Guidelines for Re-Applicants

Even qualified applicants were rejected by top ranked business schools the first time, but still holds a fair chance to get admitted in the next attempt. If you failed first time, it’s important to improve your application, evaluate your essays, seek feedback, and assess your application before reapplying next fall. As a re-applicant, it’s important to work with concrete strategies and strengthen your application. Thus, here are some of the most important guidelines for re-applicants:-

Evaluate your Applications

Many business schools send detailed letters or personalized feedback to the dinged applicants, figure out the reason for your rejection. You may seek feedback from specialized consultants to find out loopholes in your application. At the same time, it’s important to evaluate and work on your own soul searching.

Rework on the following essential aspects of your process:

• Revisit the list of Schools– analyse the schools, where you had applied. Were you satisfied with the schools you applied to? Be open to expanding the list of schools and programs where you’ll be reapplying.

• Scores: Was there any scope of improvement in your GMAT score? Would you have taken some more professional classes before applying if you had more time?

• Your Recommenders: Ask yourself, if the recommender you chose, was the right choice. Were you entirely confident in him/her? Or you had better options to showcase a different side of your profile?

• Quality time spent on the application: Have you shown your best work in your essays? Did you spend the quality time on multiple iterations of your essays? Or were you rushed through the entire process of filling out the application?

• Stay Calm– Don’t just jump to retaking GMAT, joining new work or other transformations. If you got wait-listed or cleared interviews, it proves that you are all, you just need to tweak. You may work a little on your essay structure, be more specific with your career goals.

Once you have evaluated and identified the areas of improvement for the next application, it’s important to take feedback from a variety of sources. As business schools are full with applications, it is not possible for them to directly speak with each applicant to give them the feedback. But, in case, you have the opportunity to speak to the admissions committee, take advantage by asking for specific points about each area of your application. You may also try to reach out to friends and family, who have experience with MBA programs.

Improve Your Candidacy

Once you have evaluated your profile and taken several feedbacks about steps improving your application, you just need to get started.

Many business schools ask for a fresh application while some other schools just want a reapplication essay to showcase what you’ve achieved in gap years of two applications. Many schools waive-off recommendation letters as reapplicants. All that business school wants to see is that how you have strengthened your application in the last one year. Put more stress on showing how you have grown professionally and personally in this gap year.

Good luck

–Team Leverage