Normally I post the deadlines for your convenience. However Stern will post its deadlines later this month. The deadlines from last year that currently appear on Stern's website are unlikely to change, but are still not set.

My comments are in red: Stern's tips are italicized.

Please note the following details when completing the Essays section of the standard online application.

The following essay questions give you the opportunity to more fully present yourself to the Admissions Committee and to provide insight into your experiences, goals and thought processes. Your essays should be written entirely by you. An offer of admission will be withdrawn if you did not write your essays. Please note the following:

• Essays 1, 2 and 4 must be typed and submitted using the standard U.S. 8 1/2” x 11” format, double-spaced, in 12-point font.

• Please adhere to the essay word limits provided for each question.

• Word limits apply to the total question. For example, your response to Essay 1 should answer part (a), part (b) and part (c) with a maximum of 750 words.

• Label the top of each essay with the following: Name, Date of Birth (month, day, year), Essay Number and Page Number (e.g.: Joe Applicant, January 1, 2001, Essay 1, Page 1)

Essay 1. Professional Aspirations

(750 word maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font)

Think about the decisions you have made in your life. Answer the following:

(a) What choices have you made that led you to your current position?

(b) Why pursue an MBA at this point in your life?

(c) What is your career goal upon graduation from NYU Stern? What is your long-term career goal?

This version is almost identical to last year's question, with an added long-term goal question in part c.  Stern wants to know about your career decisions in the past, your reasons for an MBA now, and your plans for the future. A classic goals question, this question asks you to show the logic behind your career development and how an MBA at this point in time will help you achieve your short and long-term goals.

The part of the question asking about your "career goal upon graduation" is a critical one. Are you realistic about where your past experience plus a Stern MBA can take you? Stern doesn't want people in la-la-land who will be impossible to place.

Finally make sure you answer all elements of the question within the word limits (not guidelines). No adcom member sits there and counts words, but the readers can tell when you are significantly over. "Significantly" in my book is more than 10%. Write succinctly.

Admissions Tips:

• Listen to our podcast: Writing your Story.
• Proofread your essays carefully.
• Make sure you have fully answered the essay questions.
• Be genuine in your essays - tell us about the real you.
• Follow the essay instructions, including word limits and font size.

Essay 2. Your Stern Experience

(500 word maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font)

We take great care to shape the Stern community with individuals who possess both intellectual and interpersonal strengths. We seek individuals who are highly intelligent, collaborative, and committed to flourishing as Stern leaders. Please answer the following questions:

(a) What is your personal experience with the Stern community? Tell us what actions you have taken to learn about us.

(b) Describe what most excites you about Stern from both an academic and extracurricular perspective.

(c) How do you anticipate making your mark on the Stern community? Be specific about the roles you will take on and the impact you hope to achieve.

Have you attended MBA fairs? Stern receptions? Have you visited campus, corresponded with or talked to students and recent alumni? Reviewed Stern's web site and printed material? Talked to possible employers? Read blogs of current NYU students? If you take any of those steps, let Stern know what you have done and how that research clarified for you both how you would contribute and how you would benefit by joining the Stern community.

Parts b & c are new, but flow logically from part a. Based on your research, what do you find most attractive? What would motivate you to attend Stern if you have multiple acceptances? And again based on your research, how do you intend to contribute to the rich communal life at Stern. Stern has many avenues for involvement: experienctial learning opportunities, clubs, events, community service. What's your niche?  Show that you have done your homework about Stern.

Admissions Tip:

• To see if Stern is a fit for you, come visit us in New York City.

Essay 3. Personal Expression

Please describe yourself to your MBA classmates. You may use almost any method to convey your message (e.g. words, illustrations). Feel free to be creative.

All submissions become part of NYU Stern’s permanent records and cannot be returned for any reason. Please do not submit anything that must be viewed or played electronically (e.g. CDs, DVDs, MP3s, online links), that is perishable (e.g. food) or that has been worn (e.g. used clothing). If you submit a written essay, it should be 500 words maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font.

If you are not submitting Essay 3 online, you are required to upload a brief description of your submission in your online application. Please note that on the online application checklist, you must select "Submitted Online" for Essay 3 even if you are mailing it.

To submit Essay 3 by mail, please follow the mail and labeling instructions and ensure it is postmarked by the deadline. Also, note that supplemental Essay 3 packages are subject to size restrictions. Essays that exceed the stated size restrictions will not be accepted for review by the Admissions Committee. Please see the table below for the maximum package size guidelines:

Bribes don't work either. Candidates can get very creative with this essay and use different media (other than culinary and electronic), but for the majority of you who will convey your ideas in words, think of how you describe yourself in a social setting, meeting people for the first time. If it's the first day of class or a mixer early in the pre-term, how would you break the ice? Would you try to set up a tennis game or golf match? Would you find someone to explore NYC's museums? Or do you hate museums and prefer the outdoors? What would you say if you were in the campus coffee shop and sat down with some new classmates? Could you create a dialog? A short skit?

Hint: Don't use your four Chicago PPT slides.

Admissions Tip:

• Listen to Isser Gallogly, Executive Director of MBA Admissions, discuss Essay 3 on Public Radio's "Marketplace". (Before listening, note that we now have new Essay 3 size restrictions.)

Essay 4. Additional Information (optional)

Please provide any additional information that you would like to bring to the attention of the Admissions Committee. This may include current or past gaps in employment, further explanation of your undergraduate record or self-reported academic transcript(s), plans to retake the GMAT and/or TOEFL or any other relevant information.

• If you are unable to submit a recommendation from a current supervisor, you must explain your reason in Essay 4.
• If you are a re-applicant from last year, please explain how your candidacy has improved since your last application.
• If you are applying to a dual degree program, please explain your decision to pursue a dual degree.

Obviously if you fit into one of the categories described in the 3 points above, you need to write this essay. If you don't fit into the above categories and have something you want the admissions committee to know that isn't part of the required essays, then you still should write this optional essay.

If you would like help with your NYU Stern MBA application, please consider Accepted.com's MBA essay editing and admissions consulting or a NYU Stern Comprehensive Package, which includes essay editing, interview coaching, consultation, and a resume edit for the NYU Stern MBA application.

deepakpanigrahy / deepakpanigrahy

173 followers · from Bangalore · Software Developer in Oracle

Congratulations on winning your choice of Accepted.com Admissions Ebooks!

We want to thank our Twitter followers. Twice a month, we randomly pick one of our followers as a winner in our Thank You Thursday contest. The Thank You Thursday winner will receive an Accepted ebook of his or her choice. Just our way of saying - "Thanks for Tweeting with us"!

Not on Twitter yet? Join now to stay up to date on the latest admissions news and events and to have a chance to be our next Thank You Thursday winner.

APPLICATION DEADLINES

Round 1 Application Deadline -- October 8, 2009

Decisions Due--December 18, 2009

Round 2 Application Deadline -- January 7, 2010

Decisions Due--April 2, 2010

Round 3 Application Deadline -- March 10, 2010

Decisions Due--May 7, 2010

ESSAY QUESTIONS

SHORT ANSWERS

Please answer each of the four questions below with a short paragraph of no more than 150 words. This is an opportunity to distill your core ideas, values, goals and motivations into a set of snapshots that help tell us who you are, where you are headed, and why. (600 words maximum)

1. What are your professional goals immediately after you receive your MBA?

2. What are your long-term career aspirations?

3. Why are you choosing to pursue an MBA and why now? (If you plan to use your MBA experience to make a significant change in the field or nature of your career, please tell us what you have done to prepare for this transition.)

4. What attracts you specifically to the Yale School of Management’s MBA program?

PERSONAL STATEMENT 1

Describe an accomplishment that exhibits your leadership style. The description should include evidence of your leadership skills, the actions you took, and the impact you had on your organization. (500 words maximum)

PERSONAL STATEMENT 2

Choose one of the following topics and answer it in essay form. Please indicate the topic number at the beginning of your essay. (500 words maximum)

1. A central premise of our teaching about leadership at the Yale School of Management is that true leadership—leadership that helps to address a significant problem in a new way—is necessarily personal. It is only when personal passion aligns with meaningful aspirations that individuals are able to inspire others to act in support of an important goal or cause. What are you most passionate about, and how have you demonstrated a commitment to this passion?

2. What achievement are you most proud of and why?

3. What is the most difficult feedback you have received from another person or the most significant weakness you have perceived in yourself? What steps have you taken to address it and how will business school contribute to this process?

4. Describe a situation in which you devised and implemented a creative or unique solution to a difficult problem. What obstacles did you face and how did you overcome them?

5. Required for reapplicants: What steps have you taken to improve your candidacy since your last application?

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION (OPTIONAL)

If any aspect of your candidacy needs further explanation, please provide any additional information that you would like the Admissions Committee to consider. (250 words maximum)

(1) Timing is critical. The general rule is to complete each secondary application within two weeks of receiving it.

(2) Prioritize Schools. If faced with more secondaries than you can handle – prioritize. Complete the secondaries from the schools you are most interested in attending and/or have the greatest chance of being offered an interview first.

(3) Be Thorough - Do Not Rush. The essays in your secondary application are equally important as your personal essay and in some cases more important. Do not rush through them.

(4) Research Each School. Before starting to write any essays, spend some time reviewing the website, the mission statement and the curriculum of the medical school. (This is something you want to repeat again before interviewing.) Try to incorporate in your essays some of the information you learn so that you stress why you are a good match and what you can offer their school. In essence you want to personalize each essay. Try to reinforce how your past experiences match their mission statement or how your interests match their specialty offerings. Each school has a special focus (such as a unique curriculum, strong research base, a focus on the underserved or primary care). Think about what you have to offer that aligns well with their focus or mission and reinforce that in your essay.

(5) State School Essays. When completing an essay for your state school do stress why you want to go there just as you would any other school. Financial reasons and proximity to home are important reasons but you still want to reinforce why you are a good match for the school.

(6) Share Additional Information. Each secondary application is a place for you to show a little more of yourself. Try to include information in your essay that you may have not been able to incorporate into your AMCAS application.

Again this is the final piece of information that will be considered by admission committees prior to interview offers so put the time in to each and personalize them.

By guest blogger Theresa Davies-Heerema, Ph.D., who has advised many medical and dental school applicants during her career in post-graduate education.

As described in the first and second MBA Math Monday finance exercises, quantitative finance builds incrementally.  Those exercises deal with converting a single amount of money at one point in time into a different single amount at a different time.  This exercise deals with converting multiple cash flows into a single cash flow.  With this step, and the issues that it raises about rates and timeframes, finance supports the efforts of business people everywhere to capture the current value of future financial prospects as well as the efforts of individual and institutional investors to make current investments that will generate future cash flows.

Constant annuities, which are a set of equal periodic payments, are incredibly common, especially in the credit markets.  If you've ever taken out a loan to buy a car or house or finance your education with student loans, you've sold an annuity.  You get money upfront and the lender receives a stream of constant payments from you.  The inability of the world's largest financial institutions to correctly value subprime mortgage annuities was the trigger to the ongoing financial meltdown.

Exercise:

What is the present value of an annuity in which $300 is paid each year for 4 years, assuming a discount rate of 8% and the first payment is received one year from now?

Solution (with audio commentary): click here

Prof. Peter Regan created the self-paced, online MBA Math quantitative skills course and teaches live MBA courses at Dartmouth (Tuck), Duke (Fuqua), and Cornell (Johnson).

Chicago Booth Essay Questions and Slide Presentation

Below are the Essay questions for the Fall 2010 application.The Fall 2010 Chicago Booth application will be available on the Online Application System in mid-July 2009.

Essays

1.How did you choose your most recent job/internship and how did this experience influence your future goals? What about the Chicago Booth MBA makes you feel it is the next best step in your career at this time? (750-1000 words)

1a.FOR REAPPLICANTS ONLY: Upon reflection, how has your thinking regarding your future, Chicago Booth, and/or getting an MBA changed since the time of your last application? (250 words)

2.Please choose one of the following (500 - 750 words):

Describe a time when you wish you could have retracted something you said or did. When did you realize your mistake and how did you handle the situation?

-or-

Describe a time when you were surprised by feedback that you received. What was the feedback and why were you surprised?

Slide Presentation

We have asked for a great deal of information throughout this application and now invite you to tell us about yourself. In four slides or less please answer the following question: What have you not already shared in your application that you would like your future classmates to know about you?

We have set forth the following guidelines for you to consider when creating your presentation.

• The content is completely up to you. There is no right or wrong approach to this essay.
• Feel free to use the software you are most comfortable with. Acceptable formats for upload in the online application system are PowerPoint or PDF.
• There is a strict maximum of 4 slides, though you can provide fewer than 4 if you choose.
• Slides will be printed and added to your file for review, therefore, flash, hyperlinks, embedded videos, music, etc. will not be viewed by the committee. You are limited to text and static images to convey your points. Color may be used.
• Slides will be evaluated on the quality of content and ability to convey your ideas, not on technical expertise or presentation.
• You are welcome to attach a document containing notes if you feel a deeper explanation of your slides is necessary. However the hope is the slide is able to stand alone and convey your ideas clearly. You will not be penalized for adding notes but you should not construct a slide with the intention of using the notes section as a consistent means of explanation.

Optional Essay

If there is any important information that is relevant for your candidacy that you were unable to address elsewhere in the application, please share that information here.

Stern has posted its questions and provides extensive directions and tips to help you respond to them. I am just going to post the basic questions for the moment. For the detailed directions, please visit the Stern website.

This year's questions are very similar to last year's;#2 is somewhat changed. My tips will come later.

Essay 1. Professional Aspirations
(750 word maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font)

Think about the decisions you have made in your life. Answer the following:

(a) What choices have you made that led you to your current position?
(b) Why pursue an MBA at this point in your life?
(c) What is your career goal upon graduation from NYU Stern? What is your long-term career goal?

Essay 2. Your Stern Experience
(500 word maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font)

We take great care to shape the Stern community with individuals who possess both intellectual and interpersonal strengths. We seek individuals who are highly intelligent, collaborative, and committed to flourishing as Stern leaders. Please answer the following questions:

(a) What is your personal experience with the Stern community? Tell us what actions you have taken to learn about us.
(b) Describe what most excites you about Stern from both an academic and extracurricular perspective.
(c) How do you anticipate making your mark on the Stern community? Be specific about the roles you will take on and the impact you hope to achieve.

Essay 3. Personal Expression
Please describe yourself to your MBA classmates. You may use almost any method to convey your message (e.g. words, illustrations). Feel free to be creative.

All submissions become part of NYU Stern’s permanent records and cannot be returned for any reason.Please do not submit anything that must be viewed or played electronically (e.g.CDs,DVDs, MP3s, online links), that is perishable (e.g. food) or that has been worn (e.g. used clothing). If you submit a written essay, it should be 500 words maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font.

Essay 4.Additional Information(optional)
Please provide any additional information that you would like to bring to the attention of the Admissions Committee. This may include current or past gaps in employment, further explanation of your undergraduate record or self-reported academic transcript(s), plans to retake theGMATand/orTOEFL or any other relevant information.

If you are unable to submit a recommendation from a current supervisor, you must explain your reason in Essay 4.

If you are a re-applicant from last year, please explain how your candidacy has improved since your last application.

If you are applying to a dual degree program, please explain your decision to pursue a dual degree.

• In "My first Blog - Who am I" and Why do I want to do an MBA?, The Man Who Thinks He Can explores his reasons for pursuing an MBA. I hope he won't take offense, but he really needs to sharpen his reasons. Detesting his current and previous jobs, as described in the first post, is a terrible reason to apply to business school. The reasons he lists in Why do I want to do an MBA? are at least positive, but they are not specific enough. His post-MBA goal should detail more than "a better network" or the possibility of getting an "enjoyable and well paid job." What kind of job does he want after his MBA? In what industry? Doing what? For most programs, direction and purpose is part of the admissions evaluation. He says that blogging is helping him clarify his thinking, and I hope it continues to do so.
• At the other end of the process sits Stratcase who has been accepted to b-school and offers suggestions to consultants about the MBA admissions process. I strongly agree with this piece of advice: "try to find a speciality." If you are a "consultant," you are just like all the consultants out there. However if you are an environmental consultant, or a health care consultant, or a process improvement consultant, there are fewer of you applying to business school. That modifier distinguishes you and helps you stand out from the crowd. Obviously, your work experience has to substantiate the title, but if it does, use it. For more tips on applying from consulting to business school, please see:
  • The Consultant`s Guide to MBA Admission, an ebook.
  • "Application Advice for Management Consultants."

Source: Why Do I Want an MBA (http://themanwhothinkshecan.blogspot.com/2009/06/why-do-i-want-to-do-mba.html)
Source: Advice for Consultants Who Want an MBA (http://stratcase.wordpress.com/2009/06/20/advise-for-consulting-who-want-an-mba/)
Related: Goals in MBA Admissions: A Must (http://accepted.typepad.com/admissions_almanac/2005/04/goals_in_mba_ad.html)
Related: Applying to Business School in Times of Crisis (http://www.accepted.com/mba/applyingbschoolcrisis.pdf)

Even in more promising economic times, many new Ph.D.s, particularly those in the humanities, experience difficulty landing jobs. “The supply-demand ratio is as bit out of whack” explains Jack Schuster, a professor emeritus at Claremont Graduate University in California and an expert on the academic labor market. In this kind of economy, he adds, “things are very, very tough.”

According to the Modern Language Association, hiring in English and foreign language departments fell more than 20% this year at U.S. universities. Similarly, job postings of the American Political Science Association were down by 14%.

Although teaching abroad offers new opportunities, there are some risks associated with it as well. In addition to limiting networking possibilities, an overseas job could harm academics’ job prospects when they seek to return to the U.S.

“From the U.S. vantage point,” says John Curtis of the American Association of University Professors, “there is that element of difference, newness and uncertainty about how universities operate abroad.”

Source: What Helps New Ph.D.s Land Jobs in Academia? A Passport (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124536653296629273.html)