Handicapping Your Shot At A Top MBA

Ms. Psychology

• 710 GMAT
• 3.1 GPA
• Undergraduate degree in psychology from the University of Pennsylvania
• 4.0 GPA Master’s
• Master’s degree in psychology from Pepperdine University
• “Took five years to get a 2 – 3 year degree because I switched from standard psych to MFT when I realized I wanted to work in the business world, but still wanted to get my license (sense of closure – could still practice if I wanted to). Had a hard time finding a place for practicum, eventually realized that I wasn’t making it happen because I didn’t really want to do it. Switched back into standard MA program and finished (finally!)”
• Work experience includes part-time work at a regional accounting firm (my dad was a partner); after firm was acquired by a tier two national accounting firm, I was promoted to manager
• Extracurricular involvements includes running half marathons, raising $3600 for AIDS Project LA, ran marathon in Hawaii, help with ACG cup locally.
• Goals:
To apply psychology concepts and theories (which I love) within business world…”I see me fulfilling this goal by working in management consulting”
• “Hoping for Stanford.  Columbia is on the list because I would enjoy living in NYC for 2-4 years (before running home to the beach). The more research I do, the more I think Kellogg is a good fit. USC and UCLA backups.”

Odds of Success:

Stanford: 10%

Columbia: 20%

Northwestern: 20%

USC: 40% to 50%

UCLA: 20% to 30%

Sandy’s Analysis: I don’t mean to rain on your parade, but Stanford is going to be a real long shot given low grades (which grad school grades do not ‘cure’ although that helps), zig-zagging career, and for Stanford, sub-par GMAT (although your GMAT is fine and 80% on each side) –and no overwhelming stardust factor  (reported in your profile anyway) tilting this the other way.

Did I miss this? Are you employed at present?  That could be another issue.

I think what you need to do is get a job with a consulting company or some outfit that uses psych majors to do Human Capital type consulting or even career advisory consulting. That would strengthen this profile a good deal. I would then state that doing that type of work is also your goal, which apparently it is, but man, you would have a much easier time at schools which are realistic for this profile, those schools being the ones ranked  10-25 in U.S. News or P&Q rankings, if you were applying from a job.  You say,

“Columbia is on the list because I would enjoy living in NYC for 2-4 years (before running home to the beach). The more research I do, the more I think Kellogg is a good fit. USC and UCLA backups.”

Well, running home to the beach is something we all want to do, but I wouldn’t use that as one pillar of my why USC or why UCLA essays. I think Columbia is going to be a reach here, for same reasons as Stanford, plus Columbia is not all that tilted towards consulting either, although let me add, consulting IS the career for you. You got that one right. USC and UCLA are not what I would call back-ups!  USC is in-line for your stats, and a real solid choice. UCLA, if you read this story in P&Q,  is on a jihad to increase applications (they were up 22 percent this year)  and otherwise boost its rankings—that means admitting people who are likely to not have trouble finding jobs two years later.  If you want to attend UCLA, you need to turn yourself into one of those people.  The best way to do that is already have, as an applicant, the job you want when you graduate, or some isotope of it.