Pants Poopers Strike Back: Wharton R1 & R2

Still awake at 3 am at night, strill trying to synthesize the data from all over and hoping that the frets of the morning sun will bring some bright news!

I open my email each morning hoping for great news; and each morning I'm disappointed. 3AM isn't unusual for me though; it's just part of running my business. There's just some stuff that must wait until the day's business is through, and I also spend a lot of time on the phone with China so I'm almost always working from 12-3. The good thing is that I don't need to get up until the crack of noon.

Unfortunately I have to be at office around 9:30

Even me, every day I wake up - first think I do is to check my emails hoping for a +ve response and each day I am disappointed! I even visit the admissions page hoping that the email is not quick enuff! I seriously hope that this wait will end in a happy news for all of us!

I hope you guys are right about the admissions411 info, but I don't think the new site format is conducive to people logging their interview data as much as it has been in the past. So much information is now required that people probably stopped logging their info. For example, you can no longer just log the fact that you got an interview. Now you have to tell them when you got your interview invite and when you've scheduled it in order for it to show up in the tables. Yesterday, I logged that I got an interview at LBS but it doesn't show up because I wasn't able to enter an interview date yet. Moreover, I don't plan on ever logging my interview dates because thats more info than I want to provide. I really hope they make some changes to their mandatory data fields. Its quite annoying.

Yeah, that is a good point - since they changed the UI, the admissions411 activies seem to have dropped. It is a bad timing for them to change the UI. For a few weeks, I could not change my passowrd. Had to use some funky key combinations that they provided us!

Even if you assume that the visits to admission411 have dropped by 50%, still the percentage of intv invites for R2 is lower than what they called for R1.

I sound like a accountant trying to mainipulate the books for my satisfaction! Fingers crossed.

Why the hell your reasoning and analyses are always GMAT centric????

GMAT scores are by far the most objective piece of info in this entire process. Why would you not want to analyze it ad nauseam?

perhaps because there is no difference between a 720 and a 770???

Think about it... the difference between a 720 and a 770 is literally a difference of how one answer 4~5 questions differently in a test.

Admissions411.com organizes their data by GMAT score so it's the easiest to look at. Very few people (less than 1/2 I think) report GPAs so it's really not a useful data point. What other available data do you think would be useful? It's simply not possible to organize any analysis of work experience or interview skill or essay quality or recommendation strength. I guess you could try to organize some analysis based on age, but that would be asinine.

In direct response to your question, what the hell data available at Admissions411.com do you believe would be useful????

The difference between 720 and 770 is about 8-10,000 test takers. Perhaps the difference is important, perhaps it isn't. But the total number of seats at elite and ultra-elite schools is something like 6500. So, to me it's clear that if 10,000 people are fighting for 6500 seats, they cannot all possibly considered equally. The difference between 690 and 720 is another 10,000 test takers. Surely all 20,000 cannot be crammed into the 6500 available seats that everyone is gunning for.

This is what Mr. Thomas Caleel said

"In terms of the less traditional applicant with a 600 GMAT, people get very caught up with the GMAT. What I always stress on is that last year we denied over 2,000 candidates with GMAT 700 and higher and almost 800 applicants with GMAT of 750 and above. So the GMAT and your undergraduate academic performance only tell us whether or not you can handle the academic rigor of the program."

And I believe every word that is quoted there. But you need not look any further than the actual quote itself to see that he does in fact distinguish between a 700 score and a 750 score. Otherwise, there would be no point in referencing separate data for 700 and 750. If in fact he believed that 700 and 750 were equal, he would simply give a stat for 700.

That's like a sports announcer saying "This team has won 17 of 20 games against top 20 opponents. Additionally, they have won 6 out of 8 against top 10 opponents." The reason someone would say something like this is because they are making two distinct points. There's simply no point in saying something like "This team has won all 20 games it has played this year. Additionally, it has won all the games it has played against top 10 opponents." That would be redundant and silly.

The simple fact that Caleel references 700 and 750 separately by definition means that he considers the scores differently. It would be redundant to offer separate statistics if in fact they were considered the same.

Other than the fact that he considers 700 and 750 separately, the absolute numbers denied at each level are meaningless - the percentage of admits and denies are the real key. I would wager my mortgage that 750 scorers are denied at a lower rate that 700 scorers. I would also guess that, considering Wharton's reputation, there might be more self-selection among lower scorers. In other words, those that apply with lower scores probably have lots of other highly desirable characteristics (work experience, college pedigree, high GPA, etc.); otherwise they wouldn't bother.

I have not seen any evidence to convince me that, if other things are equal, schools consider 700 the same as 750. I do not believe it, and Caleel does not believe it either. It's clear from the above quote.

Pehilu,

MY 2 cents.
I really hope your analysis on GMAT is not true... I am really waiting for someone under 700 to get into Chicago/Wharton or any other top 10 school.. Hopefully that will change your opinion on GMAT..

I have spoken with NUMEROUS Alumni.. Each and every person told me.. anything in the 80% range, and you are fine.. GMAT is just the measure of whether you can perform academically well at the required school. Nothing else.

If you have a high GMAT, but cant present yourself well in the interview, or sound arrogant, in yuour essays or interview... You will be dinged.

"The school is looking for candidates that can be employed at the end of the degree.." - This is the exact quote a student from Cornell told me. He also mentioned "Show them why you really want the school"

I guess this debate of GMAT is never going to end from your end..

There is no doubt that many people will get into Chicago and Wharton with sub-700 scores. There is also no doubt that poor work experience, interviews and essays will also earn you a ding.

But none of that means that a lower score is equal to or better than a higher score. It's just not true. People with higher scores are in fact admitted at a higher rate than people with lower scores. In all cases, applicants (for the top schools) must have top work experience, grades, essays, extracurriculars, interviews and all the rest.

I have no argument with the idea that top schools greatly value things other than high GMAT scores. I agree with that wholeheartedly. But I disagree completely with the contention that, after some point, a higher GMAT is not more valuable. Any school that wants to place a lot of its graduates at top banks and consulting firms knows better.

The GMAT is a way to measure whether an applicant can perform academically, but it is also a way to measure one applicant against another. Can someone give any logical, reasonable answer as to why if all other things are equal, a top school (that admits top 1% type people) would choose to admit someone in the top 10% when someone in the top 1% is available? There's simply no logical explanation why a school would do this - which in essence is why different scores are inherently not equal.

Look, I'm not trying to promote a policy for schools to follow. I'm merely interpreting available data. Do you have any convincing data that suggests otherwise? I'd be happy to consider it. It's not that one score is good, while another is bad; and it's certainly not that any particular score will get you into any particular school. But GMAT is one of the few things that applicants have influence over when nearing the application process and all the data I have seen proves that a higher score will help you more than a lower score because for each individual applicant all other factors will in fact be equal.

Willget800,

What do you think an alumni means when they say "Anything in the 80% range and you are fine." Why do you take that to mean that all GMAT scores in the 80% range (or higher) are the same score? If somebody said that to me, I would take that to mean, "Hey, if your GMAT score is in the 80% range you should probably stop worrying about it and start worrying about the rest of your application."

Someone brought up the point that the difference between a 720 and a 770 is how you answer 4 or 5 questions. I actually don't really understand how CATs work very well but are 4 or 5 questions not significant? There are only 78 questions on the test. Would you want to take the test and just skip the first 4 or 5 because it's not a big deal? Also, when you think about how a CAT works, the design is intended to determine each person's "ability" and questions are administered in a way that seeks to give each person questions that will be slightly challenging for their ability level. So someone who is doing very well will get succeedingly more difficult questions so if that person misses a very hard question they won't be penalized as much as someone who misses easy questions.

At the end of the day, two people could miss the same amount of questions and have scores that are very different.

I think he meant - If your score is in the 80% range of the schools gmat score, STOP worrying, and concentrate on the rest of the application.
Yes if your gmat is < 80% range, be prepared to speak of a low gmat score. otherwise dont bother. thats what i understand from alumni and current students

I never said that.
At least for top schools, a 750 may not be a deal maker but a 600 may be a deal breaker. GMAT kind of threshold that you need to clear. I know higher is always better but with "other things" equal.

I am yet to see one of your post (regarding admission process, chances and analysis) talking about "other things" such as geography, work experience, age etc.