Admissions Success Stories

I feel happy that I still have a chance, disappointed that they didn't think I was good enough to accept immediately and frustrated because now I have to do all the things people do to move from waitlist to accepted. Had I just been dinged directly at least I would have known where I stood. I'm in purgatory now......

This whole waitlist thing has been spinning around in my head all day. The good news is that since I returned from Paris back to the US, I have had a change in my role(s) and have been involved in many more activities with more responsibility. That gives me something to talk about - what I need is to add "new" information that reveals more about me and my leadership qualities. It's not going to be enough to simply reiterate the same information from before - if that info wasn't good enough for a direct admit it won't be enough to get out of the waitlist.

I suspect that with R3 coming to a close and R2 under review, there will be many more applicants to compete against. R1 ended beginning of November and that was just as the financial crisis was reaching it's peak - there was no way for the wave of laid off people to take the GMAT and submit their apps before the end of the round. But now...

Thanks for posting this pseudo-blog, Mayo. It's comforting to hear all this from someone else going through this entire nerve-wracking process!

Hi Mayo,
Congratulation on your admit to UCLA. I recently took GMAT. Got 720. I am in the process of writing application essays. Have you taken any consultants help in writing essays. I am having very tough time writing essays. Please suggest me.

manikiran wrote:Hi Mayo,
Congratulation on your admit to UCLA. I recently took GMAT. Got 720. I am in the process of writing application essays. Have you taken any consultants help in writing essays. I am having very tough time writing essays. Please suggest me.

There are many books available that discuss how to write good stories and how to market yourself to the adcoms, but if you are really struggling then you may want to re-evaluate your reasons for an MBA. Why an MBA?

Look at your life, your struggles, your accomplishments, your passions and look for the underlying themes and currents then bring those elements to life on paper. In my essays, I talked about how my main passion is learning - expatriating to France for 2 years without family was an opportunity to learn to discover. Others may perceive it as risky or scary or whatever, but in my mind it was about learning and experiencing something new.

So how about you? Why have you made the decisions you have made so far?

mayonnai5e wrote:I feel happy that I still have a chance, disappointed that they didn't think I was good enough to accept immediately and frustrated because now I have to do all the things people do to move from waitlist to accepted. Had I just been dinged directly at least I would have known where I stood. I'm in purgatory now......

Mayo don't be like that :)

Being waitlisted means that they ARE impressed with you and weren't ready to let you go. This is a great thing. After all they ding plenty of worthy candidates and you weren't one of them coz they weren't ready to reject you. This is a good thing, not bad:)

I guess in your position you could view this as glass half empty/half full, but be sure that yours is half full or even MORE. Good luck!, and a couple of years from now when you are finishing your Haas MBA you won't even remember that at some point in your application you were waitlisted.

Zipper, love your words and encouragement - thanks!

Scheduled my interview with Haas for February 11th. I'm going to sit in on a class visit on the 10th also; the idea is that I'll be able to talk about the visit during the interview and show my interest as well as get a better feel for the campus, class and students.

Flying up to SF tonight. Class visit tomorrow. Interview Wednesday. Wish me luck!

Just got back from my interview with Haas. 45 minutes long with a 10 minute introduction about herself. Topics discussed:

* Walk me through your resume
* Why an MBA?
* Why Haas?
* Tell me about a time when you had to negotiate or work with someone and didn't get your way - how did you handle that?
* How do you receive constructive criticism? Give me an example of some constructive criticism that you've received from your manager recently.
* What do you do for fun outside of work?
* What do you bring to the classroom?
* What is your leadership style?

The conversation flowed very naturally in an informal structure - it was laid back. I felt that there were certain points that I didn't get across 100% because I'd go into a particular point then she'd engage me and take it in a different direction. Hopefully, she took it in a different direction because she felt she understood what I was trying to get across and wanted to move on and not because I was rambling and she didn't want to hear it anymore.

Overall, my impression is that the interview went well. Now I just have to pray she felt the same.

Best of luck! getting to an interview stage is a win in itself!
I hope you will get to your dream school

all the best, ... was waiting for this post....
In Marathi we call this situation bhijat ghongada the waiting period with no result in hand.... :roll:

Goodluck Mayo, I am pretty confident that you'll make it.

Good luck getting into Haas Mayo.

- pradeep

Thanks everyone for the best wishes. In the Haas waitlist, you are offered the opportunity to submit two new recommendations. My two new recs were submitted a few days ago; one was from the software technical director from my program, the other from none other than Eric, founder of BeatTheGMAT.com.

Thanks Eric!