Hella

I have been going at it for a solid 7.5 hours now. I started reading applications that are due tomorrow a little after 1pm today and I’m about 70% done currently. I will probably end up putting the last couple to the side since I still have a midterm to study for this evening. I must say that one application in particular took me about an hour and forty-five minutes to read. I had to familiarize myself with the application a couple times (yes, I read the essays twice; I also skimmed the recommendations again after reading them a first time) and better understand some things about the applicant’s culture. It was a very good reminder that strong applications come in all flavors. Overall, when I really took an objective view, this was a solid application. Incidentally, the applicant chose to use an optional recommender and in this case it really did make sense.

This week I’m noticing many of the same things as last week, notably how little detail some applicants give to explaining why Wharotn is the ideal business school for them. While I don’t enjoy reading laundry lists of keywords that seem to be scraped from the admissions website, it is nice to read about how an applicant specifically plans to get involved while s/he is a student here.

A couple of the applications I have read this week shined in terms of overall presentation. This is where the recommendations, the essays (examples highlighted), career progress-to-date, and extracurricular involvement all seem to weave themselves into a coherent story. It’s great to read recommendations from people with two differing perspectives that also resonate with what’s mentioned in the essays. While it would be bad to coach one’s recommenders to the point to where the essays sound like the recommendations word for word, I hope my point is clear.

Filed under: B-School