Calling all Darden Fall 2010 Applicants!

To provide full disclosure, I will share somethng about the interview scheduling calendar which I found to be rather odd!

Of all the days between now and January 28th, only one is marked as available on the on-campus interview schedule: Friday, January 22nd; all other days are greyed out.

On that day, only five slots are listed as available:

8:00 - 9:00
9:00 - 10:00
10:00 - 11:00
11:00 - 12:00
1:30 - 2:30

The fact that only one available day of on-campus interviews remains on the Darden schedule could be unique to my invitation, but I'm not sure this is the case. Again, I did find it to be rather odd.

Thanks Doctor for the insight.

Keep in mind that I'm almost certain that multiple people interview in each of those timeslots. I have no idea how many but it's certainly not 1 person/timeslot. So dont give up hope folks!

I clearly expect that several interviews will take place in each 1-hour slot. This is common practice in several other schools; however, I still find it odd that only one day, of all the days between now and January 28th, has been allocated for interviews. Also bear in mind that I speculated that certain days could be locked out to specific applicants.

Good luck to everyone still waiting, though!

No doubt that you did, and I was not implying that you didn't know that, I was simply trying to reassure those that immediately think the worst.

While it would be amazing to receive an interview invite in the next few days, it will be expensive to pay for a flight to Charlottesville on such a short notice.

Use miles if you have them, school is already going to put you in debt so I would not let the airfare get in the way of interviewing.

I do not think it is that odd that there is just one day and it is the 22nd. That gives them enough time to evaluate the people they interview before the deadline.

Additionally, I do not think the school is planning on interviewing many more people given that there already have been +/- 10 interview days and this is not taking into account international interviews.

Submitted for 2012

24,

I mention that I find the single interview day situation quite odd because the Darden School of Business Admissions Committee has always stated that interview invitations will be released up till the decision date of January 28th. If this holds true, it follows that interview slots ought likewise to be available up till the decision date. The only reconciliation to this discrepancy I can think of is that dates beyond January 22nd (the only day available in the calendar to me at present) are locked out to accommodate other candidates who might receive their invitations over the next 16 days; however, in the interest of scheduling flexibility, I still find it odd that only one day in the schedule would be made available, leaving only 11 days to make travel arrangements to Charlottesville.

Also, remember that the Admissions Committee implies on the Darden website that it delays the release of final decisions beyond the Round 1 deadline for candidates who will interview on or close to the Round 1 application deadline of January 28th, an indication that they do not necessarily establish a window in which to evaluate the entire applicant pool prior to the Round 1 deadline:

As copied from the website: "If you receive an interview invitation on or close to the decision deadline, your timeline for interviewing and receiving an admissions decision will be delayed slightly from the published timeline. "

To those waiting, I not only hope that Darden will invite even more applicants between now and the deadline, but I believe this will indeed be the case. Darden has a relatively low acceptance yield, and must offer admission to a great many candidates in order to fill the class. I do not believe Darden (though in this premise, I could be wrong) assigns applicants to wait-lists without interviewing them first, indicating that its Admissions Committee will likely interview a significant portion of the applicant pool.

Good luck!

Hi guys,

Any international applicant here doing phone interview? My friend got an email confirming a phone interview but they're asking her to be the one to call the interviewer. I just find it odd that Darden would not offer to call the applicant instead.

Hi I'm an international applicant from Singapore. Where is your friend located?

By the way, I'm a R2 applicant and have not received any invite.

I will have a phone interview tomorrow, and I wouldn't consider it unusual to have the applicant call the school.

I would tell your friend that 1) her calling the school gives her an opportunity (like all face-to-face interviewees when they arrive) to demonstrate her professionalism by calling at EXACTLY the time she should, and 2) if she's the nervous type, would she really prefer staring at the phone for 10-20 minutes waiting for someone to call her, or rather be in control of the situation herself?

As you can see, it's beneficial for both parties. Anyway, best of luck, perhaps your friend and I will be debating phone interview etiquette at First Coffee in 7/8 months...

*don't worry about money either, you can use skype

For those Round 1ers out there- What was correspondence like with the school after you submitted your app? Did you receive anything between the receipt for the app fee and your interview invites?

No, there wasn't anything until the interview invite.

Posted from my mobile device

same here.

Need your advice on something. I am Round 1 applicant who has not heard back anything on the interview front. There has been a development on a personal front though. I volunteer for a non-profit and I got invited to join the Executive Board as Secretary.

I know its normal for applicants to send in updates if they are wait listed. Will it be weird/unacceptable to send Darden this update in the form of a letter? Will I come off as too desperate? Or is it a perfectly fine strategy?

Any thoughts pls?

Send them an email, it can't hurt! It has the benefit of first notifying them of something pretty cool with your profile and second showing an active interest in the school. The Darden adcom seems to be very open to communication and receptive to you reaching out. Give it a shot!

Also, anyone else going nuts with all these other schools already releasing decisions. I can't wait for January 28th!

Of those invited for interviews, how many of you are still in the running at Darden and has anyone pulled out with admits elsewhere? Just want to hear if you decided to push on with Virginia or why you felt another school was a better fit?