Hello All,
I wanted to write this post to explain my experience applying to French Business School's for the Master in Management (MiM) Program. I applied to the 5 French schools through the SAI application as well as ESSEC Business School. When I was first thinking of applying, I looked through the forums here to see what advice people gave. I found that almost everybody was emphasizing the fact that you absolutely HAD to have a high GMAT score in order to get admitted to those schools. This really worried me as my GMAT score wasn't that high, it was 620. I was very discouraged because working full time and also having an extra part time job, there was no time to study properly to retake the GMAT. Anyways, I took a deep breath and applied to the schools anyway.
The results came in this past week and I was admitted to every school including Emlyon, ESCP and ESSEC which are top business schools in France. So, I just wanted to write this post and say that your GMAT score isn't everything and there are many ways you can work on your application to stand out from the rest of the candidates applying. I think that many people panic and get anxious when they get a low GMAT score which shouldn't always be the case because there are multiple parts of your application that the admission team takes into account when evaluating your profile. If you got a low GMAT score (and can't retake it for whatever reason such as finances, time constraints etc.), I would recommend to still apply to the school and just focus harder on the essays and making your CV/Resume as impressive as possible. Always have confidence in yourself and your capability. I knew that I was capable of being successful in a rigorous program such as the MiM and that the GMAT score didn't reflect my true ability so I applied anyway and got accepted!
I hope this post will inspire and encourage other students to apply for the program they wish to attend. Good luck to everyone applying!
Please contact me if you have any questions.
All the best,
Patrick