Here is a Q&A guide to answer your burning questions on applying to a safety school.

Q: What is a "safety school"?

A: A safety school is one where you are highly competitive and that is strong in your area of interest, but it not as highly regarded overall. Your goals are clearly supported by this school.

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Often, when speaking to a student interested in applying to an MBA program—any MBA program—I find myself doing a bit of psychological counseling when we get to the undergraduate record evaluation. This is not necessarily because the student has a below-average UGPA, which sometimes is the case; no, what I find myself doing the most is arguing with the student as to the validity of their undergraduate major. Oftentimes, the first words out of a student’s mouth will be, “Okay, we need to do some damage control. I was an English major in college,” or “I know this is going to hurt me, but I was a psychology major.” These humanities, liberal arts, and social sciences students start committing academic hara-kiri before I even look at their transcripts. On the flip side, most students with economics, business, or business administration majors soar in to the process with an over-inflated sense of the merit of their academic credentials: “I know my GPA’s a little low, but I was a business major, so I’ve got that going for me.” Of course, this is not the case for all of my students, on either end of the spectrum—but I see this often enough that I thought it would be interesting to do a brief study and actually see if I could pinpoint that ever-ephemeral answer to the age-old MBA question: Which undergrad major or majors actually improve admissions chances—and which don’t?

What I found out was very interesting.

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The following is an excerpt from The Princeton Review’s best selling title, Business School Essays That Made a Difference.

Being a great storyteller and a gifted writer can be a major advantage to the prospective b-school student. But be forewarned: A wonderful answer to a question not asked will not help you here. We can’t stress enough that you must answer the question.

Each school has its own set of questions. Although posed differently, all search for the same insights. Here’s one commonly asked question and what’s behind it.

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Most candidates who have a goal of attending business school at some point in the future understand that the schools want to see evidence of community service.  In response, they dive into a community service project in hopes of checking the community service box on the application.  Unfortunately, they never stop to think about why the admissions committee is interested in their community service accomplishments.  The admissions committee isn’t like a judge who has sentenced you to 100 hours of community service.  Rather, they are interested in your community service work because it provides insight into your deeper interests and the causes that you care about.  Most of us need a job to earn a paycheck, but community service (barring a judge’s mandate) is optional.  Therefore, you will want to put a great deal of thought into what kind of community work you do.  If the only reason you can come up with for being involved with a particular organization is because you think it will look good on your business school application you may be wasting your time.

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It’s MBA interview season, which doesn’t mean you get a free pass to stress out. In fact, if you keep the four “must-knows” in mind during your interview prep and during the big event itself, you’ll find that acing the MBA admissions interview doesn’t need to drive you crazy.

In fact once you sort out the following five key elements, you’ll feel more relaxed and more confident—two “must-haves” for interview success!

So, what are these secret ingredients?

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As I’m sure you know by now, letters of recommendation are a critical portion of the business school application. Two to three letters are required for most business schools and they serve as an outside verification of your qualifications. Most applicants will have their two most direct supervisors write these letters, as most schools specifically list that as a requirement.

Quality letters of recommendation vouch for you by adding personal anecdotes and embellishing your brand. So how do you make sure your recommenders are sticking to your story?

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You’ve got just about two months until the MBA application deadlines of early January roll around. You want to present an organized, complete, and impressive application, all under the buzzer. There’s only one way you’ll get it all done—and done well!—and that is, by getting organized.

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If you have read the news lately from Business Week or Inside Higher Ed, you may have noticed that the GMAT is now popping up on corporate recruiters’ checklists for job applicants as well as for many top consulting, finance, and banking firms as a measure of job potential.

So how should you wrap your mind around this information?

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With interview invitations from a number of programs already on their way out to Round One applicants, we wanted to offer Beat The GMAT readers some advice on this critical element of the admissions process. While we have previously offered tips about interview etiquette and suggested approaches when ‘interviewing the interviewer’, we’ll focus today’s post on a few fundamental steps one should take to effectively prepare for an MBA admissions interview.

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Many MBA admissions officers will tell candidates that if they can complete their applications and submit them in Round 1, then they should do so. Most MBA programs will also tell candidates that they should try to avoid Round 3, as the majority of the places in their classes will have been filled. So, what does that say about Round 2?

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The 2008 collapse of the Wall Street giants – AIG, Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Bear Sterns, to name a few – coupled with the demise of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae have done a number on the prospects of the financial MBA. Even just five years ago, landing a job in the investment banking sector of Wall Street was sometimes enough to guarantee you a low six-figure income straight out of college (not a mean feat in any economic climate), and a solid mid-six figure income out of business school. Fast forward to 2009, and it’s reality-check time: Wall Street and the finance industry are still reeling from a loss of over 200,000 jobs, over 60,000 of them in New York—and the jobs that are left certainly aren’t bringing in the huge bucks. Whereas the top b-schools used to send over 45% of their graduates on to join the private equity, hedge fund, i-banking, and consulting ranks, these numbers are quickly shrinking, and both newly-minted and prospective MBAs are being forced to find new and innovative ways to not only bring their knowledge to the companies that are hiring, but also make a living.

Even though the finance MBA is not dead, the jobs left standing in the aftermath of the financial collapse are no longer the ones Gordon Gekko would lose sleep over. The remaining large investment banks are still hiring—mostly positions in mergers and acquisitions, though (a popular field in an economy when bigger companies come to the rescue of smaller ones in danger of collapse). Regional banks and boutique firms are still strong: positions as portfolio managers, analysts, financial advisers, and—quite popular recently—credit risk management analysis are still available and popular. Smaller regional banks like BB&T and lenders like Buffalo, New York-based M&T are still looking for fresh talent. However, says Ed Fredericks, professor and career adviser at Pepperdine’s Graziadio School of Business and Management, “the jobs aren’t going to be as lucrative, exciting, or crazy as they were before.”

What does this mean for you, budding MBA? That the times, well, they are a-changin’.

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The Africans at Microsoft diversity group recently assembled a panel of experts to talk about earning and making the best of an MBA degree. The panel is a candid discussion with business school admissions and career services people, current students and MBA graduates on a range of topics. Speakers included representatives from some of the best schools in the country, including Harvard Business School; Sloan School of Management at MIT; UC Berkeley; University of Washington; Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern and Wharton, among others. The panel, hosted at Microsoft’s corporate headquarters in Redmond, WA, had over 200 attendees from around the world including employees of Microsoft, Boeing, and Coastal Carolina University. Listen in as we bring the event to you.

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Think you need to quit your job and relocate in order to pursue an MBA? Think again. Many top-flight business schools are offering fully-accredited MBA programs either partially or completely online. These programs offer management professionals the chance to continue their career development while earning an MBA. The online and "hybrid" MBA degree programs we look at in this podcast require varying amounts of team-based, online work and actual face time with fellow students and program faculty. On today's show, four representatives from four very different online or "hybrid" MBA programs talk about how their programs are designed, and what kinds of people make up the student body.

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During the last six weeks I had the opportunity to attend and present at World MBA Tour events in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.  For those not familiar, these are large grad school fairs, co-sponsored by Kaplan, featuring dozens of the world's top business schools.  They also include admission seminars and panel discussions with admissions officers.

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Investment bankers. Consultants. Software Engineers. What do these three groups have in common? You may have answered, “over-representation,” and if you are among these groups, you probably groaned as well.  Well, all is not lost for the over-represented. While you cannot change your work history, you can change the way you introduce yourself to the Admissions Committees. So, we, at MBA Mission, have compiled a few simple strategies for introductory paragraphs, as they pertain to personal statements (Questions like: “Discuss your career history. How will an MBA help you achieve your goals?”), which will help you standout.

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