Darden acceptance calls

Question

I just got one yesterday (on Wednesday) afternoon. Seeme like they started 2 days in advance. I am an international. 

Has anyone else been called? Good luck to all.

OasisNYK · Answer

Nope no call here - I am on the wait list though

rhyme · Answer

Was that all the excitement you could muster for an admit?

kidderek · Answer

My sentiments exactly!!! hahaha People are literally dying out here waiting for admits.

died4me · Answer

I just got my call from Darden 5 mins ago

2 admits 1 waitlist 2 dings...
50 % success rates.

OasisNYK · Answer

Yeah - I am one of them.....things arent looking too good right now

squali83 · Answer

At this pace there will be no one receiving admits tomorrow! Starting to get a little nervous :roll:

OasisNYK · Answer

Yeah, the BW forum has a few admits too

squali83 · Answer

Yeah I read those too. Also, if you look at Admission411.com it is saying that Darden has already accepted close to 20% of the applicants on there for this round. Oh well, tomorrow we shall know.

OasisNYK · Answer

Well I am on the wait list so it is possible I wont hear anything - but you will at least get something.

I know they reviewed the wait list last week so we shall see. It looks like most getting accepted have GMAT Scores >710

squali83 · Answer

Well if that is the case I will probably be out of the running. Good luck with the waitlist, from what I remember you raised your GMAT to 710 so I would feel pretty confident if I were you. Hopefully we both will hear something positive!

OasisNYK · Answer

I just feel like the wait list might not be necessary - or that I wont hear until well into may or early summer if I did get in so I am concerned.

squali83 · Answer

Most schools review wait lists with every admit round. I imagine you will hear rather shortly after I do. I would not worry too much, the worst thing about hearing late is burning a security deposit at another school. Who knows this whole admit process seems to be completely random.

OasisNYK · Answer

lol well i wish i had that problem - i would gladly burn a SD at another school - but my reality is 2 WL left to hear from...the rest were dings...

batchgmat · Answer

Wow..This shocked me, I got DINGed. After getting in @ Duke and Michigan (and interview invite from Cornell) I thought I was a cinch to get in. I'm 90% Michigan anyways, so this doesn't really bother me too much. Hurts my ego a tad though. :-D

Who knows what to make of this whole process...

Who knows what to make of this whole process...

pelihu · Answer

Woohoo, I made it at Darden. Website updated right after 12AM EST. I'll be back to post some more details. A little basketball to watch, and a little celebrating to do first.

rhyme · Answer

Congrats. So is Darden the front runner now?

batchgmat · Answer

Congrats!

gmat_crack · Answer

Congrats Pelihu....

pelihu · Answer

Thanks guys.

It's probably going against the grain a little, but from a personal standpoint, I think I prefer Darden to Duke. I don't know if it's because I don't like their basketball team, or if I don't want to be hated by everyone all across the country, but Duke never struck a great chord with me. I do think Duke is a great business school and I'm sure everyone headed there will have great experiences. I'm going to do some additional research on both schools before I make a final decision between the two, and I'll post my thoughts in the next few days. Once I make a choice, I'll release my admit at the other place to, hopefully, free up a spot for a GMATclub Waitlister.

With regards to other schools, I expect to hear back from UCLA soon, but since expanding my personal network is one of my goals (I did my undergrad at UCLA), I'm not sure how I'll feel about UCLA v. Darden & Duke. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. I also followed up with Michigan and found out that my app wasn't considered for the last round because one of my recs arrived very late. If some of you recall, I wasn't given a decision on the deadline. This really pissed me off because I actually confirmed (I still have the email) that this wouldn't be a problem; my rec was late because my recommender in China couldn't access US websites due to the Taiwan earthquake. Anyhow, even though I love Michigan, I'm pretty unhappy with their shoddy treatment, and probably won't have them consider my app for R3. Then there's Berkeley and Stanford, which would throw a big wrench into everything, and the Columbia WL.

As I mentioned earlier, I didn't want to post anything about my Darden interview until after the decision because I didn't want to jinx myself (as with Columbia), but I had a great interview with Darden. I'll post a report later.

Batchgmat, I agree that it is tough to figure out. Darden did report in a recent podcast that admissions were up 35% this year, and that while 79% of business schools reported increases in applications, only 20% (I'm going off the top of my head) reported substantial increases, and Darden was in that group. It seems that almost all of the top ranked schools have had substantial increases though. Bottom line, it is a maddening process for applicants; very tough to figure out.

Darden acceptance calls

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards