Background:
27/M/Caucasian
GPA: 3.69 from small NY State School
Major: Poly Sci graduated in 4 years in 2005
Fairly decent extracurricular activities in undergrad: golf team, finance and judicial boards, honor societies, mountain bike and stock market club

Took about a year to get my first job after grad due to traveling and prepped for LSAT before deciding not to attend law school(general malaise I saw in current and recently graduating peers, and that's when things were still decent).

W/E in financial operations (back office):
-had a paid financial internship in an accounting dep during undergrad which got me the following job after grad
-3 years Financial Operations at Lazard, NYC – Securities Pricing and Index/Benchmark maintenance
-1 year and currently at State Street IMS, Irvine CA – margin desk for HF
-Sporadic volunteering

Based on my background and W/E what GMAT score will make me competitive for acceptance to the p/t USC program? If there is a general floor that would help as well.

I ask since I am horrible at these types of standardized tests and really need to gauge what type of time commitment I will need to achieve my target score for acceptance. what steps can i take to be an ideal applicant other than solid essays and good recs with one from a USC alum? also i might consider applying for the 2011 since i am

Side note: I visited the UCI program and was basically told if I took the GMAT in three weeks and scored somewhere above 550 I would be accepted based on the above. I think the program had a couple unfilled seats and my NYC exp might have been helped as well (i think).

I would say with your profile, you can probably score about 30-40 points below there average. However anything below that would put you in a weak position. Your profile is stronger than most, but that being said, you also have to concider with USC's average, they probably are accepting individuals with must stronger profiles that choose not to attend USC. So the true average of the accepted individuals are probably in the range of 60-80 points higher than the floor I gave you.

Another thing to consider is that your peer group who have a finance background generally are strong test takers, more so than entertainment, or HR background, which means you still need to be competitive with other finance individuals. I hope this helps.

The average listed GMAT for Marshal is 620.
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