Mr. Overcoming Adversity

You’re knocking on the wrong door. Sadly, your numbers just don’t translate into an accept from Stanford. When a school only admits less than 7% of its applicants from an already self-selecting pool of candidates and you come into that pile with a GMAT score that is 84 points below the class average of 734, you are toast. Sure Stanford enrolled one student with a GMAT as low as 600 last year but you can bet that student is exceptional in every other way. Make no mistake, you have a great story to tell but you don’t qualify, as far as I know, as a URM which would help you immensely. You don’t come from a feeder school: There’s not a single GSB student in the Class of 2020 from Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, though there are five from Pontifica Univ Catolica de Chile and one from Universidad Pontificia Comillas. Your numbers are low. You have a better shot at INSEAD or IMD and you may want to expand your target school list with a few U.S. schools ranked outside the Top Ten. If your heart is set on Stanford, Wharton, MIT and Booth, you have no choice but to retake the test and get close to a 700 or better to have a realistic chance for admission.

Hi, Mr. Overcoming Adversity, Julie-Anne Heafey here from mbaMission. Wow, it sounds like you have incredible stories of resilience and hard work to share, but you are aiming for some tough, tough schools with some serious question marks in your background (low GMAT, low GPA, undergrad from non feeder school and work experience that’s likely…unusual). It’s *possible* to get considered at Stanford with low scores and the right story…I’ve worked with several candidates with GMATs below 700 who have gotten a coveted interview invitation at Stanford, but they’ve had other strengths working in their favor and getting over the finish line is still difficult. It happens, but it isn’t common. So, add other schools to your list and I agree you should make sure you include some outside the M7 in the US. Booth, Wharton and MIT attract a lot of finance types from around the world with very high stats, so expand your list beyond those names and put in a few European contenders outside INSEAD. IMD’s a good choice, with a GMAT average of 680 and a stated rough guideline of “over 630” GMAT, which you clear, and they offer an option to have your candidacy assessed with feedback – I’d take advantage of that! Best of luck, Julie-Anne