{"id":30145,"date":"2015-08-19T04:55:00","date_gmt":"2015-08-19T11:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/2015\/08\/round-1-vs-round-2-the-key-is-competitiveness\/"},"modified":"2015-08-19T04:55:00","modified_gmt":"2015-08-19T11:55:00","slug":"round-1-vs-round-2-the-key-is-competitiveness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/round-1-vs-round-2-the-key-is-competitiveness\/","title":{"rendered":"Round 1 vs. Round 2? The key is "competitiveness""},"content":{"rendered":"
Each August, thousands of MBA applicants ask the same question: “Is it better to apply in Round 1 than Round 2?” Conventional wisdom says the earlier, the better. In Round 1 every seat is open and there is no waitlist to consider. Furthermore, applying in Round 1 conveys that attending b-school is a true priority for the applicant.<\/div>\n
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But what about situations where the candidacy could be stronger and more competitive by taking another 3 months to add, change or fix key aspects? If the extra time can be used to improve a GMAT score by 20+ points, achieve an “A” in a rigorous extension course, get a meaningful job promotion, assume leadership of a non-profit, etc., then the applicant may be better off applying in Round 2.<\/div>\n
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Another consideration is whether the candidacy is “traditional” (e.g., a consulting or PE associate with the above-median GPA and GMAT) vs “nontraditional” (e.g., founder of a cool startup with sub-median GPA and\/or GMAT and more than the average duration of experience.) It’s logical to believe that b-schools use R1 to capture the best of the traditional applicants, knowing that they can “round out” the class with the best of the nontraditional types in Round 2.<\/div>\n
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So, determining the ideal time to apply is really a question of competitiveness – when will your chances for admission be highest? And that’s a decision that needs to be made with an understanding of the types of applicants who have been admitted by round over time. That’s the kind of perspective that comes from a professional admissions consultant like The MBA Exchange<\/a>. And answering that question begins with an objective evaluation of your candidacy<\/a> before you commit to Round 1 or Round 2.<\/div>\n
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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Each August, thousands of MBA applicants ask the same question: “Is it better to apply in Round 1 than Round 2?” Conventional wisdom says the earlier, the better. In Round…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":155,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/155"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30145\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}