Mr. Independent Tutor

Hi Mr. Independent Tutor,
Thanks for posting your profile. This is Debbie Choy from mbaMission. I think you have a lot of unique strengths in your profile – differentiated work experience as an educator and semiconductor process engineer (congrats on the 3 patents!), robust academic track record (GPA and GMAT), and community leadership as a youth soccer coach. I appreciate that you want to go to business school to grow. MIT Sloan would be the perfect school for you as it’s one of the few top schools that recognizes that “career goals” for MBA students can and do change. Hence, they don’t explicitly ask for your goals in their essays. That said, it can be helpful to do more reflection on that before you enter school. The reason being that recruiting at most b-schools start pretty soon – less than a few months after you start school. In my personal experience, MBA students who have thought about what industry / area they’d like to pursue are better able to hone in on resources, contacts, and recruiting events relevant to their field of interest. As you put together your application, do share with AdCom what drives you? What motivated you to tutor students, or focus on semiconductor process engineering? What sparked your interest in coaching youth soccer? All this will help AdCom better understand you as a team player and leader. I think if you can dig deeper and share your inner thinking and personal stories, it will make you bring your application to life and stand out from the crowd. If you’d like to discuss your profile in further detail, feel free to schedule a consultation with us. Wishing you the best in your MBA journey!

Hello Mr. Independent Tutor, this is Lisa Cummings of Stratus Admissions. As a former adcom for MIT Sloan I see some interesting nuggets in your post but a lot of holes. While your GPA and GMAT are in the range for Sloan and your patents will show innovation and success, you will need to show your schools- not just Sloan- a lot more. I realize you don’t have much of space here but I would want to know details about your tutoring company; schools will dig into your business plan, customer acquisition strategy, revenues etc. Ditto with your community work- as a soccer mom myself I love your coaching volunteer work as well as your interest in helping kids in the difficult high school years. Kudos to you but you will need to give more specifics on your involvement in these projects.

While it is true that Sloan is one of the few schools that does not ask for your goals, they do need to know that you have set your sights on something. In your cover letter to Sloan and essays and short answers to other schools, you will have to articulate specific reasons for why you want to get an MBA. What skills, hard and soft, do you lack? What gaps are you looking to fill at school? That will dictate what you discuss in your Sloan cover letter as well as in their interview. If you can’t answer the Why MBA question with specifics, schools will have a hard time seeing how you will fit into their cohorts. Given your success an an entrepreneur and inventor, I imagine you have some great stories to share! Think about how you might want to grow and in what direction(s)? Do you want to build your current business maybe or pivot into a different direction? Spend some time upfront noodling on these things and it will be easier for you as you start to tackle your applications. Feel free to schedule a consult if I can be of any help to you in the process. Good luck!