Ask Stacy Blackman

Hi Stacy,

I am a 27 year old U.S. born male of Pakistani heritage.

Graduated with a BSc in Computer Studies with a cumulative undergraduate GPA of 2.7.

In business related courses I attained a 3.14 GPA. These courses included:

• Business Law
• Microeconomics
• Money & Banking
• Introduction to Business and Organizations
• Principles of Management
• Investments
• Ethics in the Information Age
• Technical Writing

Expecting 680-700 on the upcoming GMAT

I have worked for 2.5 years as a Project Manager for a Mobile Telecomm. Aggregator (Premium SMS Messaging) with 90 employees. Recently attained the position as a Manager for Binary Content/Account Manager. Day to day tasks are 50% Account Mgmt. related and 50% technical. I can obtain excellent recommendations from some of the top U.S. media companies I have worked with as clients. As a PM, I have launched many firsts within the premium SMS industry including being first to market for downloadable content on Tier 1 U.S. carriers. I have also been responsible for an account management strategy dealing with our largest client which resulted in a savings of $2million annually for the client.

I am positioned very well within the company and my goal is to become part of the company’s management team as we grow.

My extracurricular activities include coordinating productive after school activities for at-risk inner city youth with the YMCA. I also volunteer as a coach for youth basketball also with the YMCA.

To offset the low undergrad GPA, I would like to know whether it would be beneficial to take some business related courses at a local community college? These would include:

• Accounting
• Intro to Marketing
• Calculus I
• Macroeconomics

If not @ a local community college, what would be a better option?

At this point in time, my target schools are the following:

1. Georgetown: Part-time
2. UMD-Smith: Part-time
3. Babson: Online program
4. Penn State: Online program
5. George Washington U: Part-time

Would a 700 plus score and the addition of the 4 mentioned classes at a 3.5-4.0 clip bump my chances of getting into a higher tier school? Clearly, I want to attain admission into the highest ranked school possible.

Obviously, I would prefer a part-time or online program with name recognition as I want to continue working. If you think a 700 GMAT and the additional 4 courses would make it worth applying to a higher tier school I would be willing to apply to a nationally ranked full-time program (NY area).

Thanks in advance.

Stacy Blackman wrote:I suggest a Calculus course. Taking 1-2 extra courses at the best school possible, and doing well, plus a 700 would be great. Those details will help, but are only a piece of this process, which is wholistic. Those two things will not make or break you. It is definitely worth applying to a higher ranked program. You can also look at a part time NY based program, such as Columbia (they have a few interesting programs).

Everyone seems to speak of a 'holistic' approach for admissions criteria. Does a particularly deficient portion of an application dramatically decrease one's candidacy?