Italian candidate profile evaluation (please)?

[jjenrico]

Hi Clearadmit.com,

my name is Enrico, I'm italian and I plan to apply to a MBA in the US next year.

I hold a Bachelor's degree from a top 20% italian university with a gpa equivalent to 4.0 and a final mark of 110/100 cum laude in history.
I also have a MA in Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology at the University of Turin (top 5% in italy) with a gpa of 3.49/3.58 (according to WES) and a final mark of 108/110.
I've spent 1 year as exchange student in Helsinki (Finland) and I've studied at U. Missouri - Kansas City for a summer semester, where I took an advanced english class.
I didn't take many quantitative classes as you can imagine: microeconomics and development econ. were the only ones.

I've been working for 1,5 years as Quality, Safety and Environment Management Assistant Manager at a service company (logistics, facility management, cleaning service) here in Italy (COSEVA, 350 employees). I've been promoted once, and I report to the vice-president of the company (my boss). I would have 2y 8m work exp. upon matriculation.
Prior to that, when still in high school, I worked for 4-5 months for a book editor as associate data miner.

Extra-cv:

I've volunteered in Romania and the Gambia (two weeks each).
I've founded and I'm the president of the first alumni chapter of my university in my province.
I've acted as consultant for the NGO I volunteered with in the Gambia (helping them to find ways to get equipment they needed) and I'm looking for similar involvement at my local church.
I speak italian, english and spanish fluently. I speak a decent finnish (I hold a national certificate from Finalnd stating that I passed level 3 out of 6, intermediate level) and I've studied chinese for a couple of years.
I've also a small entrepreneurial activity in my resume, where I used to buy and resell dvds through internet, local magazines, etc. It was very informal and I haven't any track record of it (not even tax, because of certain provisions in Italy). So I plan to list it as activity and not work experience, but I believe that this entrepreneurial exp. is good to have (I grosse dabout 50000 EUR in 2 years).

I've travelled a lot and visited 31 countries so far.

My TOEFL is 109 iBT. My GMAT is 680 (Q43, 70%, V40, 89%).
I plan to take the gmat again this march. I know that I have to improve especially the Q part, so I've hired a private tutor to try to reach at least the 75% in Q and possibly the 80%!

I also plan to take calculus before applying next fall (I plan to apply for the class of 2012).

Career goals: working in strategy consulting, possibly in a big firm (accenture, deloitte, mckinsey, Pricewaterhouse, Capgemini, Bain, BCG, etc) and internationally (if possible). I'm married to a US citizen, I'll start the program with a green card in hand, but we do not rule out to move out of the US after a while...

Assuming that I score at least 700 on the gmat, are these schools ok to consider (in order of my preference)?

1. Northwestern
2. Duke
3. Cornell
4. Virginia
5. UCLA
6. CMU
7. UNC
8. Texas-Austin

Are these school a good mix of stretch (Kellogg), Reach (UCLA), feasible schools (Duke, Cornell, Virginia, CMU) and good shots (UNC, Texas)?
I'm considering Emory and Vanderbilt as well, but I'm not convinced about those schools and their ability to bring me there where I wanna be...

What do you think?

P.S.
- The list is set as I'm going to visit these schools soon. I would like to know whether, in your opinion, I've chosen wisely or not (for my stats and my career goals).

- Also, should I not improve my GMAT, I'd plan to apply to Virginia, Duke, UNC, Texas, Cornell. Make sense?

Thanks!!

[jjenrico]

I'm also considering Georgetown as safety school.
Among Georgetown, Vanderbilt and Emory, considering I would like a career in consulting (possibly at a big firm) and possibly with a lot of travel, which of the three would you recommend?

thanks!

[Eliot]

jjenrico,

Thanks for your post. You clearly have a strong academic background - you received near perfect grades in both college and graduate school. However you need to address your quant abilities. To rectify this, i strongly encourage you to take 2 of the following 3 classes - calculus, statistics and accounting. I also suggest that you retake your GMAT so that you can improve your quant score (ideally it should be above 80%). If you take these steps, you will have a very strong academic profile for top business schools.

You have listed a nice range of schools, and you should be competitive at all of them assuming that you address your academics. Keep in mind that the strategy consulting firms tend to focus their recruiting efforts on the top 10 schools. Thus, if your heart is set on strategy consulting, then you should mainly focus on top schools such as Wharton, Chicago, Kellogg, Tuck, Columbia, etc. In contrast, it will be hard to get a job from a top strategy firm if you attend Georgetown, Vanderbilt or Emory.

Sincerely,

Eliot Ingram
Clear Admit LLC