pelihu wrote:
"Can long working experience (more than 6 years) and quite a good GMAT (690) compensate for a very low GPA(2.36)?"
The problem for this candidate is that years of experience mean nothing really. He should realize that next to him is someone who also has 6 years of experience but a 3.6 gpa and a 740 GMAT. Just having 'more' experience, doesn't in any way help his application.
I'm convinced that:
1) Some people do a bad job of answering the question posed. This seems to be very very common. (Every adcom mentions it)
2) Most people do a very poor job of making it sound like they actually want to go to the school. Canned generic statements about "great faculty" and "fabulous students".
3) There are an inordinate amount of "IIT" graduates working in India who want to go to school in the US. I'd heard this before, but I'm amazed how many of the essays I've seen are from essentially an identical demographic. Somehow, there seem to be a lot of indians on this website - I don't know why, so I don't know if it's truly representative of the population (that is, the sample I've seen) - but if so, I can understand why the "Indian engineer" is a hard app. Many have had similar aspirations too - come back to India to work on the family business. I'm not trying to discourage these applicants, but it seems like they really are everywhere.
4) In my conversations with current students and alumni, I'm shocked by how many immediately determine whether or not I'll be accepted based on my GMAT score. I don't know if they know something I don't, but a lot of them say "whats your GMAT?" and then respond "Oh, your getting in. Don't worry."
5) Lets be honest here. Schools want everyone to apply. 2.0 GPA? Sure. 550 GMAT? Go ahead. The reason is that so much of the PERCIEVED prestige (and rank) comes from the selectivity percentage. If they set a true GMAT cutoff - say 700 - how many applicants would never even apply? 41% of applicants to Kellogg are under 700 - 16% of applicants are under 640 but make up only 9% of the class. Thats almost 1000 applicants right out of the gate.. If you do the math, (
https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/adm ... res_06.pdf)
assuming a 50% yield, were talking a 16% accept rate. And as I've mentioned before, below 640, the yield is probably much higher - closer to say 10% or 8% accepts maybe. At the 700-740 level, assuming a 33% yield - one in three, the accept rate would be 44% or so. (891 offers based on 45% of class (660) * 3 divided by 44% of 4500 or so about 2000 applicants). It's a napkin calculation sure, but it doesnt seem out of the realm of possibility. If Kellogg put a cutoff at 700, theyd lose about 1600 applicants, and have only 2400 or so left - bringing their overall accept to 21%, whereas without it appears its more like 12%.