Caroline Kim

University of Virginia, Darden School of Business

“Enthusiastic, driven, hardworking, passionate about access to healthcare and innovation.”

Hometown: McLean, VA

Fun Fact About Yourself: I got to hold a donor kidney inside of a patient during a kidney transplant.

Undergraduate School and Major: University of Virginia School of Medicine (MD candidate, 2027), University of Chicago, 2021, Major: Linguistics, Minor: Chemistry

Most Recent Employer and Job Title: Student Summer Intern at the National Institutes of Health; Summer Intern at J.P. Morgan & Chase, Middle Market, Seattle, WA

What makes the case method so attractive as a means to learn and become a better manager? The case method makes it necessary to participate in real-world decision-making (i.e., listening, analyzing, and persuading under time pressure), a skill set paramount in management.

Aside from cases and classmates, what was the key part of Virginia Darden’s MBA programming that led you to choose this business school and why was it so important to you? The Leadership & Organizational Behavior (LEAD) program. LEAD drew me to Darden because it teaches more than the basics of accounting, operations, marketing, and decision-making. We learn to develop our emotional intelligence, self-awareness, and leadership style before even beginning classes, which is critical for growing and leading diverse teams in high-stakes environments, like healthcare and consulting.

What course, club, or activity excites you the most at Virginia Darden? The Healthcare Club excites me most because I want to bridge my clinical background with business skills that I will learn at Darden to work on projects that directly impact access to care and innovation in care delivery.

What are your early impressions of Charlottesville? I’ve actually lived in Charlottesville for the past three years at the School of Medicine working on my M.D. degree, so I am not new to Charlottesville this year. However, I remember Charlottesville feeling like a nice balance between a small-town and large academic institution within the backdrop of the Blue Ridge Mountains and Shenandoah National Park. To my fellow hikers, this is a granola girl’s paradise.

Describe your biggest accomplishment in your career so far: As a fourth-year medical student, I have not had a traditional career; however, one of my proudest accomplishments has been helping refugees in Charlottesville obtain personal identification materials and library access. 

What is your unique quality that will enable you to make a big contribution to the Class of 2027? Why? I bring a translator’s mindset to my class, a role where I can bridge science, policy, and business conversations and give insight into healthcare as a healthcare worker. This allows me to connect classmates from several different industries and help teams tackle problems from multiple angles and with granular knowledge of the inner workings of the healthcare system.

What advice would you give to help potential applicants gain admission into Virginia Darden’s MBA program? Know and be true to thyself. Darden values people who know themselves (their strengths and weaknesses) and how to best apply them to their passions to make real change in their community.

DON’T MISS: MEET VIRGINIA DARDEN’S MBA CLASS OF 2027

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