This is Jake the Dog.
More accurately, this WAS Jake the Dog, a week after I adopted him in May. He’s gained a few pounds and a lot of confidence since that time.
It’s also a pretty accurate pictorial representation of me last night after finishing my Kellogg app an hour or two before the deadline. No doubt about it, I underestimated the difficulty of the application process. It’s easy to write 100 word essays for undergrad apps when you are in high school with nothing to do. But when you are working, volunteering, and writing 500-word MBessAys, it takes a lot more time. Especially when they need to be flawless. So, I looked just about as lively as Jake here over the last 24 hours or so.
but it feels so good to be DONE. I realized that I don’t have the stress of some of the other applicants out there whose entire lives revolve around getting into H/S/W. I am waiting to see, and I’m just not worrying too much about it. I’m actually more concerned about what options I would look at if I DON’T get in anywhere. The hardest part is that I really just have no idea whatsoever if I stand a decent chance of admission anywhere I applied to or not. My story goes like this: I had a pretty good GMAT, but a little lower than the 80% threshold on the quant that some people talk about. Overall score was high, though. I had a great undergrad GPA, undergrad extras, and professional extras. But, I also have a couple shortcomings: a no-name undergrad school, and the biggest problem of a very unspactacular career. So, I just don’t know if I have a chance or not. And so, I don’t know how to plan.
Here is where we stand:
HBS: My app is in, but my supervisor submitted my rec a few hours too late. Still hoping they will keep me in R2. I feel pretty good about this application, but it was the first one I submitted, and I know my essays could have been exponentially better after I had practiced a little more. I’m hoping for an interview, though. I name-dropped the alum I met in July, who is an interviewer, and also used to be the Prez of the alumni board, so maybe he will throw in a good word for me.
Ross: This was by far my best application. I spent a whole weekend on campus, and the fit was just right. With all the time I spent at Ross, and the help of some great editors and reviewers, I put together some A+ essays. My interview is a couple weeks from now.
Tuck: I don’t think I’ll get in. My interview sucked because it was back in October, before I was ready for any of this really. I found a job description I actually FORGOT to fill out on the app form after I had submitted it. But the good news here is that I don’t have to wait for an interview invite, just a decision. That feels good. I also wrote some pretty sub-par essays for this one. I took it down to the wire, and it cost me some serious quality.
Kellogg: I am actually hoping for an admit here. I think I wrote some good essays, the program is a good fit, and I have a key contact there. This is another school with open interviews, though. The good thing about this is that you get a chance to interview; the bad thing is, getting an interview isn’t anything special.
So, out of the 4 schools, I will have at least 3 interviews–this alone makes me think I chose exactly the right schools to apply to. I marked my calender with their decision dates, and it looks like there is one decision each week for 4 weeks in March. Confession: I may have scheduled my Ross interview toward the late end of the range, so I could reduce my waiting time between interview and decision.
It feels good to be back to my life. It felt good to wake up today without the internal pressure to spend the day on essays. I cleaned house for the first time since November.
And I found this neat picture of my house from 1908!
And Jake slept on the couch.
[...] with Kelley and Rice the next stops in his application relay. Gltnforpnshmnt was also in the dog days of application writing – literally! On the flipside, Miss Curly Bee reveled in a much needed break, soaking up all the [...]