Haas (UC Berkeley) EWMBA 2013 - Calling All Applicants

How does that work? So they just WL most applicants and make up their mind around the R3 decision date when all applications are in?

Basically, you're qualified to be in the program at that point but they either have too many people with your background or there's some negative on your profile.

So, they wait until they have a full picture of the class and start admitting people from the wait list. If you're a wait listed engineer and another admitted engineer decides not to attend, they may admit you from the wait list.

Alright, so if they want to limit the number of engineers to 24% of the class i.e. around 60 seats (assuming a class size of 240) --

They'll admit 20 engineers in R1 put the remaining "qualified" applicants in a WL.
Then they'll admit another 20 engineers in R2 from the pool of R2 applicants + R1 WLs
And go on iterating till Round 4..

This sounds reasonable.

However, on the other hand - if they admit 5 engineers in R1, 5 engineers in R2 and then select 50 engineers from the massive pool of WLs and Applicants at the end of R3...that would totally suck.

Well, there's no way to quantify exactly how many people of each background they're admitting, but the gist of it is if you're waitlisted, they think you're qualified for the program. The point of either retaking your GMAT or otherwise improving your profile at that point is to move ahead of the other people on the list.

Assuming you've already interviewed, there's not a whole lot else you can do at this point. If you haven't interviewed, they may do a last minute interview or put you on the waitlist without an interview in this round. Not having an interview yet doesn't necessarily mean you'll get a ding.

You raise an interesting point. If you do end up on the WL, improving your profile should help you get ahead. I just wonder how meaningful these "improvements" can be.

One obvious suggestion is to boost your GMAT score. What most schools usually say in their info sessions is that if your score is above 700 (and > 48 quant), that proves that you have the academic ability to succeed in the program. And then at that point, they evaluate other aspects of your application to decide if you're 'good enough' to admit.

Are you really a better applicant if you boost your score from 700 -> 780? From the school's perspective you've just crossed the academic ability bar by a higher margin. Would they have admitted you straight away, if you had 780 the first time around?

Haas in particular is famous for saying they reject 50% of the applicants with a GMAT score >750. That said, there's not a whole lot else you can do once you're on a wait list. I've you've gotten a promotion I guess you can tell them about it, but what else? As much as schools don't like to admit, GMAT scores are a primary driver in school rankings. So, if it's a toss up between someone with a 710 and a 750 (assuming identical profiles), they just might go for the 750. It's certainly not going to make a huge difference if you're already above 700, but it couldn't hurt.

If you've scored <700 and are on the WL, it will definitely help though.

A lot of people might have applied in R1 because they wanted the decision earlier.
So why keep them in a state of agony? If WL is what the schools want, then why not encourage everyone to apply in R3?
Why have 3 separate rounds then? Why not get away with R1 and R2 and just get all the applications around R3 timeframe and choose whichever they deem are best for the class?

"Haas in particular is famous for saying they reject 50% of the applicants with a GMAT score >750"

I think that might be true for the full-time program. But then again, most top10 FT programs can stake that claim. When you have something like 5000 applicants vying for 250 seats, that's bound to happen.

I wonder if the same is true for the ewmba program.

Based on the class profile - Middle 80% GMAT Range 640-750

That means - 10% of the admits in 2012 (around 25 people) had a score greater than or equal to 750.

The fact that this range has dropped slightly from 2011 (it was 640 - 760), could indicate that they are assigning less weight on the GMAT score (assuming the applicant pool was very similar in 2011 and 2012).

Traditionally, part-time programs do not emphasize so much on the GMAT from the point of view of marketing the program. The reason is - these programs don't have to necessarily disclose their stats related to GMAT. Having said that, Haas EWMBA has been disclosing its GMAT stats and do give a lot of importance to GMAT mainly to differentiate between tons and tons of engineers (thanks to it's location) who apply to the program. If you look at other programs like UT Ausin's McCombs Part-Time program, I doubt if they would even advertise their GMAT stats.

You're still getting an earlier decision if you applied R1. If you get waitlisted in R1, chances are you would have been waitlisted in R2 too. Schools don't necessarily "want" wait lists. They want an evenly balanced class of qualified people. They know if they put you on a wait list, you may be offered admission in your second choice school and take that instead. However, not everyone they extend an offer to accepts it. So, spots do open up and the school wants to fill them. Thus the wait list.

As I mentioned before, the reason for not releasing the decisions now is there's an overlap between R1 and R2. They're looking at all the R2 applications to get a basic idea of the makeup of the class. So, once they know what they have to work with, they'll release the R1 decisions. This is also why you have a much better chance of getting admitted in R1 & R2 if you're in an overrepresented class. All things being equal, the people that applied earlier have a better shot of getting in.

Honestly, they are not being fair to people who apply in R1. Generally, any school would say that if you apply early you have a great shot at getting into it. However, in this case, one could have used the 4-5 months between R1 and R3 to improve the profile and still compete with R1 and R2 waitlists.

GMAT scores definitely play in to the equation less in a part time program than a full time program. That said, they're still important. Despite the GMAT's numerous flaws, it's the only way the school has to directly compare applicants. Between grade inflation and the rigor of the various programs, it's difficult if not impossible to compare say an engineer to a writer.

That's why they say apply whenever you're ready. My application is my application. I could have spent a couple more months agonizing over individual words in my essays, but in the end, the application is done. There's not a whole lot else I could have done to improve. I guess I could have retaken the GMAT to get 10-20 points more, but I'm already over 700. So, whatever. At least now I don't have to wait until april to find out a decision.

I guess that's why schools usually say - "apply when you can submit your best possible application" - when asked about which round to apply in.
Apart from a promotion, I don't think you can do much with your profile in 4-5 months.

Provided you don't get waitlisted, right? If you do, you compete with R2/R3 applicants. So much for applying early.

If they really wanted to be honest, they could have just said - "If you think you're best of breed, then apply in R1 or R2, else stick to R3 because that's when we make decisions on the mediocre lot..."

Agreed, they did say that. Now, I clearly understand what they meant.