Did you know that you can attend the first session of any of our online or in-person GMAT courses absolutely free? We’re not kidding! Check out our upcoming courses here.

It’s the time of year when enterprising business school hopefuls are getting a head-start on their GMAT studies. It can take quite a bit of time to get a good score on the GMAT so, if you can, get the test out of the way well before you have to start in on your applications.

In the first part of this 2-part series, we’ll discuss the benefits and drawbacks of the three primary study approaches: self-study, GMAT class, and private tutoring. In the second part, we’ll examine how to choose the best program and instructor for you (if you decide to take a GMAT class or work with a tutor). Read more

Did you know that you can attend the first session of any of our online or in-person GMAT courses absolutely free? We’re not kidding! Check out our upcoming courses here.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about making the most of your ear as a native English speaker. Here’s the short version: you already know, intuitively, a lot of the grammar that GMAT Sentence Correction tests. But the GMAT takes simple grammar errors and buries them in long, boring sentences with lots of extraneous detail. To outsmart the GMAT, simplify and visualize the sentence in your head as you read it. This will help your ear to do what it does best.

Now let’s talk about when and why to use your ear. It’s okay to use your ear on GMAT Sentence Correction… under two conditions. Read more

What have you been told about applying to business school? With the advent of chat rooms, blogs, and forums, armchair “experts” often unintentionally propagate MBA admissions myths, which can linger and undermine an applicant’s confidence. Some applicants are led to believe that schools want a specific “type” of candidate and expect certain GMAT scores and GPAs, for example. Others are led to believe that they need to know alumni from their target schools and/or get a letter of reference from the CEO of their firm in order to get in. In this series, mbaMission debunks these and other myths and strives to take the anxiety out of the admissions process.

“I was the first in my class to be promoted at McKinsey. I have a 710 GMAT score and completed Level 1 of the CFA exam, but I had a B- in calculus during my freshman year. Will that grade ruin my chances for admission?”

“My company has been under a hiring and promotion freeze for the past three years, but during that time, I have earned pay increases and survived successive rounds of layoffs. Will the admissions committee accept someone who has not been promoted?”

“I have been promoted, but my company changed names. Will the admissions committee think I am going somewhere at a sketchy company?” Read more

How can you write essays that grab the attention of MBA admissions committees? With this thorough Berkeley Haas essay analysis, our friends at mbaMission help you conceptualize your essay ideas and understand how to execute, so that your experiences truly stand out.

One look at the first application essay question for the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley this year may make applicants think the program has finally embraced the less-is-more movement in essays that so many other top schools have been joining lately. And to be fair, the total number of words allowed for Berkeley Haas’s essays this season has gone down, but not by all that much—dropping from 1,000 to 806—so candidates still have a comparatively good amount of space in which to present a well-rounded impression of themselves to the school. Although the prompts have changed in wording, the kind of information the school wants to elicit seems largely the same. As always, you want your essays as a whole to encompass a range of stories and qualities that complement each other so as to provide an accurate representation of who you are today, the student you expect to be in business school, and the professional you will be for the rest of your career. What follows is our full Berkeley Haas essay analysis, featuring their updated essay questions… Read more