Invited to Interview with Columbia!

After months of silence, it’s almost unreal to get two pieces of good news in as many (business) days, but that is exactly what has happened. Yes, this afternoon I opened up my email and found an invitation for an interview with Columbia!!

This is especially exciting because it makes my trip seem really worthwhile. I’m leaving tomorrow for San Francisco, then to Ann Arbor on Jan 22 and to New York on Jan 29. In between I’m visiting friends on the weekends.

In San Francisco I will be too early for the regular class visits, but I do have a coffee booked with a current student who I met through this blog, and I will also try to meet the director of the nonprofit management program.

At Ross, I will attend some prospective student activites and also the Black Business Students Association conference. I’m not black, but it still looks like an interesting conference with good speakers and a good way to get a sense of the school and its students.

For New York I haven’t got things arranged just yet, but the general plan will be about the same.

Anyway, there is lots to do before I leave, but I will try to post along the way! Wish me luck!!

 

Finally here…

Yes, I am now in Boston! I have wandered around the city for the past couple of days and the first thing that I notice is how young this city is. It looks like everyone is a student… and an undergrad. My friend that I am staying with tells me that there are 95 post-secondary institutions in the Boston area!

I stopped in at Boston University’s management building on Friday and spoke with a second year student about the MBA program. It was quite interesting, but also a bit disappointingly general. I’m starting to think that all the schools say exactly the same things to prospective students. Or maybe we just ask the wrong questions?

Then I went to the MBA Tour today, hoping for my decision to be clarified… and no such luck. Again, the admissions officers all start to sound the same. “We evaluate each application holistically.” “Just be yourself.” “We’re looking for leadership and teamwork.” “We don’t like to call ourselves The Finance School. We specialize in general management.” “Our school has a great community feeling.” I kept having to check my schedule to see which school I was listening to. Honestly, there were virtually no differences!

On the way back to my friend’s house, I had the great idea that we should suggest that the admissions officers follow their own advice. Stories and examples to make it come alive. More details. Just like they read a zillion essays, we are reading a zillion websites and going to all these presentations. They need to make themselves unique and stand out from the crowd!

Hmm… Wonder how that suggestion would go over?

The other thing that bothered me about the event was that the admissions officers also seem very cold. Many of them don’t seem to like talking to students very much, and really gave short, sullen answers. In fact, if I was to choose my schools based on the admissions event, I would be skipping some bigger names and applying at a couple of no-names. Not that all of them were that bad, but I was surprised that there wasn’t much of a “recruiting feeling” there.

The good part about going was that I realized that I am starting to have a pretty complete picture of the MBA admissions process. Almost nothing they said surprised me. I have read through the websites of most of the schools I’m interested in at least 2-3 times, and I really know as much about the program as what they will say in an admissions event. The only thing that I’m still looking for is the alumni/student perspective, and there weren’t any alumni there today.

So my conclusion is that it’s time to get down to serious work on the essays. I’m starting to have a feel for what I need to put into them, and now it’s time to move that process along. I will give myself a few more days to mull over my final school choices, so that when I return to Calgary I will be going full steam on essays and recommendations!