UCI Merage MBA Essays & Analysis 2025-2026

The following essay topic analysis examines University of California, Irvine, Paul Merage School of Business (Merage) MBA admissions essays for the 2025-2026 admissions season. You can also review essay topic analyses for other leading MBA programs as well as general Essay Tips to further aid you in developing your admissions essays.

UC Irvine Merage MBA Essays & Analysis 2025-2026

Let’s take a closer look at each prompt.

Essay 1 

Applicants are required to provide a link to a 1 minute (60 second) video addressing the following prompt:

Question: Please introduce yourself to the admission committee, talking about your experience as it relates to your short-term goals.

Most applicants use websites such as YouTube, Vimeo, Dropbox, or Google Drive to upload their video essays. On all these platforms, be sure to mark the video as “Unlisted” rather than “Private”. Unlisted means only people with the link will be able to see it. Just click “Get Shareable Link” in your privacy settings and paste into the FTMBA application. If your video is listed as private, we will not be able to view it and your application processing will be delayed.
First, review our Admissions Tip about video essays. On average, people can speak 150-180 words in 60 seconds.

When you’re ready, begin the video with a greeting with your name. You can then define your short-term goal, identifying your desired role and industry as well as a few target firms. Then, create context for your experiences by highlighting your specific work, academic or personal experience that has prepared you for your goals. This can look like a recent team project or strategic challenge that armed you with the skills you will need to apply in the future. Or, perhaps you have similar industry experience that would be relevant. The important thing is to make connections between your past and future–making sure to be clear about context, as the adcom will not be reviewing your resume/have a guide while watching your video. You may show a practice version to a friend and ask them to summarize their understanding of it to make sure you’ve hit all your major points.

Essay 2

Reflect on a core value that defines you. Share a specific example of how it has guided your decisions and actions and explain how it will shape your contributions and growth as an MBA student. (500 words or less)
Value-based impact essays are popular in MBA admissions, as the adcom can see past behavior and results as a predictor of future success. Per the prompt, you’ll want to focus on one value.

Regarding the sorts of recent examples that you might cover, the wording of this Merage MBA essay question is technically wide open. If you choose to focus on a professional experience, rather than gauging the significance of it solely in dollar amounts or percentages, we encourage applicants to attend to a core value. Whether the challenge was logistical (like stretching yourself to coordinate across internal teams while managing a client’s expectations) or interpersonal (such as developing a good working relationship with an adversarial colleague), effective responses will highlight a transferable skill that was formed or strengthened during this process. The latter also applies to personal examples. Whether from a volunteer experience or academic, ensure you are sharing transferrable skills.

In terms of structural approach to this short answer, you may consider using the STAR technique to structure your story:

• Situation – Set the stage
• Task – Identify the challenges and tasks ahead of the value-related achievement
• Action – Describe the actions you took to complete the achievement
• Result – Summarize the positive impact and how it relates to the select core value

Then, as you conclude with potential contributions, specifically, think about how you can translate your experience and related lessons into involvement on campus. Creating a link between your past and your potential future at the program will enable you to present a consistent and clear picture of your candidacy, as well as your professional and personal interests. The more information you can provide about how exactly you would contribute (playing a certain role in organizing a particular annual event, for example), the more reason you’ll give the adcom to admit you.

Optional Essay

At the Paul Merage School of Business, we are ambitious. We are intellectually hungry. We have a calling to deliver educational excellence valuing diversity, collaboration, inclusivity, and respect. In an effort to better understand the context of your achievements, is there any other information about your background, family or experience that you would like to share with the Admissions Committee? (300 words or less)
This is a chance to tell the adcom who you are, where you come from, and what you care about. It is also a good place to highlight instances of resourcefulness and persistence, especially discussing how far you’ve come, if you were a bootstrapper or first generation in your family to attend college. You can provide insight into your personal and professional maturity and collaborative nature over the course of a narrative. An effective approach might be to describe the initial experience and its broad implications in a few sentences, followed by a brief illustrative example before concluding with a reflection on how the experience has shaped who you are today.

It may also be necessary to use this space to address any weaknesses in your candidacy, such as gaps in employment, academic concerns, etc. In which case, the comments in this essay should be straightforward and fact-focused, offering explanation without making excuses and humbly suggesting other areas of your candidacy that might compensate for identified weaknesses.

Clear Admit Resources

Thanks for reading our analysis of this year’s Irvine / Merage essay topics. As you work on your Irvine / Merage MBA essays and application, we encourage you to consider all of Clear Admit’s Irvine / Merage offerings:

• Irvine / Merage Profile on the Clear Admit website: up-to-date advice and admissions information
• Clear Admit LiveWire: admissions updates submitted in real time by applicants to Irvine / Merage
• Clear Admit DecisionWire: school selections in real-time by admits to Irvine / Merage