Hi there! Thanks for reaching out. I see a lot of interesting things in your profile, and I think your background (while a bit non-traditional) should be attractive to b-schools. Sounds like you have some strong accomplishments at the university you can point to plus your exposure to the energy industry should be attractive. The volunteer work, language skills, and international exposure are all great and will be highly valued by the schools on your list.
My only concern is Quant skills given your Quant score + liberal arts background. Anything you can point to work wise that is quantitative in nature? I assuming the risk assessments involved some significant analysis? Have you taken any quant courses? Your overall GMAT score is excellent so that will help a lot.
I was wondering about your long-term goal re. media too -- I didn't see a strong connection to that, I guess there is the PR thing you mentioned, but if you frame that up as your long-term goal, just make sure you can show a connection and reason for why you want to pursue that route.
I think you've got a good list of schools and you should be competitive at most. Harvard could be tough, it is for pretty much everyone, but give it a shot, as they might see some of the interesting things I mentioned above.
Good luck!
Kate
EsotericWaffles wrote:
Good evening!
I thank you for your efforts on this forum. I am sure you don't get enough appreciation through these anxious admissions forums so I wanted to state my appreciation, regardless of whether or not you find a moment to reply.
Since this is my public name, I might as well be as honest as possible. I am a 28 year old American male who graduated Bowdoin College in 2011 (3.3 - Religion [modern Islam and Arabic], Philosophy). I teach political science at the University of North Dakota and manage multi-million dollar public private partnerships with a focus on drones, energy, and epigenetics. I also de facto acted as one of the bigger PR writers for the whole university system. Prior to this, I did political risk assessments for energy firms and acted as a research fellow in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan doing refugee work. I graduated Johns Hopkins SAIS (a well-known international economics school) with a 3.7 GPA focusing on econ and the Middle East. Prior to that, i was a political consultant focusing on the energy industry (.5 years) and, before that, i was a congressional intern (.5 years).
I have a 740 on the GMAT with 44 in Quant and 48 in Verbal with 8 IR and 6 AWA. My post-MBA goal is to work at MBB overseas with the goal of eventually working at or, in a fantasy world, starting my own international media firm. The Middle East is tragically under-analyzed and I believe there are a lot of opportunities on the table, but I don't currently have enough skills or a sufficiently robust network to think about undertaking that goal.
I speak Arabic and am from rural North Dakota and can do some occasionally hefty computer programming.
I volunteer to do interviews for Bowdoin College (last four years or so), perform Arabic exchanges with poorer immigrants, and write on national/local political issues.
My target schools are:
Ross
Tuck
Booth
Kellogg
Harvard
I would love suggestions or, if applicable, dissuasions from certain schools. The application fees are not small and I'd like to not get my hopes up too far, given my quantitative deficits.
Thank you,
EsotericWaffles
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28 Aug 2016, 15:17
