Calling all MIT Sloan Fall 2011 Applicants!

R1 (reapplication)

GMAT: 690(49,34), will retake

M27/ 5years of experience in Software Eng. Good resume, but in an small and unknown company.
Active member of my sport community/competitions

I was at Sloan yesterday, so I'll share some of the information that was confirmed.

Word/Line Limits
Essays and Resume: As long as it fits on one page with reasonable margins/font, you're good. No one is counting the exact number of lines or words in your document. Keep the overage as low as possible, but don't sacrifice the quality of your message to cut 5 words out of an essay.

Interviews
Your interviewer is your advocate; they have chosen you because they think you're a good candidate. He/she will be using the interview to help strengthen your case for admission. This person will have read your entire application, so if they don't talk about one of your favorite essays, it's because they didn't have any questions. From what I gathered, the MIT Sloan interview is used to fill in the gaps and help you present the strongest case possible for admission. Unfortunately, they also mentioned that the interviewer is likely to ask for NEW examples that aren't covered in your essays. I know that we've all worked really hard to polish three unique examples already, but you'll have to think of some more if you're invited to interview.

R1 vs. R2
I believe this has been previously discussed, but I'll add it here for another data point. MIT admits the same number of students in both rounds, but they receive twice as many applications in R2 as they do in R1. If you're application is ready to go, your odds are statistically far better in R1. The admissions officer did caveat this fact by stating that a strong application will succeed in either round, but who knows what they consider a strong application to be.

Biomedical Enterprise Dual-Degree On Hold
Apparently, MIT is working with Harvard on a new arrangement for this dual-degree. In the meantime, the program has been put on hold for 1 year. It was unclear as to whether the program would be available for the Class of 2013.

Fun Fact
MIT Sloan is awesome and E62 is really nice.

EFFF... Been sitting here at sbux staring at a blank screen for over an hour and can't think of one compelling story to tell for Essay #3.

Any suggestions out there? What sort of topics have you covered for "taking responsibility for achieving an objective?" I thought this one would be the easiest prompt to answer, but achieving objectives is a daily routine in the workplace. Not sure how to approach this one w/out sounding boring.

R1 vs. R2
I believe this has been previously discussed, but I'll add it here for another data point. MIT admits the same number of students in both rounds, but they receive twice as many applications in R2 as they do in R1. If you're application is ready to go, your odds are statistically far better in R1. The admissions officer did caveat this fact by stating that a strong application will succeed in either round, but who knows what they consider a strong application to be.

Try to think of objectives you had to meet for the first time - something like the first time you led a meeting or project without supervision. I'm actually thinking of using an extracurricular for this one.

Hope apps are coming along nicely for everyone. If you need a break/laugh, click below.

(Caution: Explicit lyrics, slightly NSFW unless you have headphones plugged into your computer)

If you haven't seen Adam Samberg's "I'm on a Boat" video, it's hilarious:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8F3UE9qFsg

And here's the MIT Sloan version (found it on last year's thread):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR1Daulmadk


Enjoy!

Hey, Avernusaur.

is this official fact-stat? How you come to know about no. of applicants apply to R1 and R2?

This was a statistic that was shared in the information session. I haven't seen it published on the website, but the admissions officer is a reliable source of information

Count me in for round 1

Do you guys know of any MIT cover letter samples other than what's on businesweek web-site? If not, can some of you provide an example of how you structured your letter? Thanks

We really need to put together a Cover Letter guide that we can sticky on the forums for future reference. I'm hesitant to give anyone advice right now, because I don't have enough supporting documentation (my strategy might not work). Let me put this on my to-do list and I'll get something out there as soon as possible.