Dartmouth / Tuck - 10-20-2021 | Clear Admit ApplyWire

October 19, 2021 9:35pm ET

Applying: Dartmouth / Tuck, Duke / Fuqua, London Business School, Michigan / Ross, Northwestern / Kellogg, UCLA Anderson, USC / Marshall, UT Austin / McCombs

Intake Year: 2022

Pre-MBA Career: Engineering/Operations

Post-MBA Target Industry: Consulting, Consumer Goods Companies: Accenture , Bain , BCG , Deloitte , McKinsey , 3M , Coca Cola , General Mills , Nike , PepsiCo

GMAT: 700

GPA: 3.34

Years of Work Experience: 4.5

Location: Mid-West

Post MBA Location: Not Important to me

Notes:

First off, love the podcast! It's been great insight into the MBA world from someone who isn't surrounded by the culture. Inspiring to hear about the incredible people in the same boat I am.

Studied Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at a top Engineering program in the US. In College I was the treasurer of the club baseball team (played for 4 years) which took up all of my non-school time. After school moved into and operations leadership rotational program at a Fortune 500 company in the automotive/powersports realm. There I was focused on Lean, process development, material flow, and Supplier Quality/Development. I've since moved to a Fortune 100 Medical Device company where I am a Supplier Quality engineer with a focus on quality system upgrades and supplier development. I also have direct reports in my role.

I'm looking to use my MBA to get into either general management or consulting (or a combination of the two), and have an affinity towards consumer goods. I want to take on additional responsibility in both my role in a company and as a leader of people, as I have enjoyed that aspect of my current job.

Targeting a wide array of schools because I frankly don't know where I fall on the spectrum of applicants. Right now Kellogg and Tuck are my 2 favorites, with McCombs and Anderson behind them. Really liked the collaborative focus Tuck and Kellogg had.

Taking the GMAT again, I think I can do better.

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Show Comments (9) Last: November 20, 2021

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1577 Are you applying in Round 2, to these programs? Good you are retaking the GMAT, an increase of 20+ points may have an impact. Love LBS, but does it make sense, if you want to work in the US, post MBA? Try to pick one post MBA path, to center your MBA apps. I’d think Ross and Kellogg would be great targets. Showing impact and progression at work will be key. Are you involved in activities outside of work? (1)

tfontana22 Likes Earned: 28 Hi Alex, thanks for the response. More than likely taking LBS off the list. Family used to be expats in London, and very open to return, but not critical to me. I am applying round 2 to these programs, a bit of a late start to applications, but I feel like this is the time for me to apply. I'm not sure waiting for Round 3, or next year's round 1 make sense to me but open to insight on that. Unfortunately not involved in anything organized outside of work, but am a member of the Young professionals network at work. The extracurriculars are definitely a weakness in my application. (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1577 Round 2 is definitely better than Round 3, and should be fine. With the higher GMAT score, impact and progression at work, you should be good with these target programs. (1)

tfontana22 Likes Earned: 28 Thanks for the feedback, Alex. My main concern at this point is getting my quant score up (46) because my Verbal is great (40). I know I have the math background from 4 college level Calculus/Linear Algebra courses and an A in econ. Does that background help alleviate any concerns adcom might have for a low Quant? (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1577 It can definitely help. But if you push that score up 1-2 points, it will make a difference. (1)

tfontana22 Likes Earned: 28 Perfect, that's my goal then. Really appreciate all of the feedback and guidance! (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1577 More details on this candidacy in this episode of Wire Taps: https://www.clearadmit.com/2021/11/episode-195-wire-taps/ (1)

tfontana22 Likes Earned: 28 Hi Alex, not sure if you'll see this but I wanted to say thank you both for the encouragement on the episode. I retook the test and ended up blowing my practice scores out of the water with a 760 (haven't gotten the official yet, just took it today online). You both mentioned possibly adjusting my targets to a few more M7 schools, I think this score will allow me to be competitive! (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1577 That’s terrific, very well done. Might add Wharton, Sloan, for example? (0)