At the end of the tunnel..

So in the end my brain could not persuade my heart to apply for NUS/Judge/CMU Tepper. So that says it all. This is prolly going to be the end of road for my Bschool plan this year.

My Haas application is under review right now. Yesterday the admission staff had informed me that they haven’t received my TOEFL score which came as a surprise to me. I promptly wrote back and forwarded my order summary from TOEFL.org. Thankfully, today I got a mail that they were able to locate my score and my application is now ready for review. Glitches of these kind happen everywhere I am forced to guess now.

Anyway I am not hopeful about Haas after my rather negative results. Though I do think that there is a cultural fit for me at Haas and I hope they see it too.

So in the end, it does look I am standing at the end of the tunnel. I have to start on my plan B. After making one that is.

Tuck rejected itself…

Okay, so the headline seems like a case of sour grapes. But it feels demoralizing to say “I have been dinged”. And thats happening too often off late.

Though, this one wasn’t a surprise. Interview calls for EA rounds had started trickling out from Hanover in Oct last week. And by Dec, even R1 applicants started finishing their interviews. Though some people have reported waitlist status today, which in my view was the best possible result they could have today.

With this, and almost no hopes from Haas, which is my last “alive” application, I come to the dead end today. I can’t make up my mind for Judge/NUS somehow. Though my brain says I should apply to Judge, as its a free application and I have already submitted my TOEFL to them. But my heart refuses to give me a adrenalin rush to get started with the application.

Damn.

Haas R2 submitted!

I submitted by application for UC Berkeley for their R2 deadline a few days ago. Didn’t find time to post this bit of info here. Work has been hectic.

I got very less time to go through the essays and the application before I turned them in. Blame it on my system bug – procrastination. Not sure if I could have improved them more.

Haas is the most difficult school to get into after Stanford, according to the acceptance rates- adammarkus
Hence, I am not counting much on this school. Specially after a few of my recent results, my confidence was low. In fact, the thought of passing on Haas this year came to my mind. But in the end, I went ahead as Haas has been my dream school and I absolutely wanted to apply at it.

Fingers crossed a bit. Haas adcom please find some reasons to get interested in me, reasons which ISB/LBS/Tuck didn’t manage to find!

TOEFL.org brings good news!

I got my TOEFL score today! I was expecting that they mail people people when the scores are ready, but it seems like they don’t. As today “15 biz days” time limit expired, I went to the official site, logged in and found my score under a gift wrap right there waiting for me.

I got a decent 112! Was relieved when I saw this figure. As I wrote earlier, I won’t have been surprised to see a score around 100. So in the end, it seems I did well in the exam. Here is the break up(out of 30 in each section) I got:

Reading: 30
Listening: 30
Speaking: 23
Writing: 29

So I lost 7 out of 8 total lost marks in the speaking section. Hmm. But as I said in my last post, one needs to practice hard for this task in order to score well. And my preparation was superficial at best, hence not complaining.

I am happy with my writing section performance for sure. On the GMAT I had got 5/6 which is not great(measly 60 percentile). But here 29 looks decent. Seems like writing rubbish on blog sites and frenzied application essay writing are getting counted.

CAT-2002 then. CAT-2008 now. I have grown old, sigh..

I never knew I would be writing this. My “better half in waiting”, who had bought a CAT form for me in a bid to get me tied up in India for next year too. She had sensed from my thoughts that I would fall for a better school and would not think much before taking up some Bschool in US. And hence the CAT form so that I get some more Indian Bschool options.

I had decided against sitting for the test after I got into this world of GMAT and top Bschools such as Tuck, Haas, LBS and ISB. I knew I won’t be able to study for the exam and CAT is the last exam on earth to treat you with respect if you are without a good preparation. I had, and still have, doubts about my “fit” to IIMs now as I would have close to 6 years experience by july 2009. Yes, I have grown old…

Anyway, I didn’t get any chance to study for CAT at all during this year and was in two minds till the night of 15th Nov whether to go to the exam center to flex some muscles of my brain or sit at home and focus on my Haas application and upcoming TOEFL exam. In the end, I chose the former option and went to the center, and spent 2.5 hours attempting paper in a totally relaxed manner(just the way I am writing this post right now!).

In the end, I think I did not do a bad job in the test. I was not sharp and fast as I used to be long ago but still managed okay. The result will be declared in first week of Jan. I hope I don’t find myself waiting for it as anxiously as I used to at one time- something which will happen only if I get at least one admit by then. ISB you listening?

ISB final decision tomorrow.. Time to act brave, yet again?

So the day has come. 20th Nov. Final decision for R1 applicants of ISB.

Last year they had announced results 2 days earlier than the declared deadline. No such surprise this time, though I think it made life tougher for a lot of applicants who have been having sleepless nights for last 2-3 days, getting alarmed at each incoming message tone and each new mail pop ups…

Have you heard of “Doc update theory” for ISB admits and rejects? No? Let me shed some light. After you receive interview call from ISB, you are asked to email them your Xth and XIIth marksheets, etc. The ISB admission staff, in due course opens your mail and uploads these documents against your application and it shows up in your application checklist in the application portal. Now the theory says- if your docs are shown uploaded, it signals an admit as ISB adcom won’t bother about this rather tiresome process for around 800 people who are going to be “let go of” for this year. Makes sense? I bet it does if you don’t hear of cases where people got the docs updated before even the interview! Also, the adcom and a current student(Simz@pagalguy, Sameer in real life) have denied this theory emphatically. I don’t believe it in either as I think it is being done on the basis of application numbers.

Whatever it is my docs are not uploaded yet. And it hurts a bit though my application number is pretty much at the back-thanks to my submission of the application on the last day of the deadline for R1.

Whatever it is, we will come to know of the veracity of this theory tomorrow. And how much I hope that I dont find myself reporting a ding tomorrow just like I did for LBS after writing a post similar to this one.

Wish me luck!

I proposed. LBS disposed..

So as I feared in last post, got a ding from LBS at around 11.45 pm on 12th Nov. Yes, LBS managed to keep its word of announcing the shortlist on 12th Nov(though there are a few people who were informed that their result was not ready yet and they would be informed the next day).

Anyway. So what now? Well, this innocent looking 3 word question will need a lot of deep introspection on my part. ISB final result is a week away. If it is favorable, well, it will come as a big relief and will served as a shot in the arm for my bigger application for Haas. If not, I would still app at Haas with all my vigor and would pray for it to open a micro hole in its door through which I could try to squeeze in…

More thinking later. For now, I am trying to focus my attention away from ISB to Haas(9th Dec-R2) and TOEFL(23 Nov, Pune). As I write, these lines came to my mind(GnR):

Her hair reminds me of a warm safe place
Where as a child I’d hide
And pray for the thunder
And the rain
To quietly pass me by

Where is this warm safe place for me?

LBS interview list tomorrow!!

Okay so 20 mins for clock to signal the beginning of D-day for LBS- 12th Nov. However much I have tried to keep my expectations down, I can’t escape from the curiosity of knowing the result. I know in all likelihood, I would be writing a post like “Ok. So a ding from LBS…” here tomorrow but hard to calm down the fast heartbeats still.

Looking back at my application for LBS- I think I did a decent job. I had completed this application along with Tuck application in 10 days flat and hence I really shouldn’t be creating much fuss if I do get a ding tomorrow.

Keeping my fingers crossed for now. Miracles- where are you?

Haas R1 gone. TOEFL, here I come…

So Haas didn’t budge from its requirement of TOEFL for Indian candidates. And with that, I breathed easy. I was out of town on Diwali for family regroup and since was desperate to meet the R1 deadline, was sure of spoiling the festive mood. Wrote to Haas about waiving off TOEFL and here is what they replied:

Dear XXX,

Here are the answers to your questions:

1.  We are not able to waive the TOEFL for applicants educated in India.

2.  You must have completed the test by the deadline for which you apply.  Please see our application directions for additional information on this.  If you complete the TOEFL by November 25, you would be eligible for our second deadline.

This basically translates to:

1. Its R2 for me at Haas. sigh..
2. Need to take TOEFL now, only for Haas perhaps, but can’t help. Haas is one of my dream schools and I am already running out of schools which I would like to attend. I have applied at highly competitive schools this year such as LBS and Tuck and hence to improve my odds of getting lucky, need to have Haas up there too. Had a sneak peek at TOEFL requirements from office and think I should be able to manage it okay in around 15 days. Need to book a test slot in Pune soon as I have heard it takes some 15 days for TOEFL score to come from ETS. Gosh, I don’t want to miss R2 for Haas, which falls in Dec first week for want of TOEFL score again…

Any help for acing TOEFL will be highly appreciated!

Ding from IIMC…

Okay so as my innermost fears have been screaming for so long, its a ding from IIMC PGPEX. Since, I was not running this blog at the time of interview, here is the experience I posted at PG:

” I was interviewed today in Mumbai. No stress questions, no leadership, no quant questions. They asked some random questions but I never got a feeling that they were seriously interested in digging more about me. So they seemed to have taken the decision about me long before I entered the “interrogation room”. And since my app didn’t have something exceedingly attractive, I tend to think the decision was a ding. The interview lasted around 15-20 mins. “

So what now? Boy it surely feels bad to get rejected and shakes your confidence a bit. Anyone who doesn’t admit this, is probably lying. Since I applied at a very few schools in R1 so far(ISB, IIMC, Tuck and LBS), this ding also has made me rethink my career goals. Do I need MBA at this year desperately? Should I apply at a few lower rung schools such as Judge, Said, UCLA, Texas or use this year’s app and interview experience to take a shot at same and better schools next year? My interview with ISB went okay, and it surely feels good to hope of making it to the final list, but looking at the stiff competition in the Indian applicant pool, I better keep it out of my thinking process.

Waiting kills me. And yes, I have already waited enough(had calls from IIMs,FMS, etc around 4-5 years back) for my MBA. So there is a strong sub-conscious force to get past this long cherished dream. But when the sanity returns, I find myself asking – “why a rush now when you already waited this long. Go for the best!”. And that is what I would perhaps do. I have following schools in my list now:

1. Haas(R2)

2. Judge(R2)

3. NUS(R1)

If nothing happens in any of these, I think I would defer my plan to next year. Hope things don’t go that bad though…