Breaking Down Columbia Business School's 2012-2013 Admissions Essays - Short Answer Question and Essays.

1. Breaking Down Columbia Business School’s
2012-2013 Admissions Essays
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2. Breaking Down Columbia Business School’s
2012-2013 Admissions Essays
Guide for Columbia Business School’s
2012-2013 Admissions Essays
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3. Breaking Down Columbia Business School’s
2012-2013 Admissions Essays
So what does this mean for you, the applicant?
As I noted with last year’s (2011-2012) release of new
essay questions – “whenever a school releases new
essays questions, it serves as a sort of referendum on
the strategy of the prior year.”
With essays that remain fairly intact, I can confidently
say we have the school (and its essays) dialed in.
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4. Short Answer Question
2011 - 2012: What is your post-MBA professional
goal? (Maximum 200 characters.)
2012 - 2013: What is your immediate post-MBA
professional goal? (200 characters maximum)
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5. Our analysis remains the same as last year.
We added the underline to “characters” for emphasis,
because we can only imagine how many people will
write 200-word responses to this question. The only
small change is that Columbia specifically called out
“immediate” goals.
We imagine that more than a few applicants failed to
heed the specific examples that Columbia provides;
taking liberty and stating goals that are so broad, no
career center representative can comprehend passing
onto a potential recruiter.
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6. What Columbia wants you to do here is twofold:
2.give them a specific thesis for your candidacy, and
3.focus on your short-term goals.
These are two aspects of applying to Columbia that we have
hammered for the past year. Some schools favor a broad vision for
your career ... Columbia wants to know what you plan to do when
you graduate. If you were a client of ours last year or even just had
a consultation call, you will know that we have been espousing the
viewpoint that Columbia cares most about professional potential -
we've been saying it until we are blue in the face, really. The fact
that they have pulled this little exercise out of the series of essays
and forced you to put it in lights underlines, highlights, and italicizes
how important it is to have a short-term goal that "checks out."
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7. Again, the good folks on the Columbia admissions
committee even give you a template. So no one should
screw this up. This essay is all about following orders -
being realistic, tactical and pithy.
“After my MBA I want to build my expertise in the energy sector and
learn more about strategy and decision making by joining a
consulting firm specializing in renewable energy and power
companies.”
“After my MBA I hope to work in business development for a media
company that is expanding its market share in Asia.”
“My short term goal is to work with an investment firm that utilizes
public private partnerships to invest in community development
projects.”
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8. Essay One - A and B
2011 - 2012:
Considering your post-MBA and long term professional
goals, why are you pursuing an MBA at this point in
your career?
Additionally, why is Columbia Business School a good
fit for you? (Maximum of 750 words).
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9. 2012 - 2013:
A. Why are you pursuing an MBA at this point in your career,
and how do you plan to achieve your immediate and long term
post-MBA professional goals? (Maximum 500 words)
B. Please view this video, entitled Community at Columbia.
Diverse, tight-knit clusters and carefully selected learning
teams are defining features of the first year at Columbia
Business School. Along with more than
100 student organizations and countless events each
semester, the cluster system helps to create a supportive and
devoted lifelong community. Describe why you are
interested in becoming a part of the Columbia
community. (Maximum 250 words)
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10. For Essay #1, this is basically the same as last year. The
only notable exception is that Columbia broke the essay
out into sections A and B. Other than that, it's the same
essay.
Now keep in mind, just because you bumped out your
thesis to the short answer field doesn't mean you are off
the hook in defining your goals again here. Indeed, you
probably won't have properly defined your path in that
short answer, so you really have to immediately pretend
the Short Answer question above doesn't exist.
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11. Your Essay 1A will need to feature What, Why, How,
When, and Where - the purists' career goals essay.
And, as with last year, we will be putting an emphasis on
Columbia's unique desire to see an alternate career path
presented, as well as really stress testing the ‘how’ or
Proof Paragraph, to make sure that transferable skills are
on display - that you leave no doubt at all that you can
land that post-MBA job.
As in years past, Essay #1 will be the make-or-break
Columbia essay. If you can't define realistic goals based
on your background, and have those goals apply to what
Columbia can help you achieve – don’t even bother
applying to Columbia.
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12. Essay 1B now breaks out the specific “why Columbia”
aspect of the essay.
We would guess applicants paid too much or too little
attention to this section. Either way, Columbia seeks to
get rid of the variability by clearly defining 250 words here.
Also, pay freaking attention - the fact that Columbia
breaks off this essay prompt and specifically calls out why
you are interested is because they want to know that if
they accept you, you will matriculate.
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13. Essay 2
2011 - 2012: Describe a life experience that has
shaped you. The goal of this essay is to get a sense
of who you are, rather than what you have achieved
professionally. (Maximum of 500 words.)
2012 - 2013: Describe a personal experience and
how it has influenced who you are today. This essay
should have a personal rather than a professional
focus. (Maximum 500 words)
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14. This essay remained unchanged.
Again, we feel validated in our approach that we have
put forth for the last 2 years, which was to stress one
experience or interest and build a theme around it,
rather than just rattle off your resume.
Columbia has further zeroed us all in by asking for a
“life experience,” but the big takeaway here is that they
want a story, not a list. Furthermore, it should be fairly
obvious, but this should from your personal life and not
from work.
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15. In Conclusion
In all, it is great to see that Columbia is continuing to keep it real - real
clear and concise.
In fact, everything about the Columbia application brings clarity to the
experience. Instead of reinventing the wheel for 2012-2013 (compare
this with HBS's revised application essays), they are dialing it in.
Columbia knows what they want - applicants who can get jobs, and
are committed to strengthening the school's community (NYC offers
students a lot of distractions.) If you can think like a recruiter, you're a
step ahead of most applicants and in line with Columbia's admissions
committee. This means that the application is straight forward, but it
also means that there is less room for error as mistakes are likely to
be punished even more severely than year's past, when Columbia
already loomed large as a program that had expectations for “good”
essays and was fairly tough on those candidates who failed in that
regard.
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16. If you are just starting out on your admissions journey, email us at
mba@amerasiaconsulting.com to request a free consultation.
Additionally, you can download our free guides for applying
to HBS, INSEAD and Columbia.
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