Columbia: Calling all applicants - Class of 2016

Yes, I did visit the school.
Age: 29 at matriculation
GMAT: 700 46Q 40V 6 AWA 5 IR
GPA: 3.96 from a private university in New Jersey
Current Industry: General Management in Retail (promoted three times)
First generation immigrant from Poland
Prior to my current industry I was a full time musician (recording, touring, weddings etc)

Overall I think what did me in was my age, current industry, goal and non traditional background plus I took two breaks from school because of my prior career goals with music. My post MBA goal was to transition into retail consulting with a top firm in Poland but I'm assuming that was too much of stretch for the adcom based on the "OK" gmat and not much else.

I'd like to think my essays were on par because I did enlist some "help".

Hope this helps

@nottonystark, it may be out of line to say this since we obviously haven't seen your essays, but we would be a little suspect of them. The profile you described is pretty good (strong, even, in some respects) and Columbia is always on the lookout for a nontraditional applicant - not sure you're completely in that category but there's some whiffs of it. The challenge for a less-linear career history is that it can be more difficult to show the positioning to the goals, and that matters a lot at Columbia. One main issue probably was GMAT quant - that could've been a hurdle for you, given the challenging curriculum at Columbia; it depends on where else you were able to show quant proficiency in your app. If you didn't demonstrate that, it could've been difficult to overcome. Beyond that, we're not seeing any true showstopper issues - your age totally was not the problem (29 y/o is fine) and the GPA looks pretty amazing. Mostly we're suspicious of the essays (the goals in particular, in terms of how they were laid out).

Sorry to hear about the outcome though, it always stings.

EssaySnark

nottonystark, sorry to hear about the ding, I think by looking at your stats, the quant of GMAT & IR caught my eye. I don't think age is an issue at all, nor is the non-traditional background.

Thanks Zurichs

I did consider a retake however the 700 was a third crack at the GMAT. Granted my last official practice test was a 740 with a 48Q so I underperformed. My two prior attempts at the GMAT were in the vicinity of 30 to 40 points below my practice exams as well so there were some obvious day- of performance issues.

I guess it depends on who you ask. Some would say a 4th attempt may be frowned up whereas others say keep taking it until you hit that number. I erred toward devoting the time to the rest of the application but I do agree that my quant and IR are subpar for Columbia.

I took notes on my interview and am now getting around to putting together an interview report. Here's how my interview went:

Interview Invite: 8/15
Interview Report Submitted: 8/23
Accepted: morning of 8/29

My interviewer was a recent graduate. We met at a Starbucks near where she lives on a Friday afternoon. She told me from the outset that she thought the whole process would take about 45 minutes with 30 minutes of her asking me questions and 15 minutes for my questions to her (more time than I had planned questions for, so take note of that). The interview stuck to that schedule pretty much to the minute.

Walk through resume
Why business school
Why Columbia
Short term goal
Long term goal
Talk about a time you had difficulty working with a team member
What club would you start at Columbia
What would you do if you didn't get the summer job you want
What would you do if you didn't get into business school
Anything else I should know about you (phrased open-endedly - could talk about extracurriculars or things to be sure the adcom heard)

The two big questions I expected based on other reports but didn't actually get:
1. Adversity - Though I suppose the difficult time with a team member question was just a narrowed version.
2. Ethical dilemma

The interview did not seem to be tailored toward ED at all. Showing that I had done my homework on Columbia was definitely important. I think they are looking to weed out casual applicants and really just want to hear that you are a serious person with a solid direction to your career.

Hope this helps!

Hello everyone,

I have a dilemma regarding filling in details for one of my recommendations. The person who is providing me the recommendation is my ex senior colleague with whom I worked for 3 years.

But he is currently pursuing his MBA at Haas School of Business, Berkeley and is a 2nd year student. So i wanted to check what details should I fill for him when sending him the recommendation link:

Organization, Position/Title and Industry

Should I give the details of his last position in the company where he worked with me before going for his MBA?

My questions:

-resume walkthrough
-why mba, why cbs
-team work, leadership examples
-ethical dilemma

all fairly standard questions. focus on the why cbs part and show your passion!

Hey Vivek - you might want to contact Columbia on how they want you to handle this. We would assume that you would enter UC Berkeley as the Organization and Student as the Position but Columbia may prefer that you use the info from his last job, as you suggested - this is something that the school should guide you on.

EssaySnark

Hi there - any thoughts from the forum on merit consideration for early decision applications? i.e. the logic being since you are essentially "locked into" Columbia, there is less incentive to give those folks scholarships vs. someone who is considering Columbia amongst other options.

Would love to get any empirical or anecdotal feedback from the group.

We have firsthand proof that this does not happen. We have clients every year who get into Columbia via Early Decision and are awarded scholarships. There were rumors along these same lines re: Duke's Early Action which we contacted their admissions team about; this stuff is totally unfounded. We wrote a rant/blahg post about the Duke thing and this in general here.

All that being said: Columbia is not the most generous for scholarships, just as a rule. There are other schools much more liberal with handing out money to hook the candidates that they like.

EssaySnark

I can confirm this. Dean Hubbard has admitted he knows they are cheap with scholarship money compared to other schools and that is something he wants to rectify. I know of classmates who applied Early Decision and received anywhere from $10,000-$30,000 in Fellowships.

Great that's really helpful, thanks for the responses essaysnark and mappleby.

Guys, in Columbia's employer section, they ask for "Description". Is this for our job description or is it a description of the employer?

Job description.

Thanks.. That's what I suspected initially. But while filling out HBS app, Harvard clarified that they wanted description of the employer. So I figured it could be the same case for CBS.

The schools and their apps are different. Harvard wants a description of the business, Columbia wants a job description. You asked in the Columbia forum and we answered what Columbia wants.

The schools and their apps are different. Harvard wants a description of the business, Columbia wants a job description. You asked in the Columbia forum and we answered what Columbia wants.[/quote]

Indeed sir. Just confirming. Thank you.