Mr. Non-Traditional

Hi Mr. Non-Traditional, this is Kristen from MBA Prep School! Congratulations on completing your degree while simultaneously working. What an accomplishment, and surely a great triumph to share with the Admissions Committee. Your GMAT score is also going to be very attractive for your target schools, and hopefully will take some of the attention away from your GPA. However, you are going to need to put together a strong story to truly divert attention away from your academic performance. In my experience, sometimes MBA programs needs to convene a faculty committee to review any applicants who GPA is below a 3.0 before admitting them. If the school has a highly competitive pool, they won’t always bother doing this unless the candidate brings something really special to the table. You will need to highlight the reasons behind your non-traditional academic journey, how you overcame challenges of balancing it all, and big professional wins you have had in your internship or full-time role. You’ll also need to be clear about why consulting is the next best step for you (and perhaps be more open to other firms beyond MBB). Lastly, I think it would be wise for you to broaden your school list. This year looks to be extremely competitive given the number of students deferring due to COVID 19, so you will be up against a tough pool. If you’d like to chat further about your application strategy, let us know!

Hello Mr. Non Traditional, I’m Lisa Cummings of Stratus Admissions. Congratulations on your recent graduation! I worked at a very part time job in undergrad and found even that difficult to manage alongside classes, I can’t imagining working enough to self fund your education. You are a master juggler and you must be supremely organized. While your solid GMAT score is comfortably in the range of your target schools, your GPA will be a major sticking point for the programs on your list. Schools, especially the M7 are very stats focused as GMAT and GPA numbers are a key drivers of their rankings. Additionally, not all schools give the same weight to work done while in college to work they consider to be full time post degree. So while your age in years will be in line with the cohort, your work experience may not be perceived to be at the same level. BUT let’s look at the many positives of your amazing journey. Normally we suggest that those with a lower GPA use the additional or other information section to briefly explain their grades. In your case, given that you were working to finance your education, that may warrant more narrative in your essays and certainly in your interviews. You will want to polish your story to show the schools how their MBA program will help prepare you to attain your goals. As a former adcomm at MIT Sloan, I can say that top schools often don’t have much incentive to take the “risk” of accepting students with a GPA lower that 3.0. However, there certainly are a LOT of great schools out there that could give you the skills you need to reach your goals and may be a little more forgiving of that one data point when they review your file and see what else you have to offer. I have given you a 10% chance at your target schools but I imagine that number could increase significantly with a broader school list and a solid application. I wish you the best of luck!