McCombs (UT Austin) 2013 Calling All Applicants

Do you think if I have a 730 on the GMAT and had a pretty good interview that I have a good chance of getting in?

Sorry -- I guess what I'm asking is, how closely are applications looked at before interviews? Is the interview much of a deciding factor? Are they only screened about whether to be interviewed, and then looked at A LOT more closely after the interview?

Hello
I am an international student. My under grad was in English. Do I still need to take IELTS/ TOEFL?

Thanks

Wanted to come up on the net here, I am a McCombs round one admit and will be matriculating in the fall. I was a UT undergraduate and I am currently an active duty army infantry officer (75th Ranger Regiment), had a 670 GMAT, and a 3.78 undergrad GPA with a liberal arts degree.

If anyone has any questions on UT/Austin as a whole feel free to message me, especially any other vets that are headed to McCombs.

Anybody else get an interview invitation email despite already having an interview scheduled? I got an invitation email a few weeks ago directly from an admissions officer saying he'll be visiting my city soon and I and scheduled with him when he's in town (and my "interview" tab on the website reflects that). However today I got another invite, though this one looks to be a system-generated automatic email, and it also has an interview deadline before my currently scheduled interview.

I can't get to a phone to call MAC today but will do so first thing in the AM. In the meantime, I wanted to see if anybody else received a similar note?

Looks like 23rd Jan is the deadline to receive an invite for R2 applicants.

It makes sense. January 23rd is the next application deadline date. I am losing hope with every day that goes by. I would be interested in hearing from waitlisted applicants about how they were notified.

i think the invites are pretty "dead" already... the last one reported on gmat club was more than 10 days ago.. i lost hope about a week ago

too bad man, mccombs is one of my favorites...

also, it is interesting to see that there are many people in the gmat 750+ range not getting invite (according to the statistic on the first page. )

I think McCombs realizes that many students apply to UT as a safety school. 750+ GMAT applicants probably refuse offers too frequently. The small class size of UT doesn't support more offers either.

I would think that if you didn't get an interview invite, you wouldn't be waitlisted; seems like those who get interviews would be the ones likely to get waitlisted.

I agree w/ the theory about McCombs trying to protect their acceptance yield rate to a certain degree, but there's a chance that many students w/ high GMATs are letting their "safety school" bias bleed into the application (not saying that this happened to either of you). rjdunn got an R2 interview invite w/ a 780 GMAT, and 3 R1 gmatclub admitted applicants had a 740+ GMAT, so you could easily have one coming your way this week. I'm not saying any of these apply to you, but just some factors that might come into play:

- Are your essays cookie cutter in the sense that you could virtually copy and paste everything into your next school's application by replacing the school name?
- I've heard AdCom members say it's surprisingly common to see applicants who actually leave another school's name somewhere in the application.
- A question on the app. reads, "Other Graduate Applications." If it says something similar to, "Stanford, Wharton, HBS," did you properly justify in your application what unique characteristics make McCombs stand up to the others?
- Do you know how you were rated by your bosses in the letters of recommendation section? If their ratings are low enough, AdCom members have said that's instant death.

I'm sure everything will work out, but just some food for thought...

I agree w/ the theory about McCombs trying to protect their acceptance yield rate to a certain degree, but there's a chance that many students w/ high GMATs are letting their "safety school" bias bleed into the application (not saying that this happened to either of you). rjdunn got an R2 interview invite w/ a 780 GMAT, and 3 R1 gmatclub admitted applicants had a 740+ GMAT, so you could easily have one coming your way this week. I'm not saying any of these apply to you, but just some factors that might come into play:

- Are your essays cookie cutter in the sense that you could virtually copy and paste everything into your next school's application by replacing the school name?
- I've heard AdCom members say it's surprisingly common to see applicants who actually leave another school's name somewhere in the application.
- A question on the app. reads, "Other Graduate Applications." If it says something similar to, "Stanford, Wharton, HBS," did you properly justify in your application what unique characteristics make McCombs stand up to the others?
- Do you know how you were rated by your bosses in the letters of recommendation section? If their ratings are low enough, AdCom members have said that's instant death.

I'm sure everything will work out, but just some food for thought...[/quote]

As far as my essays, I provided specific examples of the benefits of the UT MBA program that would require major revision to be used in other applications. I did not provide a list of other schools because that only benefits the school at my expense. The recommendations were very strong and from directors. UT was my first application and I took precaution to ensure that I used McCombs and UT only.

I think that the major weakness of my application is my work experience. I will only have 41 months of experience by the time of matriculation. No supervisory experience.

Honestly, I was hoping to leverage my prior McCombs master's degree to get into the MBA program. In fact, I have already taken MBA courses at UT and earned As. I don't know how I could possibly support my academic aptitude more than that. However, the lack of management experience ("leadership") will probably kill my chances.

Thanks, Debbie Downer. Just kidding. You make a good point. There are gmatclub members that have been waitlisted with and without interviews. I would like to think that I will be waitlisted. While I am not expecting a ding, I would be surprised to receive it. The option to delay could be quite valuable to McCombs. Accordingly, I think the upside only proposition would incentivize McCombs to keep borderline applicants (I am assuming that I would be included in this group) in the mix. The less than 50% acceptance rate of admissions offers also lends itself to a bigger waitlist pool.

I would rather be dinged after interview than waitlisted without an interview. I really want the chance to plead my case before someone that I can persuade.

As far as my essays, I provided specific examples of the benefits of the UT MBA program that would require major revision to be used in other applications. I did not provide a list of other schools because that only benefits the school at my expense. The recommendations were very strong and from directors. UT was my first application and I took precaution to ensure that I used McCombs and UT only.

I think that the major weakness of my application is my work experience. I will only have 41 months of experience by the time of matriculation. No supervisory experience.

Honestly, I was hoping to leverage my prior McCombs master's degree to get into the MBA program. In fact, I have already taken MBA courses at UT and earned As. I don't know how I could possibly support my academic aptitude more than that. However, the lack of management experience ("leadership") will probably kill my chances.[/quote]

Yeah, the wait sucks, and it seems like you have a strong case. I'd agree w/ you that it'd be more of an issue of leadership/managerial experience than # years WE. However, have you spoken to them about how they view diversity of applicants? At my undergrad institution, the MBA program specifically said they try to avoid people who already got another business degree from the school because they won't receive as much added value as someone else the second time around. Conversely, I did notice a few profiles on the McCombs MBA site of UT undergrads. Do you know any of the 2nd-yr. students or AdCom members?

Posted from my mobile device

[/quote]- A question on the app. reads, "Other Graduate Applications." If it says something similar to, "Stanford, Wharton, HBS," did you properly justify in your application what unique characteristics make McCombs stand up to the others?[/quote]

When they ask you this question always put one school much higher ranked (when applicable) and then other schools in the same bracket.

For instance if McCombs ask you it should be something like: Wharton (the much higher ranked) and then the likes to UCLA, Cornell, Rice, Notre Dame.

McCombs was my first choice but the lowest ranked school I applied to. It would have been absurd for me to tell implicitly they were the lowest ranked school I was applying to. They would have thought they were my safety school.

Sorry! I wasn't trying to kill your hope. I didn't know there were people on here who got waitlisted without interviews; I guess I should have looked better.

Just out of curiosity, would one receive a rejection notice before the final notification deadline, or is it standard to not hear until the deadline in the case of a ding?