In Through the Out Door By Al Cotrone, Kris Nebel and Jim Hayes, Office of Admissions and Career Development
As many of you know, last year wecompletely revised our MBA application questions to better reflect ournew school positioning. Diligent effort went into ensuring that the newquestions accurately reflected and attracted the type of student thatcould capitalize on the Michigan experience. However, in the interestof continuous improvement, and to further clarify our expectations, wehave again refined the essay questions for this year's MBA application(we'll be reviewing the BBA application soon as well). We are veryexcited about these recent changes. We will get the first glimpse oftheir impact as we begin reviewing Evening MBA applications this month.
In case you have not taken a look at the PDF of the MBAapplication, which is on our website, we thought it would be worthwhileto let everyone know what the revised questions look like. We alsowanted to address some changes to the Consortium application.
First, the questions:
1. We believethe key to effective leadership is the ability to transform theoreticalconcepts and ideas into action that can change the world. Given thisperspective, please describe your most significant professionalleadership accomplishment. In doing so, please describe how youtransformed an idea into action, the challenges you faced, and theimpact your leadership had on your team or the organization. (500-wordmaximum)
2. Our unique approach to utilizing action-basedlearning and interdisciplinary experiences allows our students todevelop the confidence and skills to build and lead organizations. Inthis environment, Michigan MBAs are active participants in the learningprocess and assume responsibility for co-creating their educationalexperience.
Given this context, please respond to the following two questions:
a. Describe the steps you proactively took to develop professionally and personally over the past two years. (500-word maximum)
b.Describe how you will approach co-creating your Michigan MBA: Whatcareer goals have you set and what objectives will you establish foryour Michigan MBA experience? How will you utilize the opportunities atMichigan to achieve your objectives and create an MBA experience thatis right for you? How will you and your approach benefit other membersof our community? (500-word maximum)
3. Describe a time when your personal ethics or values were a consideration as you resolved a dilemma. (500-word maximum)
Optional Questions
Applicants can answer one, both or neither of these questions.
1.Describe an experience or experiences you have had that highlight thevalue of diversity in a business setting. (500-word maximum)
2. Ifthere is any other information that you believe is important to ourassessment of your candidacy, or important to our understanding of youas a person, feel free to elaborate here. (500-word maximum)
Whew!- are you glad you have already been admitted? As you can see, we haveworked tirelessly to portray our strategic positioning in these essays,and as a result, we feel it will help applicants better understandMichigan, as well as help us better evaluate students. Applicantscannot simply answer the traditional why MBA/why Michigan questionswith something like, "I want an MBA to allow me to go into BrandManagement/I-Banking/Consulting, etc. and Michigan is highly ranked inthat area" - well, actually, that was never really a goodresponse...but nonetheless, you can see we really are looking for morein terms of how students plan to take an active role in creating theirMBA experience (co-creation.) We will also get a sense for howproactive they have been in their past development (action-basedlearning) and learn not only what they want to do post-MBA, but alsowhat their objectives are for their MBA experience.
In pastyears, the Consortium application questions were very similar to ouressay questions, and we also asked Consortium applicants to write anoptional essay/cover letter to speak directly on why they wereinterested in Michigan. When we changed our essay questions last year,we asked all Consortium applicants to answer Essay #2. This year ourEssay #2 has been incorporated into the new Consortium onlineapplication, which makes it clearer to those applicants. Through thatresponse, we really will get a sense for their fit with Michigan, theiralignment with our core strategies, and their plans to co-create theirMichigan MBA. Through the other Consortium essays, we will understandtheir leadership accomplishments, their stance on ethical issues, etc.As we recently discussed with our new Admissions Student Committeemembers during training in September, the evaluation process forConsortium applicants is exactly the same as for non-Consortiumapplicants. If any of you have additional questions on this, please letus know.
Admissions MBA recruiting is underway in full force -since August we have been in Latin America, Asia, Toronto, Boston, LosAngeles, New York, San Francisco, Houston, Atlanta, Chicago, andAustin. One of our staff recently headed off to Western and CentralEurope, and several other trips and receptions are planned through lateNovember. A complete listing of recruiting trips is available online athttp://www.bus.umich.edu/Admissions/Mba/forumsreceptions/default.htm.Also, look for (and offer to assist) prospective students in our midst- in the lounge, in a class, on a tour. We have heard great feedbackfrom the prospective students that were in for Entrepalooza and theWomen in Leadership Conference. Your welcoming attitude helps portraythe community we have here at Michigan. Please offer to share yourexperience with them.
That's it until next time, when we willdiscuss the special challenges that our international students face intheir career searches.
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发表于 2005-2-16 15:07:00
