But they do happen to be schools with Round 2 deadlines in the future.
Does that mean you should apply?
It would be in our self-interest to say YES! APPLY! Because then we could try and sell you the need for some consulting services to increase your chances of success. But that’s pretty distasteful don’t you agree?
The realty of course is that these two schools do not have applications that you can slap together overnight. They’re not as big of a lift as, say, Stanford, but definitely their requirements are not trivial.
If you’ve already applied to schools with an emphasis on career goals, like Duke, UCLA, or Columbia, then sure, you could have a decent pitch already pulled together for NYU essay 1.
MIT’s cover letter is an altogether different challenge. It’s very short (300 words!!) which means you need to know what you’re going to say and know how to put it together. MIT does NOT want you to present career goals in their app; it’s not what they care about in the evaluation. So if you decide to do MIT and NYU both in the next few days, you will not be reusing anything from NYU essay 1 in the MIT app.
(Pro Tip: Even though in a Q&A session, the Sloan adcom will say that career goals can be discussed in the Optional Essay, they only ever do that in response to a specific applicant asking, ‘Where do I discuss my career goals?’ – they do not SUGGEST that anyone should be using their Optional Essay for career goals. This distinction is important.)
We do of course offer the MIT Sloan SnarkStrategies Guide and the NYU Stern SnarkStrategies Guide as useful resources if you’re debating whether to try at one or both of these schools.
We will be around (of course) through the weekend and if you have questions on these schools’ apps or differences and distinctions, feel free to hit us up in the comments on this post, and current clients can always ask for input in SnarkCenter too.
Don’t be tempted to slap together a few more apps just because the deadline is in the future. Both of these schools are MAJORLY selective these days – NYU perhaps a bit less so, but that does not mean they’re not picky on who they admit. They are. MIT is, too, as much as ever before. You wouldn’t want to throw away your apps fees based on a misunderstanding of the competitiveness of these programs especially.
There are plenty of other very good full-time MBA programs that might still be viable as late-round selections. You can poke around on the many posts here on the blahg about Round 3 and lower-ranked schools to see what we’ve had to say on these topics in the past.
More apps is not going to increase your odds of success – particularly not with schools like Sloan and Stern where they care about fit. Only do it if you’re going to do it right, otherwise you’re setting yourself up for disappointment and an empty bank account with nothing to show for it.
If you’ve already been writing essays for other schools since December and you’ve gotten feedback that your essays are in line with what the adcoms need to see, then sure, you can potentially pull off another app in the next few days. Just go into it with eyes wide open and with a clear view of your own presentation skills and profile. If those things are lined up, then there’s no reason you can’t add another app to the Round 2 mix.
Either way: Good luck with all that you’ve got in the hopper and we hope that at least one of these schools turns into a winner for you this year!
Tell us what you think.