MBA Handicapping: How To Get Into HBS With A 3.2 GPA

Okay, we admit it. The headline is a bit of clickbait. It’s not because today’s candidate on Fridays With Sandy didn’t get a 3.2 grade point average during his undergraduate years. It’s because Andrew Dominguez is hands down the most impressive MBA applicant who has ever undergone the Sandy Kreisberg treatment on Poets&Quants.

We’re not surprised that this 29-year-old professional was already interviewed by HBS and is awaiting his round two answer which will come in 11 days on March 31. During our video session, Andrew shares his interview experience via Skype with two Harvard admission officials and dishes on a series of tricky questions that came off a single, nearly throwaway line at the very bottom of his CV.

So even though he got a 3.2 from Loyola Marymount University, a non-feeder college to HBS, he is an extraordinary candidate who also gives other applicants an idea of what you’re up against when you push the submit button on your application to Harvard Business School.

He’s highly accomplished, smoothly articulate, super smart and his interests in Kierkegaard & Aquinas, along with English and Irish poetry studied in Dublin, belie his expertise in mechanical engineering. With a 730 GMAT and even splits on the verbal and quant, Andrew also has a master’s degree in mechanical engineering with a 3.74 GPA. He has worked for a medical startup for more than five years, helping to guide their sleep apnea product from start to finish, starting at the lab bench to manufacturing.

Right now, he is in the middle of the COVID-19 crisis, playing a role in helping his current employer significantly boost the production of badly needed ventilators for patients sick with the disease. Oh, and did we mention, he has three patents to his name. Andrew has applied to only three schools: HBS, Oxford, and Cambridge.

If you would like to participate in a future Fridays With Sandy webinar, you can contact Sandy and P&Q Founder John A Byrne here.