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Jan 27, 2015: Booth starts sending interview invitations to R2 applicants. First invite reported on forum at 12:30 PM Pacific Time.
March 25, 2015: Booth starts calling R2 applicants. First call reported on forum at 06:30 AM Pacific Time from HongKong.
Apr 17, 2015: Booth starts sending interview invitations to R3 applicants. First invite reported on forum at 12:15 PM Pacific Time.
May 20 2015: Booth starts calling R3 applicants and applicants waitlisted in prior rounds. First call reported on forum at 11:58 AM Pacific Time from NYC.
This is a Boothie here from Class of 2016. Would love to answer any questions you may have for the application process as I've benefited from the forum as well as an applicant. Fire away with any questions you may have....
Thanks Boothie! Any advice on how to tackle Booth's presentation/essay, especially considering that it is the only required essay this year?
First thing I would say is, think freely about it. It is an open canvas and how you approach it can say a lot about you. Avoid reading up too much about what other people are doing (including blogs) because - 1. It might end up looking like others, 2. It may not represent exactly who you are.
If you are not comfortable with PPT, definitely go with the essay. I went with PPT cause I felt I could do a much better job of expressing myself using visual images. - boothie2016
Hello applicants and future applicants! The Round One deadline has come to pass and now many of you are anxiously awaiting what happens next. I know the evaluation process can seem like a black box, so we’re hoping to give you a better sense of what will happen behind the scenes over the next two months.
As a first step, our online application system reviewed all applications for completeness. Unfortunately, if any required material or information is missing, your application will be moved to Round Two.
The evaluation process is then divided into two phases. The first is the pre-interview phase, where our Admissions Committee will spend time reviewing your applications to determine if you will be invited to interview or denied without an interview. Applications are read in random order and ensuing interview decisions are released on a rolling basis from mid-October to October 24th.
If you are invited to interview then you have moved onto phase two, or the interview phase. We highly encourage all applicants to interview on-campus to immerse themselves in the Booth community for a day. Understanding that not everyone can travel to Chicago during our interview season, we have alternative options available, including hub city locations and alumni interviews in cities across the world.
On-campus interviews are conducted by our second-year student fellows and hub interviews are conducted by alumni,and in some cases second-year students. From an evaluative standpoint, there is no advantage or disadvantage to completing your interview on or off campus.
After you have completed your interview, your interviewer will submit an interview evaluation. At this time, the Admissions Committee will again thoroughly review your application in its entirety.
Final admissions decisions are then released at 9:00am CST on December 18th. You will receive a decision of Admitted, Denied, or Waitlist and can view your decision through your application status page.
If you are invited to interview, rest assured you will receive thorough instructions and information via email. But if you have any questions in the meantime, please feel free to use the comments below to continue the conversation.
Best of luck!
Tyler
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For those with invites, do you see anything different on the application status on the Booth website?
No the status doesn't change. You just see a link to select interview date etc. you do get an email notifying you of the status change. Also, if you access the app through your phone, it doesn't show the interview link. That's what happened to me earlier. - topspin360
Hi everyone. Best of luck to all those waiting for their invite invitations!
Need your two cents on something. They're having a hard time matching me to an alumni interviewer in my home country, so they're giving me a choice - either to fly to Singapore (3:30 flight) and interview with an alumni, or have a phone interview with a 'member of the admissions staff'. Which choice do you guys think is better? Flying out to SG might show my dedication to the school, but having my interview with someone from admissions would be less subjective (imo). Help please!!
My advice: travel! I think that the "member of the admissions staff" is an "admissions associate" (i.e., a 2-year current student who helps the admissions office by conducting on-campus interviews), not an "admissions officer". I assume that because you will generally be interviewed either by current students or by alumni, not by admissions officers.
So I think that you should interview with the alumni and show your excitement. Also, I think you can show more "you" if you interview in person, and therefore it is of your best interest to be interviewed by an alumnus in person.
I had my interview last Friday (Oct 31st). It was off campus. Questions he asked me were: - Resume specific (like why did I pick my undergrad school, my career path, what my work function is, etc) a huge chunk of time was spent here. - What do I find challenging about my job? OK this kind of stumped me for a while since he said he wasn't 'convinced' that the answer I gave was challenging enough. We also spent a bit of time discussing this - What are my STGs and LTGs? - Why MBA? Why now? - Why Booth? - What classes do I plan to take? - What is my greatest professional failure? - Any questions for him?
The interview took an hour more or less. But I honestly found it tough because I had a hard time connecting with him. I talked a lot about social impact, because that's really my story, but he didn't seem to be interested in that. He also kept grilling me on all my answers (he kept pushing back on my answers and asking 'why' more times than I can count). So different from the interview I had with Kellogg. I handled it the best way I could though. I only hope he had a good impression of me.
Oh! And the interview was supposed to be at 5, but he pushed it back to 5:45, but then he couldn't get out of a meeting so he had me go back to his office at 9 pm (!)
Alumni interviews are more varied than on campus ones that's for sure. But I've seen people say it went horribly and they got accepted and vice versa. So it's hard to read into it much. I'm also not convinced everyone is on the same playing field and that your interview will make or break you. I think they grade every aspect of your application and your interviewer gives you a score (from 1 to 6?). Then they combine that info with your application and pass it along to a new admissions person who's never read your profile and he decides "Admit, Reject, or Waitlist" and that gets pushed to the Direction who can agree or veto that decision.
Mine was supposed to be in 30 minutes but my interview asked to reschedule to tomorrow same time. Hoping for the best! - LifeLiver
I talked a lot about social impact, because that's really my story, but he didn't seem to be interested in that. He also kept grilling me on all my answers (he kept pushing back on my answers and asking 'why' more times than I can count). So different from the interview I had with Kellogg. I handled it the best way I could though. I only hope he had a good impression of me.
One thing I always tell people is to know your audience. Booth doesn't really care about social impact. It's not that kind of school or environment. Focus on social impact would have made a much better impression on a school like Kellogg where they even have a concentration in Social Enterprise. If you are a good fit for Booth, you aren't a good fit for Kellogg. And if you are a good fit for Kellogg, you aren't a good fit for Booth. They are polar opposites when it comes to culture and mission.
Ouch. I can't speak about specifics at any other school, because Booth is really the only one I have deep experience with, but Social impact and social enterprise are high priorities here. For those interested in pursuing a career in this space or just passionate about giving back, here are some resources:
The Social Enterprise Initiative brings together 10 student groups whose mission includes making the world a better place. They also host programs like the Social Impact Leadership series and social Entrepreneur in Residence.
Booth's chapter of Net Impact has over 200 members. Their Board fellows program offers students the opportunity to intern as a board member for some of the best-known Chicago-based and national non-profits. Many of these highly competitive appointments also include responsibility for an impact consulting project.
Social New Venture Challenge is the do-good side of Booth's well-known entrepreneurship competition. Through the months-long competition, teams receive coaching from faculty, entrepreneurs, and industry insiders before pitching their idea to a panel including venture capitalists and impact investors. The founder of one of last year's top finishers was recently featured in Forbes.
Booth also hosts a competition called MBA Impact Investing Network and Training (MIINT), fields teams for the Hult Prize competition, and recently had 2 of the 3 finishers in Haas's education case competition.
This is just a portion of the social impact programming Booth offers. Good old fashioned community service is also alive-and-well through Give Something Back and a number of the other SEI-affiliated groups.
The idea of having a social impact concentration is an interesting one, but I'm not sure it fits with Booth's discipline-based approach. Booth concentrations are focused on fundamental disciplines, academic subject areas like Finance and Strategy rather than around career tracks like Consulting or Brand Management. So the question is whether the research around Social Impact is robust enough to distinguish it as a separate science or whether the tools required to be successful in that arena are a combination of marketing, finance, entrepreneurship, strategy, and the rest.
Whatever your interest is, Booth provides are environment where you pursue it. As Dean Sunil Kumar is fond of saying, "swing for the fences, the school has your back."
I just had my off-campus interview, very kind alumna
Why MBA? Why now? Why Booth? What characteristics a leader should have and if I think I have some of these A time when I had to motivate someone, how did that person react and how did I react after that A question about one of my ECs that she found interesting How did I prioritize when I have to do or choose among many things (then we talked about the many things we can choose at Booth) How I see myself in 5 years What I do in my free time Questions for her
I think it was ok (not bad, not amazing)..... now just wait 38 days - dlmm
Interviewed on Saturday. Everyone was very nice and chatty. All the applicants were even very supportive of one another; overall great experience. I got really nervous in my interview and I'm hoping I didn't blow it - one of those cases where you're worried you rambled, or said something silly, or something, but can't pinpoint any specific thing. So I guess that might just be nerves. Questions I had:
Tell me your story. Why an MBA? Tell me a time about when you worked through something difficult on a team. Tell me about a team you worked on that had conflict or was difficult to work with. Tell me about a team you worked on that was a great team to work with. Tell me about a time when you showed leadership. How will you contribute? Any questions for me?
Also, an important thing to note, they didn't even ask the "Why Booth" question. I spoke with someone who interviewed right before me who said they didn't ask him that, so he made sure to fit it into the "Why MBA" question. Maybe it's because we addressed that question already, but I would recommend fitting it in so that you're not left trying to sell yourself over it at the end. - Devon
I wonder what the distribution between admits in Round 1 and Round 2 is though, anyone has any clue on this?
GregMatte wrote:
I haven't seen any hard data on this, but I do remember a similar question was brought up during my Booth campus tour, and the response from adcom member was that "roughly 50/50 offers between round 1 and 2.. but we offer to whomever fits yada yada..". I've also heard that r2 has the largest app volume (I do not remember source, but I want to say Booth live Q&A). Putting those together, your chances are higher in r1 assuming similar distribution of "talent" across r1 and r2. Interpret as you will!
I would argue that R1, while having a fewer number of applicants, would boast a higher quality applicant pool. I.e., the people who have their "stuff" together, got started early enough, and timed their GMAT prep and application/essay prep well enough to meet the R1 deadlines. Also, this is where you find the majority of re-applicants from the prior cycle(s) who may have been WLed then denied, etc. Therefore, I agree that there is a better ratio of potential spots to applicants in R1 vs. R2, but you're competing against "better" candidates.
Maybe those factors offset to create a similar chances [EDIT: for the qualified but average/above-average candidate] across both... As a re-applicant, I was advised that my best shot this cycle would be to apply R1 to best demonstrate continued interest. - bschoolbandit
As I’ve been involved with the admissions process leading up to first round decisions coming out later this month, I’ve thought back a lot on some of the major questions I had before going back to business school. I’ve mentioned before that giving up a stable income and good career track can seem like a huge risk, and there are a lot of unknowns. Now with more than a year under my belt, I wanted to retrospectively answer the three questions I (and I think a lot of other people as well) had about going back to business school:
Am I going to have any time to see my family (or time for myself for that matter)? On several occasions I heard partners of business school students refer to themselves as “B-school widows”. With courses, club meetings, interesting speakers, recruiting, and a whole host of other activities with which to fill your day, life at Booth is never dull. With that being said, I have been very pleasantly surprised by how manageable it has been to be able to be home almost every night for a little family time before the kids are in bed. While I have had to sacrifice attending some interesting events on campus, I have been fortunate to have classmates who are willing to help accommodate my family life and have allowed me to schedule group meetings outside of my dedicated family time. In general I would say I’m on campus from 8-5 most days, with homework picking up for a few hours again after the kids are in bed. Lots of other students in similar situations work out their own unique schedules, but at this point my children still recognize me, so I’ll count that as a success.
How hard is business school, really? Hard. I have been incredibly impressed by how intelligent and demanding the professors are, and how driven all of my classmates are. Everyone expects you to know your stuff and put in your work, which to me is hugely refreshing. I haven’t had to worry about group members pulling their weight on projects like in undergrad. To be honest, I originally pictured business school as a bunch of people lounging around, “networking” and talking about optimal debt structures. That is definitely not the case here. Booth is well deserving of its reputation for analytical rigor, but I feel like the difficulty of the coursework has prepared me well to be successful in my future.
Will I be able to get my perfect job? When I thought about selecting my post-MBA career, I imagined going to some big Booth list and selecting from any of the dozens of jobs that matched all of my criteria. Although career services does an amazing job of providing resources during the recruiting process, and there are hundreds of fantastic companies that do some sort of recruiting here, I quickly realized that the perfect job simply doesn’t exist. Booth puts a lot of work into helping you explore career paths and assisting you with career research, but in the end I learned that I needed to be reasonable in my expectations. Once I finally came to grips with this fact I was able to settle in and have found a great post-MBA job with a company I didn’t plan on recruiting with and in a city I never imagined living in. However, I think in the big picture this will be the perfect place for me to start off my career, even though it didn’t check every single box for my preconceived “perfect job.”
I’m more than a year in now and can honestly say that none of these questions turned out to be the major roadblocks I expected them to be. Once you get here, meet your awesome classmates, and settle into B-school life, everything really falls into place. What are some of the big questions that you guys are wrestling with about coming to Booth or back to school in general?
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-BB
For those of you applying Round 2, I took a few notes from an in-office Booth event we had with an admissions officer. Though I've already applied R1, I thought some of y'all could use a break from some of us talking about the wait or the speculation going on in the Kellogg thread.
Disclaimer: these are my notes and my interpretation of things that were said; you should always do your own detailed research and formulate your own opinions on any school.
About Booth (very consistent with public information): - consistent with the broader UofC community, there is a big emphasis on ideas, inquiry, and academic excellence - high emphasis on the "Chicago Approach" (see: https://www.chicagobooth.edu/about/chicago-approach) - contrary to finance and quant-reputation, curriculum is focused to provide analytical framework that is applicable across every industry - flexibility throughout the academic experience - with the exception of LEAD, all courses are up to the student; this theme carries through how students engage student-led orgs, housing, career center, housing, etc. - strong support system - within weeks, you are engaged by a career adviser, academic adviser, 2nd year mentor, and many opportunities to connect formally and informally with 2nd year students and alumni - opportunity for international study such as study abroad for a semester or participation in international clubs
About the Non-Essay/Presentation sections of the Application: - generally, there was a huge emphasis on the holistic picture and demonstrating the competency to tell your story through the sum of each component; sections of focus are listed below: - goals section: point of this section is to communicate how your experiences and passions combined with your expectations of your Booth experience will enable you to achieve your ST and LT goals; for those sponsored, advice was to place particular emphasis on what you hope to get out of Booth as having your ST goal just be "go back to my sponsored company" is not enough - LOR section: emphasis was on: (i) using your 2 LORs to be complementary to each other, (ii) though you cannot write them, you can influence them to 'complete your story' - optional section: only use as appropriate; examples for appropriate uses are employment gaps, components severely less competitive components (e.g., low GPA, etc.), why current - unlike other schools, Booth does not specifically ask "Why Booth" so the advice was to demonstrate it in places like the essay and interview
About the Essay / Presentation portion of the Application: - this should answer ''what else is there you want to share within the context of the whole application?'' - no limit, but self-awareness on the amount of content shared is important (i.e., 22 page presentation 'not fun' to read) - topic is completely up to you and can address a range of personal issues (e.g., what are you passionate about? what completes your story? is it an experience? a collection of experiences?) - viewed as a first impression to how candidates handle ambiguity - 'not looking for Pulitzer Prizes' but do care about grammar, proper writing, etc. - advice to dig deep and be introspective - if you do a presentation, make sure not to try and hammer an essay into your presentation - an example shared of a unique approach to the presentation was using a newspaper-like format
To those who also applied R1, best of luck to you all. To those who will apply R2, I hope the above helps and I encourage you to have fun with it! - positivelyJC
It’s hard to believe that the holidays are already upon us and that we are getting ready to admit Round 1 applicants this week on December 18!
Nevertheless, we know there are lots of Round 2 applicants who are ready to get the ball rolling and hit submit on January 6. In the spirit of Booth’s commitment to inquiry, I’d like to answer some of the most common questions from applicants so far this year.
1) Who should I ask to write my letters of recommendation?
The admissions office asks that you select two recommenders to submit letters for your application. We highly encourage you to select at least one recommendation from your current supervisor and the other is at your discretion. Commonly used second recommenders are past supervisors, clients, or those you may have worked with at volunteer organizations. It is worth noting that we do have a number of applicants who are uncomfortable asking current supervisors for recommendations because they have yet to disclose their future plans. We understand that this can be a difficult situation so we highly encourage you to explain your reasoning behind not choosing your current supervisor.
2) Should I do a presentation or essay?
In this year’s application, we only have one required question for you to answer. You have the freedom to choose how to communicate the answer to us – in essay or presentation format. There is no preferred format for the admissions office as we recognize that everyone wants to tell their own story differently.
3) What does the Round 2 timeline look like?
Applications should be submitted for Round 2 by January 6, 2015 at 5:00 PM CST. Later in January, we will begin releasing interview invitations. Please note that we review applications and release interview invitations in no specific order. All applicants will receive a decision of Invite to Interview or Deny Without Interview by February 4.
Interviews will begin on February 9 and will go through the first week of March. Applicants will have the option to interview on-campus, with a member of our alumni community in your area, or at one of the various cities we visit around the globe for interview days. Final decisions will be released on March 26 at 9:00 AM CST. At that time you will receive a decision of Admit, Deny, or Waitlist.
We know you may have many more questions during this process so please feel free to ask in the comments below. You can also connect with admissions during our twitter chat tomorrow on December 16. Use #BoothMBA to follow the conversation.
All the best to our Round 2 applicants!
Tyler
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Anyone who wrote an essay instead of doing a presentation? Or should I lose hope?
If you think you need a little oomph to stand out from the pack I think a presentation is the way to go. It shows that you went out of your way to make something just for Booth. Booth, like Columbia and Kellogg (not sure about MIT) seem to give a little extra credit to those whom they believe would be likely to select them above competing schools; taking the time to do these 'optional' assignments is one way to make that happen.
That being said, if you have poor powerpoint skills or a story that you think is much more compelling on paper than use the method that will come across strongest.
Personally I thought the powerpoint was fun. I didn't do any thing special, maybe 3 serious slides related to goals, fit with Booth and my personal experiences and then one fun slide with pictures and little snippets about myself. I know other people who were accepted and got fancy with pages that looked like recipes from a binder, etc.
Best of luck to everyone in round 2, looking forward to seeing some future classmates here! - bostonbp
Chicago Booth is lucky to receive applications from more qualified and intelligent applicants than we can accept. For this reason, we utilize our waitlist for those we’d love to have as part of our community, but simply do not have the space for in our class at the moment. To those Round One applicants who have elected to remain on our waitlist, we fully understand the uncertainty you feel, and appreciate your patience and dedication to being at Booth. Below are some things to remember:
1. A waitlist decision is not the Committee’s final decision.
One of the greatest things about the admissions process at Chicago Booth is how fluid it is. Our mission is to craft the best class possible, and, as such, we maintain a robust, unranked waitlist of very qualified candidates who we feel could be excellent contributors to the incoming class. Therefore, we continually evaluate applicants’ files throughout each round.
2. The Committee welcomes updates to your application.
Consider the submission of any new materials that you feel would strengthen your candidacy, including, but not limited to: an optional video of up to 90 seconds that reiterates your interest in Chicago Booth and why you feel that you would be a good fit for our unique community; additional essays that provide context or clarification for information contained within your application; or employment updates (i.e. recent promotions). Should you choose to submit additional materials to enhance your application, refer to emails you have received from our office for full instructions. Additional submissions for Round One waitlisted applicants must be received by February 9. Your application will get another full review in Round Two that will take into account any supplemental information that you provide.
3.Get to know our community and our students.
While we are not able to discuss the specifics of your application with you or explain precisely why you were waitlisted, we do encourage you to find ways connect with our students to help you better determine why Booth would be a good fit for you, and vice-versa. Whether that is through virtual channels like The Booth Experience blog written by students or visiting campus to see the community firsthand, there are many opportunities to connect with us. When your final admissions decisions do arrive, you will feel confident in any choice you make.
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-BB
well i just spent a lot of time i should have spent working analyzing the R1 invitations.
So first person reported on October 16th and the 24th was the last day. Here was the breakdown (reported on the thread)
Oct 16: 2 people 1.52 EST Oct 17: nothing (think it was Booth Live) Oct 18-19: weekend - nothing October 20 : 13 people 1:52 est October 21: 6 people 1:00 EST October 22: 8 people 1:18 est October 23: 11 people 12:42 EST October 24: 14 people + dings 4:30 EST
2 takeaways
1. the emails are sent in one batch 2. they really do send emails on the last day...in fact, that was the highest reported day for R1. and there really was no correlation date between invite date and A/D/WL - angelfire213