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Advice needed for a South African applicant!

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nrxbra001
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Advice needed for a South African applicant! [#permalink] New post   11 Aug 2017, 13:11
Hey guys and girls,

So I have taken my GMAT today and although I was about 30 points shy of my target, I still mustered up a little 690 (Q78, V37) (grateful for that because my highest MGMAT CAT was 660!). Now I move on to my next worry, which school will have me!?

My background is in chemical engineering, working for 4 years out in South Africa. My undergrad marks were average. I am looking at applying to some schools in the US (NYU Stern, Columbia, Duke Fuqua, MIT Sloan) and also to some in the UK (Oxford and Cambridge).

I am worried that my GMAT is low and will affect my chances of admission to these schools.

Any advice? The age old question, is it worth a re-take?
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Re: Advice needed for a South African applicant! [#permalink] New post   12 Aug 2017, 00:21
nrxbra001 wrote:
Hey guys and girls,

So I have taken my GMAT today and although I was about 30 points shy of my target, I still mustered up a little 690 (Q78, V37) (grateful for that because my highest MGMAT CAT was 660!). Now I move on to my next worry, which school will have me!?

My background is in chemical engineering, working for 4 years out in South Africa. My undergrad marks were average. I am looking at applying to some schools in the US (NYU Stern, Columbia, Duke Fuqua, MIT Sloan) and also to some in the UK (Oxford and Cambridge).

I am worried that my GMAT is low and will affect my chances of admission to these schools.

Any advice? The age old question, is it worth a re-take?


Hi there,

You are just a little below the target or should I say safe GMAT score for your target schools. But you have a good profile and I think a good chance of getting in. Remember, GMAT is not the only parameter for evaluation. You need to present a very rounded well presented profile. If you honestly believe you can improve your GMAT score by that 30 points and by all means take it again. But you will not be able to make it in time for R1. For reasons of diversity you should be good for R2 too. Now you need to decided Retake & apply in R2 or apply in R1 with 690 !
Hope this helps. Let me know if you need any further help.

Best,
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Re: Advice needed for a South African applicant! [#permalink] New post   12 Aug 2017, 03:31
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The diversity factor might pick up a little bit of the slack but if you feel that you've left any money on the table at all, and you have a history of mock scores being significantly higher, retake the exam.

But, if it requires intense study for you to get a better score and you're insisting on applying around 1 then no.

It's kind of a balancing act at this point between applying at a favorable round, how much effort its going to take for you to get a better score, and the most important thing in my opinion is *leaving adequate time for you to do a great job on your applications*

In your case, with many schools, ten weeks minimum and more if you work crazy hours. This is quite honest honestly a very underleveraged strategy, everyone focuses on gambling on the GMAT when doing the app is a far more controllable way to distinguish yourself.

Quality apps is paramount, if you try again, set a GMAT deadline ten weeks before the first app deadline to call it a day.
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Re: Advice needed for a South African applicant! [#permalink] New post   13 Aug 2017, 03:06
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nrxbra001 wrote:
Hey guys and girls,

So I have taken my GMAT today and although I was about 30 points shy of my target, I still mustered up a little 690 (Q78, V37) (grateful for that because my highest MGMAT CAT was 660!). Now I move on to my next worry, which school will have me!?

My background is in chemical engineering, working for 4 years out in South Africa. My undergrad marks were average. I am looking at applying to some schools in the US (NYU Stern, Columbia, Duke Fuqua, MIT Sloan) and also to some in the UK (Oxford and Cambridge).

I am worried that my GMAT is low and will affect my chances of admission to these schools.

Any advice? The age old question, is it worth a re-take?


It really depends on the rest of your profile, as the GMAT score is just one parameter that the schools look at. So I would want some more details about you in order to answer that. (Especially interested in any unique back story, promotions during your career and extracurricular activities)

So feel free to either write more about that here or contact ARINGO directly with this additional information here: https://aringo.com/mba-process-registration/

JL
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Re: Advice needed for a South African applicant! [#permalink] New post   13 Aug 2017, 11:08
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nrxbra001 wrote:
Hey guys and girls,

So I have taken my GMAT today and although I was about 30 points shy of my target, I still mustered up a little 690 (Q78, V37) (grateful for that because my highest MGMAT CAT was 660!). Now I move on to my next worry, which school will have me!?

My background is in chemical engineering, working for 4 years out in South Africa. My undergrad marks were average. I am looking at applying to some schools in the US (NYU Stern, Columbia, Duke Fuqua, MIT Sloan) and also to some in the UK (Oxford and Cambridge).

I am worried that my GMAT is low and will affect my chances of admission to these schools.

Any advice? The age old question, is it worth a re-take?


Thank you for the post and it is a pleasure to meet you. I am working with another applicant from South Africa now and I was just in Cape Town and Joburg a few months ago. I would love to learn a bit more and then would be happy to schedule time to discuss and compare you against my other client and the broader applicant pool.

Undergraduate: What school did you go to and what were your specific grades?
Work ex: Company and role? Did you work for one company or more than one?
Extra-currics: Leadership roles?
Demographics: ??

Truthfully I could give you advice but it would not be well informed until I learn a bit more about you!

Please send your resume and we can chat further. scott@personalmbacoach.com

Best,
Scott
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Re: Advice needed for a South African applicant! [#permalink]
13 Aug 2017, 11:08

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