Carnegie Mellon / Tepper - 03-27-2024

March 27, 2024 12:18am ET

Applying: Carnegie Mellon / Tepper, Cornell / Johnson, Dartmouth / Tuck, Duke / Fuqua, Emory / Goizueta, Michigan / Ross, Northwestern / Kellogg, UCLA Anderson

Intake Year: 2024

Pre-MBA Career: Automotive Engineer

Post-MBA Target Industry: Technology, Consumer Goods, Other

GMAT: 720

GPA: 3.0

Years of Work Experience: 6

Location: Illinois

Notes:

Background:
-American and Middle Eastern dual Citizen
-Lead engineer and project lead in manufacturing and design roles at major car OEM. 3 promotions and youngest in department.
-3.0 MechE degree from T50 university. Hoping to offset the low engineering GPA with a gmat quant, six sigma greenbelt cert, and completed MBA MATH.

Goal:
-Want to leverage the transition to EV in transportation to swap from product development engineering at major OEM to corporate product planning and strategy.

Extracurriculars:
-D&I leadership role & major company wide projects.
-Teach community teen safe driving classes on local track.
-Volunteer in company young professionals organization.

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Show Comments (4) Last: March 28, 2024

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1580 Showing impact and growth at work will be very important. Teaching safe driving looks like a very decent outside of work activity.

Any additional context surrounding the 3.0 GPA? That might be your weaker point, as you’ve identified. What is the breakdown of your GMAT score?

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anon22918 Likes Earned: 0 Appreciate the input. I lost of a friend first semester of undergrad which impacted my mental health. I did not get my house in order until my senior year. I'm not sure discussing that in the optional essays would be a good idea though. GMAT: 50Q, 38V, 8IR. I have gotten higher scores on verbal in the past but an upcoming project cycle is going to spread me too thin to prepare for an attempt at focus on top of school essays/networking/events. (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1580 You could address the loss of your friend, very briefly, in the optional essay? While that’s a great quant score on the GMAT, and doing MBA Math etc helps. You can add that to your brief explanation in the optional essay? (0)

grichmond Verified User. Likes Earned: 1152 There is a lot to like here - from your automotive sector focus (both in terms of work experience, ECs, and future goals) to your dual citizenship. I also think you have a decent range of programs on your list with varying admissions difficulty.

With that said, your GPA is a bit of a red flag and will fall well below the mark at your target schools. While your GMAT quantitative score is very solid (just one raw point shy of a 99th percentile), the verbal definitely has room to run. As a result, the overall score (720) isn't going to jump off the page at anyone - nor will it compensate for the GPA. MBA Math will help a bit, as will a brief explanation of the loss you experienced (which is very much fair to comment on - we're all human).

My thinking is that if you are applying next season (which I'm guessing must be the case at this stage), you should think about a GMAT retake; moving the bar a few ticks on verbal could result in a really stellar overall result.

And finally, have you determined where (geographically) you might want to land post-MBA? Midwest? Somewhere else? That may help you narrow this list a bit.

Best of luck and thanks for your post!
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