Ask Jason@沃顿 (closed)

cannedpineapple

Many people have written 站内信 to me asking me about questions on
application to business school (Wharton and others), on Wharton, and on
business school life in general. So I thought why not start a thread
where you can ask me questions (中英文都行) and everyone can benefit!

This does not represent the official view of the Wharton school. My answers
represent my own thoughts and those of no one else. Having said that,
as co-chair of the Volunteer Admissions Committee I am in frequent
contact with the Wharton adcom, and have met over 100 prospective
applicants looking to apply to Wharton. So I'm quite familiar with the
entire process!

Update:
22页分享本人申请文章
28页分析怎么让自己有差异性
34页纽约时报报道美国大学如何考虑transcript

The thread has now been moved here:
http://forum.chasedream.com/North_American_MBA/thread-429418-1-1.html

Cheers,
Jason

isabelgan

沙发！Jason 是个大好人啊，但是也请大家问问题时稍微客气一点，毕竟他是志愿服务者咯。。。

kenic_hu

sofa

Jason,

Tks for the kindness of sharing!  To start the thread, could you pls share some of your own stories which I believe are of many peoples' interest?  I guess you are famous to some group of people, but applicants like me would like to know more about you

Tks again!

cannedpineapple

Here's an intro to myself I posted on another forum:

Before entering college, I was awarded a full college scholarship to fund my overseas study at The University of Chicago. I also served two years and two months of mandatory service in the Singapore Army, where I led a team of about 6-15 people (depending on the exact time of the year) in a human resource branch. 

At The University of Chicago I kept up a GPA of 3.9. I also scored 770 on the GMAT. I'm fluent in Mandarin Chinese and English, and I speak conversational Thai. In the past three years I've spent four months volunteering in Thailand, three months studying abroad in China, and traveled to Peru, Mexico on holidays. 

From 2005-2007 I interned yearly at the company that offered me the scholarship. In the first year I worked in corporate development, and was worked on tackling the threats to the company business model. The company is a media conglomerate, and prints newspapers and magazines; with the advent of free blogs and online news, our circulation has been plummeting. In the second year I worked at the marketing department approaching people off the streets to sign up for our new online job portal. In the third year I went back to corporate development because helping the company deal with the threats to its circulation excites me and that's my career goal. 

My internships have been great learning experiences. In these three years I've worked closely with many of the company's top executives: the company is investing heavily in me, and has been trying to get me exposed to as much as possible. I've also learned a lot from my fellow colleagues. I've also performed well in them, such that my company has now also agreed to sponsor the first year of my MBA studies. 

Apart from the short and medium term, my volunteering experiences have also clarified my long term goals as a social entrepreneur. In terms of background, my time in the army serving my mandatory service gives me unique experience as a leader trying to motivate my subordinates in an environment (forced labour) that many may not have experienced. 

The first question many people ask me when they find out I'm at Wharton straight after college is, how did you do it? Well, the short answer is, I did it by being very clear about my goals. Even with my limited work experience I know my short and medium term goals (corporate development) long term goals (social entrepreneurship) and I know exactly what I need to get out of the MBA. When schools like Wharton say that it's not 'how many years and how many months' that matter, they're not kidding. Rather, know 'why now, and why MBA', and you'll not have to worry about work experience. 

One other question people typically ask: where did you apply from? From China? From Singapore? etc? The truth is, this doesn't matter. Every individual is unique. We all went to different schools, grew up in different families, worked in different roles, and learnt about different industries. But even categories like that unfairly try to categorise someone into easy groups that they don't belong to. People tend to think that if you apply from China, you're a 'Chinese applicant'; if you apply without work experience, you're a 'college applicant'. The fact is, all of us fall into many of these categories. Why should one be more important than any of the others?

Lastly, here are some of the activities I'm involved in at Wharton: Co-President of Consulting Club; Career VP of Media and Entertainment Club; Co-Founder of Early-Career Club; elected academic board member of MBA Programme Office Advisory Board; Operations/Finance VP of Dance Studio; Membership VP of Asia Club; Panel Director for Consulting Conference; Active member of Volunteer Admissions Committee. I also did or am doing consulting projects with the Wharton Community Consultants, Global Consulting Practicum, and Small Business Development Centre. If anyone is interested in finding out more about these clubs, or other aspects of life at Wharton, feel free to post here!

[此贴子已经被作者于2009-2-22 7:54:59编辑过]

totoyan

Thanks, Jason. You are in so many clubs. Do you have enough time to get all things done? How many clubs does a normal Wharton student intensively involved in? (I mean, statistically)

cannedpineapple

At business school different people have different priorities- some want to focus on clubs; some classes; some social activities; some recruiting. I tend to focus more on clubs. There is certainly enough time to do anything- just sleep less, manage your time well, and you can definitely get your stuff done!

I can say that there are people who are involved in EVEN MORE things than me, although that's very rare. I would say that the average Wharton student is intensively involved in 2-3 clubs, at most.

cannedpineapple

沃顿面试

I thought I'd write something very briefly about the Wharton interview, since it seems many people just got invites.

1) Wharton interviews are blind. 面试官不会看过你的application.所以application的内容不单单可以说，而且还应该说（要不然他无法了解你申请商学院的目的，等）。他们唯一看到的是你面试时候交给他的简历。

2)
The interviews will be about 30 minutes long. Adcom and 2nd year
students on campus are strict on time, although alumni may take longer
depending on themselves.

3) 无论是adcom, 2nd year students,
或者校友给你面试， all interviews are treated exactly the same. The three
options are there just to make it convenient for you to schedule
something. Similarly, don't worry about which alumni to choose- the
recommendation of all alumni, whether just out of school or 10-20 years
out, are treated with the same importance and respect.

4) About
30-40% of applicants are invited to interview, and then about 30-40% of
interviewed applicants are accepted. If you were not interviewed you
cannot be accepted. The interview is just taken as another data-point
in your application. A good interview does not guarantee admission; a
bad interview does not guarantee a Ding. This is as you may expect,
given that it is a blind interview. The idea is that Wharton wants to
know as much about you as possible: the recommendations tell us about
you from a person who's worked with you; your essays tell us about you
from your own perspective; and the interview tells us about you from
the perspective of the first impression of someone who has just met you, but is closely associated with the school.

5)
The interviews tend to be very standard, asking all the basic
questions: walk me through your resume, why MBA, why Wharton, why now.
They also might ask a few behavioural questions (tell me about a time
when you failed... etc). But in general it is not designed to trick
you, so this interview might be your easiest among all your business
school applications!

6) Don't worry about bringing in videos, newspaper clips, etc. You should be able to communicate your achievements verbally.

7) Also don't worry about giving gifts, etc to the interviewer when done. A simple thank you email would suffice.

8) The date of the interview (whether early or late) does not matter. The interview will be conducted
by someone who has never read your file, and will in all likelyhood the report
will be read by someone else who did not interview you. Hence when you
interviewed is not a factor at all.

9) On-campus interviews are conducted by 2nd year
students. Hub interviews are conducted by adcom.

Updated to reflect new interview questions and answers..

[此贴子已经被作者于2009-2-24 7:00:47编辑过]

QDJY78

Jelt, 非常感谢

请问面试完最后的decision只有在decision final那天收到么 还是说之前就可能拿到了

[此贴子已经被作者于2009-2-22 8:49:52编辑过]

cannedpineapple

All decisions are released at the same time, typically on the decision final day. Decisions may be out earlier and so everyone may find out before the final day, but that is extremely rare and I wouldn't count on it.

kenic_hu

Thanks a lot Jason!

I've several more questions would like to ask -

1) How do you define "social entrepreneurship"?

Honestly it's the first time that I hear this word and am interested to know more as it looks like what I would make my career to be..

2) Could you introduce more about the Consulting Club in Wharton?  Who usually are the members - I mean those students from consulting industry or other?  What are the activities this club usually organize?

3)I realize that lacking of community activities would be the weakness in my application package.  What is your suggestion to applicants like me who didn't have the chance (or maybe awareness) to serve the public in the past student life?  Would this be a big disadvantage?

Thank you!