The Application Process

I just got in to Columbia! Anyone else?

congratulations phoebemba! i had my interview last week. how long did you wait to hear back from columbia after being interviewed?

gkumar wrote:congratulations phoebemba! i had my interview last week. how long did you wait to hear back from columbia after being interviewed?

9 Days... not that I was counting or anything, right?

phoebemba wrote:

gkumar wrote:congratulations phoebemba! i had my interview last week. how long did you wait to hear back from columbia after being interviewed?

9 Days... not that I was counting or anything, right?

Congratulations phoebemba. I know just the feeling. I too counted my days and heard from CBS this morning. I was deferred into the regular round. I am surprised as my essays (confirmed by multiple CBS alums) and interviews (confirmed by my interviewer) were above average. I am not sure what I should do now to improve my application with update letters, letters of support from alumni, and letters of support from potential employers. I would attend CBS if admitted.

Can you, essaysnark, or anyone else give advice that might help?

gkumar wrote:Congratulations phoebemba. I know just the feeling. I too counted my days and heard from CBS this morning. I was deferred into the regular round. I am surprised as my essays (confirmed by multiple CBS alums) and interviews (confirmed by my interviewer) were above average. I am not sure what I should do now to improve my application with update letters, letters of support from alumni, and letters of support from potential employers. I would attend CBS if admitted.

Can you, essaysnark, or anyone else give advice that might help?

gkumar, so sorry to hear you're on the D List!!!! This has happened to a few of our clients this year too (and as you know from our previous ranting on our blog, we're not too happy about this deferred-decision thing at CBS). Without seeing your full profile it's near impossible to say what went wrong. In general, EssaySnark usually lacks confidence in what any school's alumni say about someone's essays -- even if that alum was on the adcom at the school -- just because there are so many factors that go into play and it's really strategic and if you're not, like, doing this stuff for a living, it's near impossible to stay on top of it all. Even the best writers with the most noble intentions who graduated from the school itself often aren't great judges of what an adcom may or may not be looking for in a set of essays, in a particular admissions season, in a particular day or week.

Our opinion is sort of similar on the interviewing front - the alumni interview is a very important part of the process at Columbia, but because these interviews are conducted by alumni (at least, we're assuming yours was) then the alum isn't the best judge of how good or 'above average' the interview was only because they have such limited experience -- each alum interviews a miniscule sample so how would he/she know what's "average" or not? The interview report matters a lot in the final decision but alumni interviewer opinions don't have all that much clout in the big picture (and, they might not even really know what the adcom is looking for on an up-to-the-minute basis since they're so removed from the actual decision-making that happens behind closed doors).

The good news is that your profile HAS to be strong to have made it this far at Columbia. They're not issuing interview invites for anyone that's not got it together. If there was a too-low GMAT score or a troubling GPA in the picture, you would not have made it this far (Columbia rarely is able to overlook a low GPA, in our opinion; those candidates are usually just rejected). It's possible the career goals aren't water-tight, either in the essays or in how they were expressed in the interview; or -- most probable -- there's not enough community involvement, and/or proof of taking the initiative in the world and making an impact in some way. Columbia doesn't want any wallflowers. And, unfortunately, neither of these two issues are easily countered with more "stuff" to submit during the deferred-decision process.

If however the GMAT is a little on the low side (i.e., the quant is below a 47 or so) then you may want to look at re-testing -- it can only help, not just for Columbia but for those other schools we see on your list (Wharton, Booth, Stern, Sloan, HBS, Stanford). The other angle to pursue is if you're due for a promotion or a raise, or will be completing some high-impact project at work soon, then try to accelerate that and then report the accomplishment to the adcom once it's solidly in hand.

In EssaySnark's experience, additional recommendations and letters expressing interest etc do little to move the needle in the waitlist process at Columbia. Best not to over-communicate, in our opinion; only submit new information that's relevant to your candidacy.

Separately: Congratulations phoebemba!!! It's been a competitive season at Columbia for sure. Congrats on the admit!

And gkumar, don't give up hope! Obviously getting the deferred decision is still keeping you in the running -- and, each school's decision is an independent event and so this does not indicate what other schools are going to decide on your app.

Good luck with it, and please keep us posted!!!

Hi gkumar, well I'm sorry to hear about the deferral but I would say "chin up!" I think that it's still a good sign. You still have two more rounds to knock 'em dead with the other school apps and I'm sure you'll do well. I don't know the process for deferrals but you might do some Googling to see if/how to stay on their radar and let them know your continued enthusiasm for the school. One of my friends got into Columbia as an undergrad after being waitlisted... she basically called them a bunch of times to keep reminding them that she wanted to go there and eventually they took her. I don't know if that works for the business school though but is worth looking into!

gkumar wrote:

phoebemba wrote:

gkumar wrote:congratulations phoebemba! i had my interview last week. how long did you wait to hear back from columbia after being interviewed?

9 Days... not that I was counting or anything, right?

Congratulations phoebemba. I know just the feeling. I too counted my days and heard from CBS this morning. I was deferred into the regular round. I am surprised as my essays (confirmed by multiple CBS alums) and interviews (confirmed by my interviewer) were above average. I am not sure what I should do now to improve my application with update letters, letters of support from alumni, and letters of support from potential employers. I would attend CBS if admitted.

Can you, essaysnark, or anyone else give advice that might help?

Thank you essaysnark and phoebemba for your candid feedback. I will definitely proactively follow up with CBS and do whatever I can to get my foot in the door!

And for the next time for other schools, I think I will opt for an admissions committee member interviewer rather than an alumni. I thought both were equivalent in terms of evaluation, but apparently not.

What is a normal wait time between receiving Interview Complete status and receiving a final decision?

sanderson wrote:What is a normal wait time between receiving Interview Complete status and receiving a final decision?

Hi sanderson - perhaps you've already gotten your answer from Columbia by now, but generally a response comes within two weeks or so. The waiting period varies based on where they're at in the cycle and with holidays however. This year, many accepted candidates are getting phone calls from the admissions committee/director (if you're accepted the wait time is often shorter; those getting offered a deferred decision seem to be waiting the longest after the interview). These are just anecdotal patterns based on our experience with many clients, not official guidelines from the school or anything.

Let us know when you get an answer!

Hi essaysnark, I'm on that d list with gkumar so I know that feeling. I understand that at this point, while there are a few things we can do, the whole idea of being deferred is so that the school can assess how we fit into a broader application pool.

I am curious though, based on your understandibly small selection sample of clients who have been deferred, would you say there is like a 50/50 chance of making it in? Since it's not really a waitlist that is contingent on others accepting admission, would you say our chances are better than one would expect on a traditional waitlist? Also, all else being equal amongst applicants, would we be at an advantage given that we applied ED and thus have made it known that cbs is our first choice?

sorry if this soungs neurotic, haha...but there doesn't seem to be much info around on this and just wanted to know if you had any more info on this.

thx

Hi everyone,

I've applied to Columbia in ED (Oct. 6th) and received an invitation to interview approximately a month later (Nov. 3rd). I recently received my call welcoming me to the Columbia Business School community on Dec. 8th.

Funny story was that I was driving through the rural areas of PA and I couldn't get a good ATT signal. The first time I answered the call, I couldn't hear the admission officer. She called again five more times but after the third time, I thought it was a prank call so I just sent her directly to voicemail. When I got to an area where I could check my voicemail and email, I saw a note from Columbia saying please call her back. When I did, she finally welcomed me into the school and asked if I had any questions. I'm actually glad I couldn't answer the phone at the time because I might have crashed the car while hearing the good news!

My stats:

28 years old
740 GMAT
3.5 GPA from highly ranked public university
Information Science B.S., graduated honors and distinction
6 years WE at pharmaceutical industry, technology and project management
1.5 years WE at healthcare social enterprise
Target industry and function: healthcare entrepreneur

I interviewed in NYC with a marketing director alumna who spoke highly of Columbia. I arrived 30 minutes early to the interview and rehearsed my reasons why Columbia and why MBA now. I was surprised at how conversational the interview turned out to be and while I prepped for the questions on "What other schools did I apply to and why", she never asked me that question. I felt during the interview, she was mostly selling the great points of Columbia including lifeline ability to audit a class for free and her own entrepreneurial experiences.

At this point, I'm waiting for a few other schools to return results but I'm very excited to have gotten in at Columbia!

I'm more than happy to talk offline to anyone about my strategies and experiences throughout this process. Good luck everyone!

Chriskun

msbroker wrote:Hi essaysnark, I'm on that d list with gkumar so I know that feeling. I understand that at this point, while there are a few things we can do, the whole idea of being deferred is so that the school can assess how we fit into a broader application pool.

I am curious though, based on your understandibly small selection sample of clients who have been deferred, would you say there is like a 50/50 chance of making it in? Since it's not really a waitlist that is contingent on others accepting admission, would you say our chances are better than one would expect on a traditional waitlist? Also, all else being equal amongst applicants, would we be at an advantage given that we applied ED and thus have made it known that cbs is our first choice?

sorry if this soungs neurotic, haha...but there doesn't seem to be much info around on this and just wanted to know if you had any more info on this.

thx

Hi msbroker,

EssaySnark has very little info to offer you here. Here's our current thinking:

Columbia seems to be using the "deferred decision" process a lot more liberally this year than they ever have before; some applicants who we would've expected to get an offer after the interview were instead placed in this limbo. So it really does feel just like a waitlist to us (we think they use the terms "deferred decision" for ED applicants and "waitlist" for regular-cycle applicants partly to keep the two candidate pools straight, and also because the "waitlist" could extend on nearly indefinitely, and they're promising an answer to the DD folks by a specific date).

It's really impossible to ascribe any odds on how this will play out for DD candidates. We do think that a DD candidate now is at a big advantage over what a regular-cycle waitlisted person would be (say, in the spring), simply because there still are a lot of spots open right now, and the adcom is expressing interest in you -- some schools put even marginal candidates on a waitlist, whereas those who're going onto the CBS D-list do seem to be quite strong. So we do feel there's hope, perhaps more so than if you were on a "regular" waitlist at CBS or elsewhere.

But we have no idea if you're at an advantage over a regular-cycle candidate with a similar profile just because you applied ED. We hope they would take that into account! We just have no visibility into the inner workings, and so we can't say. Very few schools release statistics about their waitlist process and this DD thing at Columbia is even murkier than elsewhere.

So, a 50/50 chance? Perhaps; perhaps not. There seem to be an awful lot of DD candidates out there, and it also seems that app volume at Columbia may be up this year, both of which would obviously be negative factors.

Keep us posted, msbroker, and any other D-listers, we're definitely interested to know the outcome!

chriskun wrote:Hi everyone,

I've applied to Columbia in ED (Oct. 6th) and received an invitation to interview approximately a month later (Nov. 3rd). I recently received my call welcoming me to the Columbia Business School community on Dec. 8th.

Funny story was that I was driving through the rural areas of PA and I couldn't get a good ATT signal. The first time I answered the call, I couldn't hear the admission officer. She called again five more times but after the third time, I thought it was a prank call so I just sent her directly to voicemail. When I got to an area where I could check my voicemail and email, I saw a note from Columbia saying please call her back. When I did, she finally welcomed me into the school and asked if I had any questions. I'm actually glad I couldn't answer the phone at the time because I might have crashed the car while hearing the good news!

My stats:

28 years old
740 GMAT
3.5 GPA from highly ranked public university
Information Science B.S., graduated honors and distinction
6 years WE at pharmaceutical industry, technology and project management
1.5 years WE at healthcare social enterprise
Target industry and function: healthcare entrepreneur

I interviewed in NYC with a marketing director alumna who spoke highly of Columbia. I arrived 30 minutes early to the interview and rehearsed my reasons why Columbia and why MBA now. I was surprised at how conversational the interview turned out to be and while I prepped for the questions on "What other schools did I apply to and why", she never asked me that question. I felt during the interview, she was mostly selling the great points of Columbia including lifeline ability to audit a class for free and her own entrepreneurial experiences.

At this point, I'm waiting for a few other schools to return results but I'm very excited to have gotten in at Columbia!

I'm more than happy to talk offline to anyone about my strategies and experiences throughout this process. Good luck everyone!

Chriskun

Congratulations Chriskun! Hopefully msbroker and I can get off the d-list soon, and join you.

@essaysnark, thanks for the quick thoughts. Do you have any thoughts on how we can improve "employability"? We can enhance our profile with better GMAT, additional courses for low GPAs, and additional letters of recommendations for better support, but how do we enhance "employability" - chances of landing a desired job upon graduation?

I´m also on the waitlist. I applied ED, got interviewed 1st wk Nov and recieved the waitlist email 1 wk Dec...

Applied on Dec. 31st. Application went under review on January 10th. Any idea on how long most people wait to recieve an interview invitation?

Profile:
25 Yrs. Old
710 GMAT
3.5 GPA U of Mich, Economics
4 years Financial services Merrill + JPMorgan