
Date: Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Time: 9:30pm-11:00pm ET/6:30pm-8:00pm PT
What: GMAT Bootcamp
Hosts: Kaplan GMAT Instructor Team — Justin Doff, Teresa Rupp, and Lucas Weingarten
Why: To learn the strategies you need to build the speed and accuracy to tackle the most advanced content on the test.
Listen up, people! You’ve got somewhere to be on Tuesday, May 14, 2013! One of Kaplan’s Elite GMAT instructors, Justin Lawrence Doff (shown here), will be on-camera and coming to you live from Los Angeles, CA dead-set on a singular agenda: arming you with what you need to conquer the most advanced attacks the GMAT has to throw at you. Learn how to set the pace on the climb to the top scoring tiers and, most importantly, how to maintain that level of performance to the end.
It’s bootcamp*. Expect to work hard and to make gains. No matter where you are in your GMAT prep cycle, Kaplan GMAT Bootcamp is designed for the GMAT warrior within us all.
We are saying ‘JUMP!’ and you are saying ‘HOW HIGH?’ See ya Tuesday.
*But don’t worry. We aren’t going to yell at you.
Last summer, the GMAT made the most major change to its format in 15 years by replacing one of the essays with the Integrated Reasoning (IR) section. Since then, GMAT test-takers have been wondering how IR impacts their b-school applications. As it turns out, business schools are wondering exactly the same thing.
In the IR section of the GMAT, test-takers evaluate data in graphs, spreadsheets, and charts, similar to the materials they will eventually see in business school. In theory, IR can better assess students’ ability to perform the tasks expected of them in business school and the work world. Nearly a year after the inclusion of IR, the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), who administers the GMAT, and business schools nationwide are taking the first steps to determine what role IR should play in the admissions process.
Bloomberg Businessweek recently reported that business schools across the country are actively assessing the significance of IR performance on students’ eventual success in business school. While IR isn’t currently being given much weight in the admissions process, largely because many applicants took the GMAT before the test change and therefore do not have IR scores, business schools are analyzing IR data to get a better understanding of the role it will eventually play in admissions. Dan Poston, of the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business, states, “We want to see how it [IR] plays out…We want to see how predictive it is of student’s success at school.”
GMAC has released some key data on the IR section, based upon results of the more than 123,000 test-takers who have taken the GMAT since IR was added to the test. GMAC reports that the distribution of scores is normal and without bias against any subgroup of test-takers. In short, these results suggest that IR has the potential to be a valid predictor of student success in b-school.
In addition to analyzing data from GMAC, some schools are directly studying the connection between IR and student performance. For instance, at Vanderbilt University’s Owen Graduate School of Management, a group of 60 second-year students will complete the IR portion of the GMAT. Their IR scores will then be compared to their success in core courses in order to determine whether IR performance positively correlates with b-school performance.
The obvious question for GMAT test-takers is how they should approach IR in order to put together the best application package possible. While IR may not play a major role in the admissions process for the next few years, a solid IR score can only help applicants. As Dawna Clarke of Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business notes, “IR will help prospective students more than it will hurt them…If you are not ‘quant strong,’ but you have strong IR skills, then this test will help you shine.”
When I was a college English teacher, I regularly warned my students about the dangers of plagiarizing their assignments. In addition to pointing out that plagiarism is simply unethical, I made it clear that plagiarists would be punished, through a failing grade on an assignment, expulsion from class, or even academic probation. Nevertheless, every semester I would catch at least a few students who either missed my warnings or chose to ignore them.
Today, some business school applicants take the same risks, ignoring schools’ warnings about plagiarism and submitting plagiarized essays, despite the steep penalties should they be caught. A recent article in U.S. News and World Report reports that both Penn State’s Smeal College of Business and UCLA’s Anderson School of Management recently rejected over 60 applicants due to plagiarized material. Additionally, Northeastern University’s D’Amore-McKim School of Business has identified 50 cases of potential plagiarism, which are currently being investigated.
In today’s digital world, plagiarism is easier than ever–students can easily buy or copy essays from the comfort of their own bedrooms–but plagiarism is also more easily detected. Penn State, UCLA, and Northeastern are among the more than 100 colleges and universities that use Turnitin, software that checks for original work and flags potential plagiarism. Turnitin compares papers to other student papers within its database, public web pages, and commercial pages from books, newspapers, and journals, making the task of identifying plagiarized essays much simpler for admissions officials.
In short, plagiarism might be easy, but it’s not worth the risk. So, now that you’ve reaffirmed your aversion to plagiarism, what can you do to put together a solid MBA application essay? Here are few tips:
- Start thinking about your essays sooner rather than later. The earlier you start brainstorming and writing your essays, the more time you’ll have for revision and improvement.
- Be specific about who you are, why you want to go to business school, and what your goals are. The best way to stand out is to demonstrate your passion for your career interests and goals. Check out last week’s blog “Add Depth to MBA Application Essays by Owning Your Goals” for suggestions for making your essays more specific.
- Get feedback. Have a variety of people read your essays. Get feedback from friends, family members, AND co-workers so you can revise your essays from several different perspectives. You don’t need to go overboard–commentary from too many people can become overwhelming–but the insights of several different people will help you perfect your essay.
- Most importantly, be true to yourself. Business school is a big investment, and as much as you want schools to accept you, you also want to select a program that is right for you. Putting your true self forward in your essays will help to ensure that the programs you are accepted to will be good fits for you and your goals.
MBA Applications: Use Design Thinking to Find Insight
September 24, 2012
We all assume we know ourselves well. We think we know about our strengths, weaknesses, achievements, passions, and goals. We think that since we are the protagonists in our lives, the various threads, lessons and insights should be clear. We assume a lot…Then we start to write a b-school admissions essay. What happened to all that insight?
Right now many readers are either busy writing their applications for first round deadlines or are finishing up the GMAT and shooting for the second round. Either way you are smack up against the challenge of finding insight and inspiration. The only difference is whether you are confronting it now or you have no idea what’s about to hit you (but will be bludgeoned soon nonetheless). There are a multitude of ways to find inspiration and insight. Here’s one that has its origins in design thinking.
Design always comes back to sticky notes in one way or another. These little guys are one of the best inventions ever made. Even as a tech-lover, I have to admit that nothing has come even close to physical sticky notes. So gather a bunch of them along with a Sharpie marker and some of those little dot stickers.
Bring all of this to a big blank wall in your house. Start by writing one fact about yourself on each sticky note and sticking it on the wall in any random spot. Keep it simple; don’t write an explanation or an essay. Just write the one fact (it’s very important that it’s just one per note). What do you write? It could be an accomplishment, trait, strength, weakness, passion, goal, aspiration, experience, etc. The point is to keep writing until every important detail you can think of about yourself and your life is up on that wall. If you want, you can have a friend or family member look at it and add anything that’s missing. You could even involve them in the process from the beginning if you feel that they would have fun and contribute things that you might miss.
Once everything is up on the wall, start grouping items that seem related in some way. This process is called Affinity Diagramming. The idea is to be creative and keep moving things around until it just feels right. This is best done with more than one person in the mix. If there are two or three of you involved, be chaotic, with everyone moving things (and re-moving them) at the same time. In about 5 minutes or so, you will arrive at state of equilibrium.
After you reach that state equilibrium, think of a creative name for each grouping that captures its spirit or character. If you haven’t been working with anyone else, this is a good time to bring someone in. Stand back and look at what you’ve created. Write down any insights that pop out. At this point, you and your team will be able to makes some connections and draw some insight that you hadn’t seen before. Give everyone three dot stickers, each sicker is a vote. Have each person fix the stickers to the insights or individual notes that they find the most compelling. You will have the final say, but it is always interesting to see what other people think is important.
The last step is to map these insights to the various application components and develop a plan for how you can convey the richness, personality, and learning that is your life to the admissions officers at each of your business schools.
If you have questions about the process, please post them in the comments. Good luck!
Road to Business School: Washington DC
August 15, 2012
The Road to Business School event series is rolling into the Capital tomorrow night to make its last live stop. So far, Kaplan has made multiple appearances on both coasts and in the center of the country, accompanied by more than 40 business schools. MBA applicants have been networking with admissions officers and sowing the seeds of future acceptance letters. If you are living or working in the DC area, plan on stopping by and meeting with your top schools. Register here.
To help you prepare for the event, I have included the details of time and location below. In addition, there is a list of the schools that will be in attendance and their associated twitter handles. Twitter is a great place to get to know the schools you are interested in so that you can direct the messaging in your interactions and on your application toward what matters most to those institutions. If you’re looking for addition ways to prep, check out these blog articles on how to prepare your b-school elevator pitch and make a strong first impression.
Finally, don’t forget to tweet something you learn during the event using the hashtag #RTBS. Each tweet counts as an entry to win a GMAT Data Sufficiency On-Demand course!
Where:
Capital Hilton
1001 16th Street Northwest
Washington, DC 20005
When:
Thursday, August 16th from 6PM-9:30PM
Boston RTBS Schools and Twitter Handles
1. American University (Kogod) – @KogodBiz
2. Babson College – @BabsonMBA
3. Boston University – @BUManagement
4. Brandeis International Business School – @BrandeisIBS
5. Carnegie Mellon (Tepper) – @teppercmu
6. College of William and Mary (Mason) – @WMSchoolofBiz
7. Emory University (Goizueta) – @EmoryGoizueta
8. George Mason School of Management – @Mason_SOM
9. George Washington University – @gwbusiness
10. Georgetown University (McDonough) – @msbgu
11. Georgia Tech (Scheller) – @georgiatechmba
12. Hult – @Hult_Biz
13. IE – @IEbusiness
14. Indiana University (Kelley) – @KelleySchool
15. INSEAD – @INSEAD
16. Johns Hopkins (Carey) – @JHUCarey
17. Melbourne Business School – @MBScarlton
18. Michigan State University (Broad) – MSUBroadCollege
19. Ohio State (Fisher) – @FisherOSU
20. Penn State (Smeal) – @SmealCollege
21. Purdue University (Krannert) – @PurdueKrannert
22. Southern Methodist University (Cox) – @SMUCox
23. The Duke MBA (Fuqua) – @DukeFuqua
24. Thunderbird – @TBirdAdmissions)
25. UC Riverside – @UCRiverside
26. UC San Diego (Rady) – @RadySchool
27. UCLA Anderson – @uclaanderson
28. University of California, Davis – @ucdavismba
29. University of California, Irvine (Paul Merage) – @UCIrvine_MBA
30. University of Illinois – Champaign – @uiucbusiness
31. University of Maryland (Smith) – @SmithSchool
32. University of Massachusetts – Amherst (Isenberg) – @IsenbergUMass
33. University of Minnesota (Carlson) – @CarlsonNews
34. University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler) – @kenanflagler
35. University of Notre Dame (Mendoza) – @nd_mba
36. University of Rochester (Simon) – @SimonSchool
37. University of Southern California (Marshall) – @USCMarshall
38. University of Texas – Austin (McCombs) – @UTexasMcCombs
39. University of Washington (Foster) – @UWFosterSchool
40. Vanderbilt (Owen) – @VanderbiltOwen
41. Wake Forest – @Stacy_WFUMBA
42. Washington University in St. Louis (Olin) – @WUSTLbusiness
Road to Business School: Boston
August 13, 2012
Road to Business School Boston is tonight.
We’re entering our second week of Road to Business School events. MBA applicants from Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco have already had the chance to speak to admissions officers from their favorite schools. The seeds of next years bschool admits are being sown.
For example, following the San Francisco event last night, an applicant told me that he had had the chance to make a strong connection with the admissions officers at INSEAD and IESE. A few minutes further into our conversation, the rep from IESE walked by and made the effort to personally thank this applicant for coming. The attendee told her to enjoy dinner at Salt House, a great local restaurant. He had obviously made a very personal connection that led him to have that knowledge. Perhaps he even recommended the restaurant. This is the kind of connection that, along with a winning application and a strong GMAT score, leads to an offer from your favorite school. And these are happening all the time at Road to Business School events.
Tonight the Road to Business School series comes to Boston. The full details of time and location are below. Also, take a look at the list of schools to see who’s coming and check out the schools’ Twitter feeds for some quick research to help you start conversations. Finally, throughout the event, we will be live-tweeting from @KaplanGMATprep using hashtag #RTBS. Tweet something you learn at the event or instagram a photo of your experience tonight using hashtag #RTBS for a chance to win a GMAT Data Sufficiency on Demand.
Where:
The Boston Park Plaza Hotel and Towers
50 Park Plaza at Arlington St
Boston, MA 02116
When:
Monday, August 13th from 6PM-9:30PM
Boston RTBS Schools and Twitter Handles
- Babson College – @BabsonMBA
- Baruch College (Zicklin) – @Baruch_Zicklin
- Boston College (Carroll) – @BCCarrollMBA
- Boston University – @BUManagement
- Brandeis International Business School – @BrandeisIBS
- Carnegie Mellon (Tepper) – @teppercmu
- Clark University – @ClarkGSOM
- The Consortium
- Emory University (Goizueta) – @EmoryGoizueta
- Georgetown University (McDonough) – @msbgu
- Hult – @Hult_Biz
- IE – @IEbusiness
- Indiana University (Kelley) – @KelleySchool
- INSEAD – @INSEAD
- Johns Hopkins (Carey) – @JHUCarey
- Melbourne Business School – @MBScarlton
- Northeastern University College of Business – @NU_MBA
- Ohio State (Fisher) – @FisherOSU
- Penn State (Smeal) – @SmealCollege
- Simmons School of Management – @SimmonsCollege
- Southern Methodist University (Cox) - @SMUCox
- Suffolk University (Sawyer) -@SUBizSchool
- The Duke MBA (Fuqua) – @DukeFuqua
- Thunderbird – @TBirdAdmissions)
- Tuck School of Business (Dartmouth) – @TuckSchool
- UC San Diego (Rady) – @RadySchool
- UCLA Anderson – @uclaanderson
- University of California, Irvine (Paul Merage) – @UCIrvine_MBA
- University of Connecticut – @UConn
- University of Maryland (Smith) – @SmithSchool
- University of Massachusetts – Amherst (Isenberg) – @IsenbergUMass
- University of Minnesota (Carlson) – @CarlsonNews
- University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler) – @kenanflagler
- University of Notre Dame (Mendoza) – @nd_mba
- University of Rochester (Simon) – @SimonSchool
- University of Southern California (Marshall) – @USCMarshall
- University of Texas – Austin (McCombs) – @UTexasMcCombs
- University of Washington (Foster) – @UWFosterSchool
- Vanderbilt (Owen) – @VanderbiltOwen
- Wake Forest – @Stacy_WFUMBA
- Washington University in St. Louis (Olin) – @WUSTLbusiness
- Worcester Polytechnic Institute School of Business – @WPIBiz
Road to Business School: San Francisco
August 11, 2012
San Francisco is next: read this and see which schools will be in attendance.
After visiting Chicago and LA, tomorrow we’re moving on to San Francisco. If you live in the bay area and are thinking about business school this year or next, come check out the event. You can get more details and register here. Below you will find details on the where and the when of tomorrow’s event along with a list of the schools that will be in attendance and their Twitter handles.
Road to Business School San Francisco
Where:
Grand Hyatt San Francisco
345 Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
When:
Sunday, August 12th from 1PM-4:30PM
To prepare:
Take a moment or two to jot down your top questions for the admissions officers from the schools you are interested in so that you are ready to make a great first impression. You may even want to get your elevator pitch ready just in case you get put on the spot with one of the admissions officers from your top choice. Finally, do a bit of research on your top schools before the event. A great place to start is the school’s Twitter feed. To get you started, here is a list of the schools joining us in Los Angeles:
San Francisco RTBS Schools and Twitter Handles:
- Babson College – @BabsonMBA
- Boston University – @BUManagement
- Brandeis International Business School – @BrandeisIBS
- Carnegie Mellon (Tepper) – @teppercmu
- Claremont University (Drucker) – @DruckerSchool
- Emory University (Goizueta) – @EmoryGoizueta
- Georgetown University (McDonough) – @msbgu
- Georgia Tech (Scheller) – @georgiatechbsch
- Hult – @Hult_Biz
- IE – @IEbusiness
- IESE – @iesebs
- Indiana University (Kelley) – @KelleySchool
- INSEAD – @INSEAD
- Johns Hopkins (Carey) – @JHUCarey
- Melbourne Business School – @MBScarlton
- Michigan State University (Broad) – @MSUBroadCollege
- New York University (Stern) – @NYUStern
- Ohio State (Fisher) – @FisherOSU
- Penn State (Smeal) – @SmealCollege
- Purdue University (Krannert) – @PurdueKrannert
- San Francisco State University – @SFStateMBA
- Southern Methodist University (Cox) - @SMUCox
- The Duke MBA (Fuqua) – @DukeFuqua
- Thunderbird – @TBirdAdmissions
- UC Berkeley (Haas) – @BerkeleyHaas
- UC Riverside – @UCRiverside
- UC San Diego (Rady) – @RadySchool
- UCLA Anderson – @uclaanderson
- University of California, Davis – @ucdavismba
- University of California, Irvine (Paul Merage) – @UCIrvine_MBA
- University of Illinois – Champaign – @uiucbusiness
- University of Maryland (Smith) – @SmithSchool
- University of Massachusetts – Amherst (Isenberg) – @IsenbergUMass
- University of Minnesota (Carlson) – @CarlsonNews
- University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler) – @kenanflagler
- University of Notre Dame (Mendoza) – @nd_mba
- University of Rochester (Simon) – @SimonSchool
- University of San Diego – @SanDiegoMBA
- University of San Francisco – @usfmanagement
- University of Southern California (Marshall) – @USCMarshall
- University of Texas – Austin (McCombs) – @UTexasMcCombs
- University of Washington (Foster) – @UWFosterSchool
- Vanderbilt (Owen) – @VanderbiltOwen
- Washington University in St. Louis (Olin) – @WUSTLbusiness
Throughout the event, we will be live tweeting from @KaplanGMATprep using hashtag #RTBS. Make sure to check in with us and the schools you are talking to on Twitter. Also, look for great contest opportunities during the event via Twitter and Instagram (@kaplangmatprep).
We can’t wait to see you on the road to business school!
Road to Business School: Los Angeles
August 7, 2012
Next up – Los Angeles…
The GMAT team is on the road this month visiting cities all over the country with our Road to Business School events. With admissions competition still fierce at top MBA programs, and the MBA job market improving, students and professionals seeking to rebound or advance will want to know invaluable strategies about how to get into business school. For those of you in the LA area that are considering business school, join us on August 11th for our Road to Business School event. This event is a fantastic opportunity to network with admissions officers from top MBA programs around the nation and the world, learn key strategies for the GMAT, and hear from experts on the admissions process. Here are the event details:
Road the Business School Los Angeles
Where:
Millennium Biltmore Hotel
506 South Grand Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90071
When:
Saturday, August 11th from 11AM-2:30PM
To prepare for this event, you’ll want to first register; it’s completely free, but space is limited. Next, join our Road to Business School Inner Circle contest for a chance to win an edge over the competition. Next, take a moment or two to jot down your top questions for the admissions officers from the schools you are interested in so that you are ready to make a great first impression. You may even want to get your elevator pitch ready just in case you get put on the spot with one of the admissions officers from your top choice. Finally, do a bit of research on your top schools before the event. A great place to start is the school’s Twitter feed. To get you started, here is a list of the schools joining us in Los Angeles:
Los Angeles RTBS Schools and Twitter Handles:
- Babson College – @BabsonMBA
- Boston University – @BUManagement
- Brandeis International Business School – @BrandeisIBS
- California State University – Fullerton (Mihaylo) – @CSUFMihaylo
- Carnegie Mellon (Tepper) – @teppercmu
- Claremont University (Drucker) – @DruckerSchool
- Emory University (Goizueta) – @EmoryGoizueta
- Georgetown University (McDonough) – @msbgu
- Georgia Tech (Scheller) – @georgiatechbsch
- Hult – @Hult_Biz
- IE – @IEbusiness
- Indiana University (Kelley) – @KelleySchool
- INSEAD – @INSEAD
- Johns Hopkins (Carey) – @JHUCarey
- Melbourne Business School – @MBScarlton
- Michigan State University (Broad) – @MSUBroadCollege
- New York University (Stern) – @NYUStern
- Ohio State (Fisher) – @FisherOSU
- Penn State (Smeal) – @SmealCollege
- Purdue University (Krannert) – @PurdueKrannert
- Southern Methodist University (Cox) - @SMUCox
- The Duke MBA (Fuqua) – @DukeFuqua
- Thunderbird – @TBirdAdmissions
- UC Riverside – @UCRiverside
- UC San Diego (Rady) – @RadySchool
- UCLA Anderson – @uclaanderson
- University of California, Davis – @ucdavismba
- University of California, Irvine (Paul Merage) – @UCIrvine_MBA
- University of Denver (Daniels) – @uofdenver
- University of Illinois – Champaign – @uiucbusiness
- University of Maryland (Smith) – @SmithSchool
- University of Massachusetts – Amherst (Isenberg) – @IsenbergUMass
- University of Minnesota (Carlson) – @CarlsonNews
- University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler) – @kenanflagler
- University of Notre Dame (Mendoza) – @nd_mba
- University of Rochester (Simon) – @SimonSchool
- University of San Diego – @SanDiegoMBA
- University of Southern California (Marshall) – @USCMarshall
- University of Texas – Austin (McCombs) – @UTexasMcCombs
- University of Washington (Foster) – @UWFosterSchool
- Vanderbilt (Owen) – @VanderbiltOwen
- Washington University in St. Louis (Olin) – @WUSTLbusiness
Throughout the event, we will be live tweeting from @KaplanGMATprep using hashtag #RTBS. Make sure to check in with us and the schools you are talking to on Twitter. Also, look for great contest opportunities within the next few days leading up to and during the event via Twitter and Instagram (@kaplangmatprep).
We can’t wait to see you on the road to business school!
Are Business Schools on the Right Path? – Part 1
August 4, 2012
“The tragedy of the world is that those who are imaginative have but slight experience, and those who are experienced have feeble imaginations.”
– Alfred North Whitehead, in an address to the American Association of the Collegiate Schools of Business, 1927
In a 2005 Harvard Business Review Online publication titled How business schools lost their way, authors Warren G. Bennis and James O’Toole theorized that business schools had come to focus much too heavily on “scientific” research (deriding quotes were placed around the word scientific by the authors). This misplaced pedagogical focal point had hence caused the production of graduates (i.e., MBAs) that were ill-prepared for actual, real-world management. In Bennis’ own words, the thrust of their thesis is this:
“Most leading B-schools, in a valid attempt to become respected and respectable, had adopted an inappropriate model of academic excellence. Instead of measuring themselves in terms of the competence of their graduates, or by how well their faculties understood important drivers of business performance, they measured themselves solely by the rigor of their scientific research. There’s nothing wrong with rigor, but using that as the sole determinant of academic excellence not only circumscribed business education, but made it less relevant to business practitioners.”1
The aught-5 article blew up the switchboards and culled hot debate across academia. Some remained calmer than others, but all found the conclusions worth discussing (or lambasting, whatever the case may be). By their own admission, the statements made were generalizations and did not apply to some b-schools. Notable exemplars called out by the authors were Harvard and Haas. They also mentioned a couple of institutions who had at least identified the problem and committed to rectify it, namely the University of Dallas and USC’s Marshall School (the latter being the Bennis’ employer). Those institutions aside, however, the vast majority of graduate schools of business were, in their assessment, egregiously misdirected and therefore churning out unacceptable graduates.
Seven years later, Warren G. Bennis popped up on Bloomberg Businessweek’s web log, and over the course of two installments, Bennis asks the question: Have business schools found their way?
In the first blog post, he points to a recent Academy of Management (AOM) journal publication that, ironically, empirically studies the impact of scholarly research in management as it pertains to both AOM members (i.e., management academics) and those who are not members (implicitly, then, practitioners of management outside of academia). The result? According to authors Herman Aguinis, Isabel Suarez-Gonzalez, Gustavo Lannelongue, and Harry Joo, “the scientific practice gap does not seem to be narrowing.” Bennis then goes on to say that “researchers in the field of management are obsessively preoccupied with the impact of their research on their colleagues, and seem to be willfully indifferent to, if not ignorant of, everybody else, including managers.”2
In other words, business academics are more concerned with their peers than they are with business people. Thus, the original thesis put forth by Bennis and O’Toole seems only to be entrenching itself even further, which, if you buy into their assessment, is sad and unfortunate. However, Warren Bennis is surprisingly heartened. Apparently, there is an ameliorative trend he believes is taking hold in the practice of educating managers.
In an upcoming post, I will examine Bennis’ silver lining and offer up my personal assessment of business education in light of the Bennis/O’Toole observations.
In the meantime, many of you are in the middle of the bschool admissions process, and I would love to hear your thoughts on the state of business education. Please post comments below.
The Chicago Road to Business School
August 3, 2012
With admissions competition still fierce at top MBA programs, and the MBA job market improving, students and professionals seeking to rebound or advance will want to know invaluable strategies about how to get into business school. For those of you in the Chicago area that are considering business school, join us on August 9th for our Road to Business School event. This event is a fantastic opportunity to network with admissions officers from top MBA programs around the nation and the world, learn key strategies for the GMAT, and hear from experts on the admissions process. Here are the event details:
Road the Business School Chicago
Where:
Congress Plaza Hotel
520 South Michigan Avenue
Chicago, IL 60605
When:
August 9th from 6:30-9:30pm
To prepare for this event, you’ll want to first register; it’s completely free, but space is limited. Next, join our Road to Business School Inner Circle contest for a chance to win an edge over the competition. Next, take a moment or two to jot down your top questions for the admissions officers from the schools you are interested in so that you are ready to make a great first impression. You may even want to get your elevator pitch ready just in case you get put on the spot with one of the admissions officers from your top choice. Finally, do a bit of research on your top schools before the event. A great place to start is the school’s Twitter feed. To get you started, here is a list of the schools joining us in Chicago:
Chicago RTBS Schools and Twitter Handles
- Boston University – @BUManagement
- Carnegie Mellon (Tepper) – @teppercmu
- DePaul University (Kellstadt) – @DePaulMBA
- Emory University (Goizueta) – @EmoryGoizueta
- George Washington University – @gwbusiness
- Georgetown University (McDonough) – @msbgu
- Hult – @Hult_Biz
- IE – @IEbusiness
- IESE – @IESEbs
- Illinois Institute of Technology (Stuart) – @Illinoistech
- Indiana University (Kelley) – @KelleySchool
- INSEAD – @INSEAD
- Johns Hopkins (Carey) – @JHUCarey
- Loyola University Chicago (Quinlan) – @LoyolaQuinlan
- Melbourne Business School – @MBScarlton
- Michigan State University (Broad) – @MSUBroadCollege
- Northwestern University (Kellog) – @KelloggSchool
- Ohio State (Fisher) – @FisherOSU
- Penn State (Smeal) – @SmealCollege
- Purdue University (Krannert) – @PurdueKrannert
- Southern Methodist University (Cox) – @SMUCox
- The Duke MBA (Fuqua) – @DukeFuqua
- Thunderbird – @TBirdAdmissions
- University of California, Irvine (Paul Merage) – @UCIrvine_MBA
- University of Chicago (Booth) – @booth_insider
- University of Denver (Daniels) – @uofdenver
- University of Illinois at Chicago (Liautaud) – @UICLiautaud
- University of Illinois – Champaign – @uiucbusiness
- University of Iowa (Tippie) – @TippieIowa
- University of Maryland (Smith) – @SmithSchool
- University of Massachusetts – Amherst (Isenberg) – @IsenbergUMass
- University of Minnesota (Carlson) – @CarlsonNews
- University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler) – @kenanflagler
- University of Notre Dame (Mendoza) – @nd_mba
- University of Rochester (Simon) – @SimonSchool
- University of Southern California (Marshall) – @USCMarshall
- University of Texas – Austin (McCombs) – @UTexasMcCombs
- University of Washington (Foster) – @UWFosterSchool
- Vanderbilt (Owen) – @VanderbiltOwen
- Wake Forest University – @Stacy_WFUMBA
- Washington University in St. Louis (Olin) – @WUSTLbusiness
- Wisconsin MBA – @WisconsinMBA
Throughout the event, we will be live tweeting from @KaplanGMATprep using hashtag #RTBS. Make sure to check in with us and the schools you are talking to on Twitter. Also, look for great contest opportunities within the next few days leading up to and during the event via Twitter and Instagram.
We can’t wait to see you on the road to business school!
