Haas Visit

OK so first thing's first...practice exam #5. I took my first GMAT Prep exam. Overall score was only 690 Quant 47 and Verbal 38. Wow, I missed a lot of questions. On the Quant section the first question I missed was #5 and we all know that's a big no-no. Then I continued to answer another 14 questions incorrectly! My time management was really bad as was my focus...again. I know this about myself alrady so why do I try to take these exams in public places? I was at Border's. I swear the next one I take (Wednesday) will be in a room at the library! The verbal section I didn't miss nearly as many questions but still there were a lot of incorrect answers, 9 to be exact. And again time management on verbal was horrendous. The last 10 questions I had approximately 2 minutes to answer. Oops. But I suppose since I seemed to screw up so bad and still managed to get a 690...that's a good thing? I'm trying to look on the bright side. My next practice exam I need to take really seriosuly because it's my last GMAT Prep exam and from what all you MBA bloggers say, those are the ones that tend to be closest to reality.

Now about my visit to Haas. I had to wake my lazy bum up at 6am to allow time to shower, get dressed into the suggested 'business casual' attire, get my coffee, and make my way to Berkeley (an hour drive). I got there just a little after 8 and was able to find parking really close just across the street. They had sent out an email warning us that parking would be difficult and suggested a lot that was about a 15 minute walk from Haas. I'd like to see you walk 15 minutes in heels! No thank you! So I paid $0.50/hr for the lot across the street that I'm not sure I was supposed to be at, but there was no ticket when I got back to my car.

I entered the Bank of America Forum and there was quite the spread of pastries, bagels, fruit and of course coffee. I definitley did not expect anything like this. The info sessions at Stanford and at Yale were so quick and short and informal, I guess I was expecting more of the same. They had people registering and eating until about 9am. I spoke with a few potential applicants but not too many. I was also surprised about the number of people in attendance. They said 250 people had signed up. This was their first ever Saturday, summer time info session...apparently it was a success.

We were seated in the Arthur Andersen Room, a rather large auditorium, and the info session began. First to speak was one of the Director's of admission. This was the first school to actually take advantage of the university's notoriety. When I went to Stanford and to Yale, neither of the presentations said anything about the fact that the business schools were at Yale or Stanford. I think those are big selling points and shouldn't be overlooked. Anyway, the guy from Haas took note of the fact that Haas is located at UC Berkeley and that Berkeley is a great university in itself. Anyway, he sold Haas and the rankings and the programs and all the basics. And of course adding that there's a collaborative, not competitive environment at Haas (Yale and Stanford said the exact same thing...hmmm??). At this point, about an hour into the presentation I was starting to think I might want to apply to Haas and consequently starting to panic about adding another application to my to do list. Then a second director of admissions spoke about the application process. I really liked how they presented themselves. They were very clear and honest about the entire process. So now, 2 hours into the presentation and I am cursing at myself because I like what they had to say and dammit, now I'm going to have to consider Haas too?!

At the 15 minute break we were able to ask the adcom guys some specific questions (I asked about the fact that as an engineer for years at the same company my title never changed but my responsibilities did and I had many salary increases, he gave some good advice on how to show that on my resume and how to work with my recommender so that he too could note that in his letter).

After the break the Director of Career Services came on. I wasn't impressed. The only thing that I liked about their career services was that they emphasized the interview counselors and how it's very important to take advantage of the mock interview sessions that are available to you, as many as you want as long as you sign up. Other than that I wasn't impressed. So now I'm thinking ok at least there's an item I can put on the con side of my pro/con list...maybe there's hope and I won't have to apply to Haas after all!

Then the financial aid guy came up to give his presentation. He covered all of the basics. No surprises there. They, like Stanford and Yale, have a loan forgiveness program for people who go into non-profit or gov't as long as their salary is below the standard $70k.

At this point I am pretty impressed with the time they took to prepare this info session and the comprehensiveness of it all. It was very informative and they did a really good job presenting everything.

So now comes the 6 student panel. 2 students were about to start their second year at Haas, 2 had just graduated in '06 and 2 had graduated in '05. Three men and three woman (definitely not representative of the class I'm sure). They took questions from the audience and a couple students answered each one. After the panel spoke they gave us a quick tour of Haas. And I have to say out of the three schools I've visited thus far Haas has by far the best facilities!

The student panel is where I lost my interest in Haas. To tell you the truth the the staff of the school had me sold but when I heard the students I decided this isn't where I want to go to school. No disrespect to that panel. They all seemed to be nice and incredibly bright people but for some reason I kept thinking that I couldn't imagine working on a team with any of those people on the panel. I can't place my finger on why? I'm just not sure? I mean it's hard to judge that from just listening to them answer questions for an hour but I think I have good intuition and I know myself well. I just don't think Haas is the place for me.

What this did teach me though is that I definitely need to go back to Stanford while it's in session and talk to some current students. I've met the alumni and I really felt a connection with them so at least I know that. At Yale I met students and didn't feel a connectin with them like I did with the Stanford alumni but I thought I could definitely work with them in groups and would have no problems. My point behind all this blabber is that I now FINALLY understand that word everyone keeps throwing around..."fit". I just didn't "fit" at Haas.

Practice Test #4

I know the scores of these test don't matter but it is really nice once you get to that 700 score! I am really happy with my latest exam. Q-50, V-37.

The verbal score remains low but there is a specific reason for that this time around. I missed a bunch of questions right when the power went out (the heat wave in California is about to kill me with all these power outages!) and there was all sorts of activity around me and it was a series of reading comp questions that I missed. And since reading comp is my strong point, I'm not worried. I missed 6 reading comp questions, but only one sentence correction and one critical reasoning questions.

The quant score was fine. I had bad time management so I missed 4 of the last 5 questions and got everything else correct. Next exam I have to be a little more aware of the time.

All in all, I'm really feeling good now. My next step for this week is to take the two GMAC practice exams. Then the following week maybe try out a Kaplan practice exam. Or maybe I should reverse that so the Kaplan exam doesn't screw with my budding confidence? But what is most important is that I find an air conditioned, quiet place to take the exam. It's been very difficult to a good place to take these exams! The library has no wifi, my house has no A.C., and the coffee shops with free wifi have too many distractions. I may try my mom's house, but her internet connection is so slow. I'll figure it out!

Dinner with Stanford GSB Grads

Wow! I am almost at a loss for words! Last night I was lucky enough to join a bunch of Stanford GSB graduates at dinner and it was fantastic!! All of them geniuses! Their successes before grad school and their successes after are just unbelievable. And their love for the school is amazing. They all spoke so highly of the program. They gave me a bit of advice and all said I would love it there. However, after hearing their stories I am really quite intimidated and feeling a little less confident about my chances. But all I can do is present Stanford with the best application I can come up with and hope for the best.

I know some of you who have read my posts regarding branding probably think I'm a snob. But last night I realized why brand is so important to me. I'm not saying that every graduate out of a top 5 business school is a genius nor am I saying you can't find geniuses at a lower level institution but as I witnessed last night, there is a reason Stanford is branded the way it is. These guys were incredibly bright and it showed in the level of conversaton at the dinner table. They weren't discussing the latest gossip about Britney Spears or what happened on American Idol...the conversation went from business to equality in education to the biological and social factors that divide men and women to the differences between good leaders and good politicians and then they reminisced a bit about their days at Stanford. It was a wonderful evening and I am so happy I was able to be a part of it. Every day I get more and more excited about my change of career and my decision to pursue this MBA. I know I've made the right choice!

Practice Test #3

I finally sat down in my non air conditioned 100deg house yesterday to take my third practice exam from Princeton. I was finally very pelased with my performance on the Quant section. I answered only 2 questions incorrectly and ran out of time before I picked an answer for the last question. The two questions I answered incorrectly were done near the end of the exam. Now you'd think that with that performance I'd earn a pretty good score for the Quant section but I just got a 43? So now, there is definite proof that the scoring algorithm used by Princeton is a bit out of whack. Or am I missing something here? Regardless, I am thru stressing about the score on the practice exams. I was happy with my Quant section.

Verbal was another story. I did great the first half of the exam but by the second half I was losing patience and focus and just couldn't pay attention long enough to get the answers right. I did great on reading comprehension but only so so on the sentence correction and critical reasoning. What really surprised me was that the 4 of the last 7 questions were R.C. Once that long ass passage popped up I figured I was doomed, I was running out of time and there was no way I'd be able to answer these correctly. But I did. I answered all of them correctly and barely skimmed the passage. So now I am going to start spending less time reading the passages and see if I can continue with getting the R.C. questions right. If that's the case I can spend more time on the critical reasoning questions, where I seem to need more time with anyway.


All in all my overall score wasn't what I wanted but surprisingly it did boost my confidence a bit. Only a couple weeks left until the big day...better get cracking now!

And on the school front...I have a meeting with a couple of current students at Stanford GSB next week that I'm looking forward to. Hopefully I can get some more insight into the program. I also spoke with a guy who graduated from Columbia this weekend. He was very helpful as well. I am attending an info session at Haas soon as well as an info session for Wharton at the Wharton West campus in San Francisco. There is also the MBA tour happening in September in San Francisco that I will be attending too. I'd be happier if I had started this process about a month prior but I think I'm on track to accomplish my goals.

The Fear of Average

I just completed the diagnostic exam in the O.G. Based upon how many questions you answer correctly there is a scale where you will fit into one of five categories: 1) Excellent 2) Above average 3) Average 4) Below average and 5) Poor. This time around I was mostly at the high end of above average and the low end of excellent. This made me a very unhappy camper. I was only happy with my performance on the R.C. portion of the diagnostic test, I only missed one question. The rest of the sections I felt I could have done much better. And there is no real pattern to my mistakes other than silly errors. So I'm not sure where to concentrate my studies? I really am having a hard time focusing while doing problems, even at the library where i've removed every possibly distraction! I suppose I could blame it on the recent unemployed status. I tell myself that everything is great but I think the stress is rearing it's ugly head in my practice problems. I'm giving myself three more days to do practice problems to work out all the lack of focus issues, and then I'm taking another practice exam. I've set a goal for myself of getting only a 680 for this practice exam. Then I'll increase it from there.

Is anyone else afflicted with the fear of being average? When I start reviewing the practice problems I've done from the O.G. I get this knot of anxiety in my stomach. I have this overwhelming fear of being average (it's the same anxious feeling I get when I'm hanging out with my married with kids friends in suburbia at their kid's soccer games...but that's another story for another day). Sometimes I feel like I'm fooling the people around me who have such faith in me. I'm scared that one day they will eventually catch on and I'll be labeled a fraud. If i think logically about my abilities I know I'm a smart girl but logic doesn't play into my insecurities over intelligence. And this whole GMAT/application process is not helping the situation at all! I know, I know, as my best friend tells me all the time "Get over it!". Well for today, according to the O.G., at the least I am above average and at the most I'm excellent. Next time I'll just be purely excellent!

All good things must come to an end

The vacation has come to an end. If you haven't been to Lake Shasta I highly recommend it! It is beautiful! The weather was perfect. It was about 95 degrees but the water was around 80 degrees and there was a nice cool breeze. It really was perfect. I have also discovered that water skiing gets boring and wakeboarding can be the source of many a bruised limbs. I get a little too adventurous at times and my body pays the price. But it was totally worth it. I got a little gmat studying in but not much. I started to stress about it yesterday and then this morning when I got to work I found out that I have plenty of time to be studying between now and G-day.

After a week off on vacation I come to work this morning to find my job has come to an end as well. My boss left me a lovely note, yes a NOTE, that basically says "we are having some major financial setbacks and your services are no longer needed, effective immediately". Then the impersonal jack ass asks me, in the note of course, to give hime a rundown on where all my work is and what still needs to be done, etc. I just stood up and walked out. I don't plan on ever going back. I knew they were having financial difficulties and they had already let a lot of people go that's why I though I was safe. But alas, I was the final one to be let go. And it's fine, I understand their reason....they are marketing more their software than their packaging so it makes sense to let go of the single mechanical engineer...but a f'ing note? How rude!

After about 10 minutes of freaking out I realized there was definitely an up side to this. I am going to start looking for a job now but I don't plan on starting work until after labor day. I'll use this time to do lots of GMAT studying and then I'm going to Yosemite to hike and camp for a few days and then I'll relax a little bit before going back to work. The big suck about all of this is that I really wanted to only work part time so I could do the volunteer work with planned parenthood but I highly doubt I'll be able to find part time work that pays as well. But it'll work out. It always does for me :-)

So for now, off to the library to work a bazillion permutation and combination problems. My only weakness on the quant side.