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For a majority of MBA aspirants around the world, getting into the Wharton School is in some ways an end to the journey in itself. Consistently among the top in all existing international rankings, the School is on top of recall even for skeptics of the ranking system for indisputably combining the best in business education - content, faculty, research and of course, students.
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Yes, there is no cookie-cutter way to ensure admissions into a Wharton program, but it certainly does help to know what the School values. Now for all those who wait with bated breath after having filed their applications in the second round, or plan to apply for admission in 2011 or after, Ankur Kumar, Deputy Director of MBA admissions and a Wharton alumna herself, explains what differentiates a successful candidate for Wharton.
IBTimes: Just as the financial crisis and subsequent recession has brought about an entirely new perspective and focus in terms of what business education should teach, do you feel that there has also been a rethink about what the ideal aspirant for B-school should bring to class?
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Ankur Kumar: At Wharton, we're looking for the best and brightest candidates from around the globe, across different industries, and with an appetite to share their perspectives and learn from one another inside and outside the classroom. That hasn't changed in the wake of the financial crisis.
Every year each of our students brings a set of perspectives to the program and their classmates, which is shaped by their own personal and professional experiences. The recent financial crisis was a huge macroeconomic shift and event, which has undoubtedly impacted and affected all of us - and how we think about the world and business. However, this is not the first 'crisis' or learning opportunity incoming business school students have experienced. There are many other incidences in recent business history - the tech bubble bursting in 2001, the currency crises in Asia and Latin America in the 1990s - which Wharton students and alumni have experienced and leveraged as learning opportunities.
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Given our highly diverse and global student population, we're fortunate to be able to bring students together each year who have experienced different macro and micro events that they can share with their classmates and faculty to help evolve business thinking.
IBTimes: Wharton announced a pretty comprehensive overhaul of key agenda and curriculum recently; do you feel that it will also impact how you assess or evaluate candidates?
Ankur Kumar: We're excited to be launching a new curriculum in the Fall of 2012 for our incoming Class of 2014 in the full time MBA program. Those changes reflect both our entrepreneurial and evolutionary approach to how we think about and teach business. Our curriculum is constantly evolving each year, from new courses and teaching methods to larger scale changes such as this. The changes we're launching include more flexibility, analytical and communication grounding, global and lifelong learning opportunities.
While all of these come together to enhance the delivery of our core Wharton MBA offering to our students, who we are looking for in terms of candidates remains the same; people who come to us because they want a rigorous business education that covers the whole value chain of business skills - from analytical problem solving to communication to leadership and management tools - not just for their immediate steps after school but for a lifetime of personal and professional pursuits.
IBTimes: The Wharton application evaluates a candidate from four angles - academic profile, essays, recommendations and resume. How would you rate these in terms of comparative importance in influencing the final decision?
Ankur Kumar: Our evaluation process is truly holistic in nature and there's not a formula or prescribed weightings on the different dimensions and elements of the application. We ask about and want to understand these different dimensions of our candidates because they are all important and taken into consideration in our evaluation process.
It would be much easier - both for us and for applicants- if we could point to a formula or magic bullet that leads to admission in the program. The truth is that every candidate brings different things to the table and our objective is to use the written application and in interview to understand what those are and assess a candidate's fit with our program and a given class.
IBTimes: Wharton says it does not look at a minimum GMAT score; a high score does not guarantee acceptance, nor does a low score rule it out; How does a school look at a candidate's GMAT score while arriving at the admissions decision?
Ankur Kumar: The GMAT (or GRE - we do accept either test) is just one piece of data that we look at when trying to understand a candidate's academic capabilities and achievements. We don't have cutoffs or minimums; a quick look at our class profile will eliminate any potential misperception around that.
