Finally! Progress!

My application is submitted and complete. I am now officially "Under Review" by Stanford! Woohoo! Although the relief was short lived. Now I am back to anxiety. I have had my fingers permanently crossed since I submitted the application. I may have to have them surgically uncrossed once all of this is over :-)

Stanford Update

So about 15 minutes after I posted my last post I got an email from Stanford saying that my transcripts were missing! I uploaded them per their instructions though! I nearly had a heart attack. I left work in a whirlwind, ran home, found my unofficial transcript and faxed it over immediately with a letter of apology. I have no idea what happened there but now I'm so upset about it. Stanford has so many competitive applications to look at and now mine is going to be less desirable because it looks like I don't know how to follow simple directions. I hope this happens frequently and I don't look like a complete moron. Stanford is my dream school and I pray to God this won't effect my candidacy. I'm going to keep my fingers crossed from now until mid January in hopes that I'm accepted. I wonder if that will help my candidacy?!

What the heck?

What is going on with Stanford? Does anyone know how their review process goes? Do they give any updates on an applicant's status page? I suppose I could ask their adcom about it but I don't want to be the pestering type so I thought I'd ask here first.

I am having a phone conversation with a UMich (Ross) alum this week. He is a local guy. I'm looking forward to getting a feel of Ross' alumni. I've decided that out of all the schools I want to go to I am assured a great education at all of them. The most important part is whether or not I can see myself working as a team with the students at a particular school. I guess I'm trying to judge that ever elusive "fit" with a particular school.

My current job has extended my stay through January. By then I'll at least know about Stanford and Yale. If I'm lucky and I'm admitted to one of those then I may just play around until school starts. Maybe Mexico, back to Chile, or possibly Central America. I've always wanted to hang out in Costa Rica. So now I'm dreaming a little but what is life without dreams??! Boring!

I've also finally gotten back on track with the running. I'm going on 4 days in a row with the running. My wonderful friend fixed up my road bike the other day so I can start riding to work now. Hopefully this will all be very helpful for my marathon in January. It really is nice feeling human again. I was running on adrenaline for so long. I actually had time to read last night! Ahhh life is good again :-)

We Won!

The election is over and I have finally had a chance to sleep and I can almost see straight again! Woohoo! We won and we won big! For the moment, a woman's right to choose is safe and I feel like I had a hand in making that happen. What a great feeling! I've never worked so hard, so long, and for SOOOOO little $money$ before in my life. But I've never been happier. I have to say, it is a bit humbling to be a bottom feeder again. I mean I had responsibilities and all but I definitely was not the one making big ticket decisions. Going from leading a $10 million defense contract to sending out invitations for a board member's house party is VERY humbling. And as much as I loved what I was doing, I'm not so sure my ego could take much more. That's why I'm glad I'm going to grad school...I'm hoping that will allow me to start a bit higher on the food chain in this industry.

I'm not sure what happens now. I was hired on just for the campaign so officially my job ends next week but my manager is trying to get me hired on for at least another couple of months. I also had my last engineering consultant job contact me and see if I was interested in consulting on a new project for them. They apologized over the last incident (long story) and promised I wouldn't have to work for the same guy again. I'm not sure if I want to go back to engineering again but the money is so good it's hard to pass it up especially knowing that I'm going to be making nothing and spending $120k over the next two years at grad school. But we'll see what happens here. Maybe I can work part time at both jobs until I hear back from all the schools. Once I am confident that I'm accepted to at least one of the schools, I may take off to Chile to hang with my compadres over there for a couple of months. I don't know...something will come my way and I'll figure it out.

In other, actual MBA,news, there was FINALLY a change on my status page for Yale, they put my GMAT score with my application. Still waiting on them to match up my transcripts with my application. I can't believe they haven't even put together my application and others are already interviewing? It was making me nervous before but I guess they just start reviewing apps and sending out interview invites immediately? Should I be nervous? And Stanford, there has been no change on my application status page. Does anyone know what goes on there?

This weekend I will finish my UCLA application and submit that, long before the second round deadline. Then I'll start on UMich (Ross). I'm still deciding between NYU and Columbia or both? Enough of my ramblings. Good luck on the interview invites people!

Last Minute Submit

Two down, three to go. I submitted Yale at about 4 this morning and I just submitted Stanford. I think I gave both schools a very honest and open idea of myself and made clear my goals. I'm not all that hopeful. I went to Stanford recently to have Lunch with a current student and she reiterated how amazing all of her classmates and ridiculous examples. I am not nearly as accomplished as these people are. I'm just a regular girl with a really strong passion for changing the world. I hope that is enough. But I have my doubts.

Now I am going to stop thinking about B-school for the next two weeks. Now I am just going to stress about work and the election. If I make it to Nov. 8th still standing I'll be happy.

I am looking forward to my UCLA and my UMich apps. Not sure what the final app will be or if there may be more than three? I was talking to my cousin and she was making some good points for applying to more schools. We'll see. Good luck to everyone, those round one deadlines are here!

Tic Toc Tic Toc

Time is of the essence in my life right now. Not only is the Stanford application due in just a couple of days but the election is just a measly 2 weeks away. I haven't slept in weeks. Working really late hours (until 10pm!) and on weekends. I am nervous about my Stanford application since I've been so busy with work and the campaign. But I am determined to hit submit before the 1st round deadline. I refuse to hold off until 2nd round. I'm actually having lunch with a current GSB student next week. I'm looking forward to that. Maybe they'll have some words of wisdom for me.

All of this stress has made me gain 5 pounds! I'm not happy about that at all! I've only been running roughly 3 days a week. That's not good. I feel slow and sluggish. It's just that I can't seem to get up early enough to get out for my run because I'm getting to bed so late. I figure after Nov. 7th life will get back to normal. Regardless, I did find time to do a quick half marathon a week or so ago and I managed to kick my best friend's a$$ by 12 minutes! Neither of us trained for the run but he has been stagnant the past two months so he was totally unprepared. But that didn't stop him from talking smack weeks before the run and saying how he was still going to kick my butt. Ahh...victory is so sweet, but a 12 minute victory is heaven! I'll be holding this over his head until our marathon in January when I suspect he'll probably kick my butt. But that won't stop me from talking smack up until that day :-) Beating him so badly did a little job on that fragile male ego of his so this time around he is inspired to get off his booty and start training. At least I know I got him back on the horse and that was my intention.

OK I am procrastinating. I've read and reread my Stanford essays so many times they are making me dizzy.

Good luck to everyone!

Stanford and UCLA

So much has been going on the past couple of weeks. I feel like I have been saying that for months? Anyway, work really is crazy. I’ve been working 6 days a week about 10-12 hours a day. I seriously have never worked this hard for so little $$ before in my life. And although it irks me at times when I wander through Neiman Marcus (which I try to avoid like the plague these days) it really doesn’t bother me much at all. I feel good about it. It’s really amazing and it’s hard to explain that to my family and my best friend where money is so much more of a priority. Oh well. It’s my life and my happiness so they need to get over it.

Anyway, I sat in on a class at Stanford a little while ago. It was awesome. The class was mostly second year students. It was the standard b-school U shaped classroom. Pretty full class, I’d guess about 50 or 60 students maybe? The class was on Power and apparently it’s a very popular elective. The professor was great. The entire class was very conversational and almost every student had something pretty insightful to add to the conversation. I had warm fuzzies the entire time I sat there thinking how I desperately want to be one of those students. It was awesome. There was one other prospective sitting in on the class too. We had been picked up by a second year host to take us to the class. The host seemed a bit frazzled and wasn’t the most friendly host in the world but I won’t hold it against him/her. I imagine since classes just started he/she was a bit overwhelmed. But regardless there was something very intimate feeling about the visit and I am seriously in love with Stanford. I am trying so hard to put together an amazing application so they can’t refuse me!

I also went down to Los Angeles for a day to visit Anderson, sit in on a class, an info session and an interview. I hadn’t been on UCLA’s campus since I graduated and it was great to be there. I had completely forgotten how stunning that campus is. It really is such a beautiful campus. I don’t think I really appreciated it when I did my undergrad there. The weather was typical LA weather, sunny and perfect. The traffic was typical LA traffic, unbelievably obnoxious and irritating. It took me over an hour to get to campus from LAX and I had to take a cab because the morons at Super Shuttle were too late to pick me up and couldn’t promise me that they could get me there in an hour and a half after I waited 20 minutes for the damn shuttle!

Anyway, the visit was alright. I was exhausted from the get go so I don’t think I got as much from the visit as I could have. I had an interview with an associate director of admissions. I have no idea how it went. They really are intent on not giving you any feedback or maybe it was just that the interview didn’t go well? Who knows? After the interview I sat in the café that I used to study at to escape South campus (the engineering side of campus) and had a coffee and read the Daily Bruin. Then I sat in on a marketing management class. The class was interesting enough. It held my attention the entire hour and a half. The students, I won’t hold it against them since it was their first week of classes, weren’t as insightful or as articulate as the students at Stanford. But again this was a first year class with students just starting out on their mba journey so it’s hard to make a comparison. The class was a lot less conversational as well. But I did enjoy the class, minus my splitting headache. (I had a bit of a mountain biking accident about 2 days before my visit and was covered in bruises and scrapes and had two big bumps on my head, it wasn’t pretty). Then I hung around wandered a bit and sat in on an hour and a half long info session that was more of what I already knew so that wasn’t all that helpful but the person I interviewed with was leading the presentation so it was good that I attended the session.

So that is my long winded update. I’m still hoping to get UCLA, Yale, and Stanford apps done in first round then I’ll decide what 2 schools I’ll be applying to in the second round.

Letters

Hello Blogosphere-

I just wrote a long a$$ post that just disappeared into cyberspace. I'm so annoyed. Anyway, the point of it was that I am super busy at work and am loving it! I have asked my previous manager and my current manager for my letters of rec and both were happy to do it. They were very encouraging too! My essays are coming along...not as great as I would like yet but alright I suppose.

So that is my update. I really had a lot to say with details...maybe I'll update this again later tonight when I have more time.

Ciao!

An Epiphany!

Last night as I was sitting at a coffee shop working on Stanford essay A, I finally found my theme! After reading the myriads of blogs discussing their "theme" and their "story" I was getting a bit frustrated trying to think of my own. I kept getting off on so many tangents. I was convinced that my life couldn't be boiled down to a simple "story" with a "theme" that can be told in a just a couple of essays! But alas, last night I found my own theme! I found a recurring theme on all of the important and even not so important decisions I have made throughout my life. It was so clear to me. I think I may have shouted "Yippee" at the coffee shop because when I looked up from my computer I had the entire coffee shop staring at me. Oops :-)

So now that I have found my theme/story it's just a matter of writing it in a clear, concise, yet interesting manner. Let's hope this part doesn't take as long as the first part!

As I was having trouble with my essays I would go back and forth with the Stanford application. I find the actual application almost as difficult as the essays. For the life of me I can't remember the names of the organizations I used to volunteer at while in university. I guess that is a sign that they weren't that significant. But I was working almost a full time schedule (had to pay for school on my own, minus some scholarships and loans of course) while getting a degree in engineering full time as well so my time was quite limited. But I know I volunteered every once in a while when I found myself with a few spare hours. I know I tutored at an elementary school for a quarter once a week. I also volunteered with a rape prevention group too. I just don't know the details of the organizations. So do I leave those out of my list of activities? I'm going to do a class visit at Stanford in the near future so maybe I'll ask the student or maybe I'll have some contact with an adcom person.

In other news, if you hadn't noticed my list of schools has grown. I am no longer sure about NYU or Columbia but I have added UCLA and Ross to my application list for sure. I've scheduled an info session, class visit, and interview at UCLA that is coming up soon. I'm a bit nervous about the interview. I'm planning on working on my resume the next few days and refining my answers to some standard interview questions. I think I need to make my answers a little more brief (or is that briefer? Maybe this is why I did so bad on my GMAT!...uggghh that's another problem I'm going to have to deal with soon...yuck!).

Enough of this procrastinating...now that I actually have a theme to write about I better get to it!

The MBA Tour and Interviews

I attended the MBA Tour this past weekend in San Francisco. I took this opportunity to interview with a few schools (thanks to Marina), some of which I was interested and some of which I was not. So the tour itself was alright. I think for me it was definitely worth it because it was only one day and an hour drive. I think if it took any more effort than that I wouldn't necessarily think it was worth it. The benefits of the tour were...Ross (Univ of Mich.), Anderson (UCLA), Columbia, Chicago GSB, back up schools, and interviews.

I had not considered Ross because I have no desire to live in Ann Arbor and so I didn't even research Ross. But for some reason I decided to sit in on the 35 minute Ross presentation. I was intrigued because the presentation stressed their non-profit management program, corporate social responsibility, and sustainability. They just made it seem that the school's values matched mine. I still need to look further into the school but they have a great dual degree program that I've been considering (MBA/MPP). So now I think I may be applying there too.

I had not considered UCLA because I went to undergrad at UCLA and I really felt like been there done that. But I, again, was swayed by the 35 minute presentation. More research to be done. In the meantime, I signed up to interview while I'm there on business in a few weeks.

I was convinced I wanted to go to Columbia because it's Columbia and it's in New York and from the website I thought it'd be a good fit for me. Now I'm questioning that after sitting in on their 35 minute presentation. I definitely am going to postpone that application until the second round if I still decide I want to apply there.

I wasn't really sure about Chicago GSB. I thought about it but I was not into living in Chicago. Turns out I was right questioning Chicago. After the presentation I was sure that Chicago GSB was not a good fit for me.

The other benefit to the MBA Tour was that I saw a couple of my back up schools there. I kept going back and forth on whether or not to apply to my back up schools. I am now completely convinced it is not worth going to a back up school or wasting the time, effort and money to apply.

Practice interviews are a great idea. I know now that I really need to be better prepared for them. I tend to chatter a little too much when nervous. There are benefits to this because they don't seem to have enough time to ask me the hard questions? There is a lot more I could add to this but I'm tired and have to clean my house. Maybe at a later date...

Blog Crushes

So as I sit here and try really hard to focus on what matters most to me (thank you Stanford Adcom) I procrastinate. I read blogs. I read and read and read more blogs and blogs and blogs. And as I read these well written blogs about incredibly successful and bright people I realize I have some major blog crushes! There's something about well written introspection that is so attractive! I have great respect and admiration for the women bloggers out there as well...it's just not as fun daydreaming about them (such is life). Am I the only one that falls for these writers? Is it a little sad and possibly slightly pathetic? Good thing no one out there will know who I am :-)

Back to the essays I go. Tomorrow morning I am asserting myself as the official Regional Campaign Coordinator and trying to forge a coalition between our camp and another local progressive camp. I hope it goes well! I'm kind of liking this public speaking part of the job. I never knew it could be so fun with so much improvisation...engineering presentations weren't nearly as exciting. Good night all!

14 Miles from Civilization

I'm home from Yosemite and all I can think about is when I can go back. There's something to be said for being completely and totally inaccessible to anyone or anything and surrounded by nature...redwoods, mountains, fresh water streams, glaciers, lakes, wildflowers, and just plain old silence. It definitely helps to keep things in perspective. What's strange about being 14 miles away form civilization into the mountains and over 10,000ft above sea level is the people that you run into. We met a human rights activist on his way to Harvard law school to be a Human rights attorney, a guy that was building houses for habitat for humanity, a lady that was a social worker, another lady that worked on health care policy for MediCal recipients, a bunch of guys that work for the U.S. Forestry Service with the desire to keep these forests pristine and untouched by bulldozers. It was odd meeting so many "do-gooders" there. I think I've been a bit jaded being in the Silicon Valley surrounded by so many people who are here just to make money for themselves. It was nice to see so many people that were concerned about others or the environment or whatever cause they happened to be proponents of. I did however learn how to answer the question of "what do you do?". I m officially in transition! That's my answer and I'm sticking with it until I'm going to classes at Stanford or Columbia or wherever my essays may take me.

As of tomorrow, I am officially employed and working as a campaign assistant for Planned Parenthood. It's temporary, only until November. It's a pretty big undertaking for me. The hours promise to be long, the nights late and the weekends full of activity. I'm not sure I could keep that up any longer than November. I'm a little nervous considering all of this is happening alongside of me turning in at least three of my 5 applications for b-school. But I think it's worth it for the experience and for me to determine if this is really the route I want to go.

I have decided that I will apply to Stanford, Yale, and Columbia in the first round and second round I will apply to two more schools that I haven't quite decided on yet.

I've officially started on Stanford's essay A. I have about one sentence down and I'm guessing another 200 to go???? This is tough. What matters most to me and why? I know the answer but how do I relate that to career, life decisions and how do I write 3-4 pages on it? This promises to be a very good writing exercise for me as I absolutely suck at communicating my ideas verbally much less on paper! It is sort of weird though after coming back from my trip...there's part of me that's looking forward to this essay.

Wharton Info Session, etc...

So the other day I attended an info session for Wharton held at the Wharton West campus in San Francisco. It was specifically targeted for Women and minorities. It was a pretty good turn out. The presentation by the staff was pretty standard. They had an alumni panel as well. I though the alumni were pretty down to earth people I would enjoy working with.

I'm not sure how I feel about Wharton. Based on the info session I have a pretty good feeling about it. But it has its drawbacks. First of which is the class size. I feel like having a class size of 800 at the top b-school would probably foster a pretty competitive environment. The other drawback is that they don't really have a good program in terms of what I want to do. But really, I think any b-school program will apply to whatever you want? I'm not so convinced any top school's program is better than the next? But I could be wrong...

Anyway, I'll consider Wharton. I want to go there to visit and see what I think about it in person. But if I apply it won't be until the second round. I've already decided on my first round schools, 1) Columbia, 2) Stanford, and 3)Yale. I am pretty sure the second round will be only 4) Georgetown and 5) Sloan or Wharton or UCLA. But I make no promises!

In other news...to all those Californian's reading this Vote No on Prop 85! I just spent my entire afternoon signing up new volunteers and handing out literature about Prop 85, a repeat of last year's Prop 73, the parental notification proposition. The title alone irks me. The supporters of this prop could care less about parental notification...they just want to chip away slowly at a woman's right to choose and they know that coming right out and yelling anti-choice propaganda will get them shot down in California so this is there way at limiting access to woman's health care. Read up on it and make sure you vote and if you want to get involved send me an email and I can put you in touch with the right people! Now I'll get down from my soap box.

Tomorrow is always a better day

Today is my tomorrow of yesterday and it is definitely looking better! I just wanted to thank everyone for the support regarding my miserable GMAT experience! I really do appreciate it!

Yesterday I enjoyed my own little pity party for a few hours then got back on track. I mapped out my goals over the next few months. Goal and priority number one is to get a job! That being said, when I walked into my unpaid internship this morning they offerred me a full time paid, albeit temporary, job on a campaign! I haven't decided yet if I'll be taking it but I'm leaning toward yes. There are a few cons and many pros to the job.

The cons:
1) It pays next to nothing (but I knew that money was not my goal when I decided to switch into the non-profit sector).
2) No health insurance or vacation time, it's contract work.
3) The hours will be insane thru September and October up until the election in November when I need to be focusing on essays.

The pros are numerous:
1) It'll be GREAT leadership experience for me! Something I can definitely use on my apps.
2) Satisfies goal #1 that I outlined for myself yesterday.
3) The experience will be invaluable.
4) I'll be doing something I can finally be excited and passionate about.
5) It may lead to a full time real position with health benefits and vacation time here in public affairs that just opened up that they won't be filling until after the election.

I think I'm going to do it. I really need to learn to sacrifice my fun time if I'm serious about this career change and b-school. I've never chosen the easy routes in my life, I can't start now! So my days will be consumed with the campaign and nights consumed with my application essays (after I get back from my 5 day backpacking trip in Yosemite..damn this sacrifice thing is going to be difficult!).

Thanks again, all those that commented! It's nice to know there are others out there that feel my pain! Good luck to all of you!!

CANCELLED!

I just took the GMAT. I panicked and basically just threw $250 in the garbage. I am at a loss right now.

The other day I took my final official GMAT practice exam and scored horribly on it. I messed up my time management and I just couldn't keep my head focused, which seems to be a recurring theme in my life right now. I tried to muster up my confidence the two days prior to my exam and apparently I wasn't successful. I had the same time management problem on my official exam. The last 10 questions on the quant I basically just rushed thru and guessed blindly. Then on the verbal I was so distracted by my performance on the quant that I couldn't even try to focus on the verbal. So I panicked. I stared at my options REPORT SCORES, CANCEL SCORES. It took me about 5 minutes and then I finally decided to cancel.

So now what do I do? I need to start working again. I need to work full time. My time management has sucked since I haven't been working. And now I'm thinking maybe I should just forget about these top schools and use my first offical GMAT score to apply to lesser schools? Or maybe I wasn't cut out for this MBA in the first place? OK so I'm just throwing myself a little pity party right now. Once I recover from this blow maybe I'll be able to rationally figure all of this out and determine what my next step will be. Until then, I'm going running with my dog...Happy trails...

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!