2021 MBA Essay Questions: Dartmouth Tuck

Tuck has made lots of changes to its admissions cycle over the years, specifically around how it manages deadlines. Up until 2018, they had four rounds including an Early Action option, but then in 2019 they standardized on three rounds like most other schools including MIT and Berkeley. In response to coronavirus in spring 2020, they added a fourth round, and now have decided to keep it. However, guidance you may see if you get too far back in the ‘snarchive of Tuck posts may be confusing. For example, there are many posts on the EssaySnark blahg that reference “Tuck Early Action” or their previous “November Round” etc, which isn’t how it works as of 2020.

The essay questions for 2020 were the same as for 2019, so you can see the section below for those discussions.

Tuck now has a interview-anyone policy with interviews conducted online, so you’ll want to take advantage of that — but you need to submit by September 1st to do so! After that, they move to a by-invitation policy just like most other schools except for Kellogg have.

The most obvious comment about the Tuck MBA essay questions are — they are short! And kind of tricky. Yeah, not so crazy about these because of the challenges. Doable though! When a BSer nails their Tuck essays then they’re going to have a very easy time in standing out and high likelihood of an admit.

So how do you answer the Tuck essay questions??

Tuck essays

1. Tuck students can articulate how the distinctive Tuck MBA will advance their aspirations. Why are you pursuing an MBA and why Tuck? (300 words)
    
2. Tuck students recognize how their individuality adds to the fabric of Tuck. Tell us who you are. (300 words)
    
3. Tuck students invest generously in one another’s success even when it is not convenient or easy. Tell us about a time when you helped someone else succeed. (300 words)
    

 
And we just have to call attention to something: Instead of publishing an 80% range on GMAT score, two years ago Tuck posted the full range of their Class of 2019 , which is 620 to 780. Why does that matter? Well, only about four years ago, their full range was 530 to 780 — so as you can see, the low end is almost 100 points HIGHER than it used to be. Shocking stuff, these GMAT trends have been. Thankfully, we don’t expect to see this same level of tightening continue for the current season.

[end discussion of 2020 questions]

Again for the Class of 2022, Tuck’s essays emphasized the traits that they have identified as culturally significant and prevalent among the students they admit, of “smart, nice, accomplished, and aware” — yet thankfully they modified the prompts somewhat (as we tweeted last year, the first ones weren’t so great ). The problem? OMG WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU TUCK – 300 words for these questions?!? Ugh!!!! On behalf of suffering BSers everywhere, we are in agony.

We kvetched about the too-short Tuck essays even more here (July 2019).

1. Tuck students can articulate how the distinctive Tuck MBA will advance their aspirations. Why are you pursuing an MBA and why Tuck? (300 words) 
2. Tuck students recognize how their individuality adds to the fabric of Tuck. Tell us who you are. (300 words)
3. Tuck students invest generously in one another’s success even when it is not convenient or easy. Share an example of how you helped someone else succeed. (300 words)

The first thing you’ll want to do as you think about a Tuck application is to look at your calendar: When can you schedule a visit to Hanover for the interview? Tuck interviews anyone who can make it to campus. GO DO THAT!

Tuck reported a 722 average GMAT for their Classes of 2019 and 2020 (for the former, that was up **five points** from their previous year). Not sure if they’ll stick at the 722 level for the Class of 2021 based on some signals we’ve observed, but it’s still a competitive process at this school!

Some Tuck links:

• Tuck360 MBA Admissions blog
• Tuck MBA Application Deadlines
  Remember: Tuck has applicant-initiated on-campus interviews. They are technically optional, but STRONGLY recommended! They usually open up the appointments to start scheduling these in mid-August.
• Class of 2018 profile

 
[end discussion of 2019 questions]

Tuck’s Class of 2021 MBA app was centered around Tuck’s newly-stated values of “smart, nice, accomplished, and aware” — which we know all of you are! Our Tuck MBA application guide has been totally overhauled to help you make the most of the opportunities they are offering to present examples of how you are a fit to this culture.


 

The Tuck MBA essay questions were brand-new for 2018 — everything was different, but in some ways, not.

How do you answer them?

Tuck short-answer questions

1. Share your short term goals. (50 words)
   
   The word “goals” should not be plural in this question; this is best answered with ONE THING ONLY! Tell them what you plan to do immediately after graduating. If you’re applying to Columbia, Ross, Duke, Darden, or a variety of other schools, it’s the same thing you’re saying to them. Straightforward, simple, clearly stated. That’s how you handle this. If you want to present an alternate here then you won’t have space to discuss things. Do so at your own risk!
    
2. Share your long term goals. (50 words)
   
   Warning: Don’t get ahead of your skis! An appropriate level of ambition is important. They don’t expect you to have perfect clarity on what you’ll be doing five years post-MBA, but they DEFINITELY know you don’t have any clue where you’ll be in 20 years. So, don’t write about 20 years out; stay more focused in a reasonable time window. Having a clear target here is fine, you don’t need to — and shouldn’t — describe it in excruciating detail. Nobody has a crystal ball to be so confident on the future. Multiple options might be okay for the long-term goal but it’s tough to do the answer justice if you try to squeeze in too many ideas.
    
3. How did you arrive at these goals? (75 words)
   
   It’s nice they gave a few more words here but it’s still so short that it’s gonna make you cry. 🙁 This should be primarily focused on the short-term goal for most people, for exactly the reason we just laid out above: Nobody knows what the future holds. If you spend question 3 talking about the long-term goal then it had better be a tightly-crafted plan! There’s no guarantees the long-term goal will ever become reality for you, so usually, keeping a strict focus on why you’re motivated by the immediate career path you’ve envisioned will be more convincing and compelling for your reader.
    
4. How will Tuck help you achieve these goals? (75 words)
   
   This also is very short. They’ve only given you 250 words total but are asking for a very robust set of answers. Blech. The reason they’ve limited these so much is that they know you’re just making stuff up. They care much more about how you present yourself in response to the longer questions. Still, these goals questions are important because they need to be certain that the MBA is the right path and that Tuck is the right place.
    

Tuck essays

1. Tuck students are aware of how their individuality adds to the fabric of Tuck. Tell us who you are and what you will contribute. (500 words)
   
   Seems simple, but yes it will be challenging! And none of your other schools are asking anything directly comparable. You’ll need to do fresh brainstorming on this question, though there might be some overlap with what you tell UCLA about what you’re “most passionate” about, as one possible example of synergies. Pro Tip: Professional content might work but is not advisable as a first choice! This should be about YOU — with detailed nuggets that SHOW the adcom who you are based on what you spend time on, personality traits you can demonstrate in a concrete manner, life experiences you’ve had that are meaningful and give the adcom evidence about the type of person you are today. With 500 words, you’ve got plenty of space to work with and multiple examples are expected. Easy? Nope. (Pro Tip: Please do not talk about your passion for mentoring!)
    
2. Tuck students are nice, and invest generously in one another’s success. Share an example of how you helped someone else succeed. (500 words)
   
   This definitely could, and even perhaps should, be from a professional context, mostly because the first essay is best served with a personal focus. With 500 words, you actually have TOO MUCH SPACE! The huge risk here is you ramble. Please pleas please still write a tight story! In almost ALL cases, you should be able to finish the example of helping someone else in only around 250 words — and even that is a long story! Our advice is to use some of this essay to also talk about Tuck, especially any Tuck students you have interacted with during your school research, or especially if you already had connections with Tuck through your network and can give a nice little nugget that captures that relationship. If you end up with a shorter essay, in this case that could be fine!!! (Pro Tip: Please do not talk about your passion for mentoring! If you want to talk about mentoring in either of these essays then the example you use better be a) totally focused on your efforts/actions, and b) evidence that you are REALLY passionate about it! not just that you’ve done it a little here and there.)
    

The best part of these questions are their clarity. That part is good (clearly-written questions is not something Tuck has always succeeded at). The difficult part is that there is A LOT of writing — and deep thinking!! — involved with these questions, and many people will end up with raggedy messes of essays instead of a tightly constructed pitch. In past years, Tuck has issued a wordcount guideline rather than a limit. These two essay questions are an open invitation to share meaningful elements of who you are with the adcom, but they’re also a possible trap of verbosity. If you don’t have that much to say that’s interesting, it’s okay if your essay is shorter than 500 words!! If you use the full space, the content must justify the length.

Can the responses to the short-answer questions go long? Yes, but a handful of words (~10) but not more than that!

Tuck also has a standard optional essay, which like all other schools should only be deployed to explain something that is not otherwise obvious or covered elsewhere in the application, and they have a traditional reapplicant essay requiring you to discuss improvements made since your prior application. Given how very generous they are with the base essays — 1,250 words total — then you should be extremely careful to be concise if you need to use the optional essay especially. The reapp essay may need to leverage its entire 500-word allowance.

Our Tuck MBA Application Guide explains the interview policy and the advantage it offers — and everything else you need to know for a Class of 2021 app! Tuck now has a standard Round 1 which hits in September but there’s no mid-cycle release since they interview everyone who wants to. So, your experience applying to Tuck will be different than it is for many other schools like Yale or MIT.

If you decide to get some assistance on your Tuck application, then we’re able to support you with all six of these questions through our Standard Essay Decimator MBA essay critique service. Normally that service allows for four essays total, however you’ll be able to combine your short-answer questions on goals — 250 words total across those four questions — into one file and submit that along with each of the other two essays each in their own separate files (so, three files submitted together, with the first file containing four answers). If you need the optional essay or the reapplicant essay, you’re also covered; if you’re a reapplicant who needs the optional essay then you will need to purchase an essay add-on. Click here for our Help FAQ topic on specific schools and how they’re supported through our Essay Decimator in 2018.

Finally, we’re gonna point you to something not about Tuck, but published by UCLA Anderson when they released an essay question that they’d used several years ago that was semi-similar to these Tuck questions. You can’t model your Tuck application exactly on the content development strategy that UCLA discusses (especially because a lot of the ideas in that UCLA post are exceptionally high level and won’t be nearly detailed enough to carry these Tuck essays) however the process they suggest isn’t a bad one to leverage as a starting point to dig into your Tuck essay project.
 

The other news that the Tuck Admissions team has made a big deal about — but which does not actually impact any of you since you’re going into this for the first time — is that they’ve standardized their application rounds to conform with industry norms. Those are below.

If you see references to any ‘snarchived posts on the blahg to “Tuck Early Action” then you can simply read that as “Tuck Round 1” — and if you’ve read our Tuck MBA Application guide before, you already know that we’ve long said that Tuck Early Action is really a Round 1 in disguise anyway! The only way it differed in recent years from other schools’ Round 1 was that if you got in (decisions for EA were announced in December just like every other school did for their Round 1) then Tuck required you to pony up for a deposit much much sooner than other schools did. So they did away with all of that, which is nice, but does not actually matter in any significant way for the crop of BSers thinking about their app strategies for 2018 and the Class of 2021. We will cover these changes in the 2018 Tuck Essay Guide when we do our refresh, which you can expect soon after essay questions and requirements are formally announced in Hanover.

Tuck reported a 722 average GMAT for their Class of 2019 (up **five points** from their prior year, and that’s with an increased class size, too). Let’s see what they say about the Class of 2020.

For the Class of 2021, Tuck required two professional recommendations (they call them “letters of reference”) focusing on the qualities of “nice, smart, aware, and accomplished” that the new(ish) admissions director announced in May. The questions that your recommenders get closely mirror the ones that you’re answering in your essays. However, we definitely suggest looking into our custom-built Recommender’s Instruction Sets if you’re applying to Tuck among your other schools! It can be so helpful for your recommenders to know what’s expected of them and how they can truly help you in what they deliver.

[end discussion of 2018 questions]

1. What are your short and long-term goals? Why is an MBA a critical next step toward achieving those goals? Why are you interested in Tuck specifically? up to 500 words
2. Tuck’s mission is to educate wise leaders to better the world of business. Wisdom encompasses the essential aptitudes of confident humility, about what one does and does not know; empathy, towards the diverse ideas and experiences of others; and judgment, about when and how to take risks for the better.With Tuck’s mission in mind, and with a focus on confident humility, tell us about a time you:
   • received tough feedback
   • experienced failure, or
   • disappointed yourself or others.

   How did you respond, and what did you learn about yourself as a result? (500 words)

Super cool! Lots of awesome possibilities here!!! Talking about where something did not go well is one of the BEST opportunities to show who you are. The hardest part will be the “lessons learned” angle.

Tuck has always cared about career goals as an important element of your application, and we’re gratified to see them go back to the basics this year (last year’s version was a bit of a trainwreck). The best way to write Essay 1 is to show how you’ve done something in the past, that you can build on through the Tuck MBA. That’s what they are looking for with the “next step” language. Try not to overhype it though!

We definitely are pleased that Tuck changed them from what they asked last year! Tuck has now restored itself to a position in EssaySnark’s Most Loved Adcoms list based on these awesome questions. They’re going to give you enough room to talk about stuff that’s important, and you’ll be able to truly share yourself in this app. Great stuff!

And we just have to call attention to something: Instead of publishing an 80% range on GMAT score, this year Tuck posted the full range of their Class of 2019 , which is 620 to 780. Why does that matter? Well, only about four years ago, their full range was 530 to 780 — so as you can see, the low end is almost 100 points HIGHER than it used to be. Shocking stuff, these GMAT trends.

[end discussion of 2017 questions]

2016 Tuck app info

Two essays, 500 words each, maybe a little longer for the first one. Here’s the blog post where the Tuck adcom announced them in early July :

1. What are your short and long-term goals? Why do you need an MBA to achieve those goals? Why are you interested in Tuck specifically? oh they switched it! HERE IS THE **ACTUAL** CLASS OF 2019 ESSAY 1! Tuck educates wise leaders who better the world of business. What are your short- and long-term goals? How will a Tuck MBA enable you to become a wise leader with global impact? up to 700 words

   Tuck has always cared about career goals as an important element of your application, yet this year they’ve thrown a twist into the works. The best way to write this is to show how you’ve done something in the past, that you can build on through the Tuck MBA. Try not to overhype it though!

2. As a diverse and global community, our students arrive at the same place from many different paths. Tell us about an experience in which you have had to live, learn and/or work with other people very different from yourself. What challenges and/or opportunities did you experience, how did you respond, and what did you learn about yourself as a result? – interesting – this is somewhat similar to what INSEAD tends to ask (some overlap there if you’re targeting both schools) – it’s also very flexible in that the “different from yourself” angle could be applied in myriad ways (just be sure to notice the “very” part; this is asking for a story where you had to deal with things in a new way because of your differences!)

We can tell you, Brave Supplicant, that these essays will take work, but you’re going to have a real opportunity to share something significant through both of them.

There’s also an optional essay (which is truly optional), and a separate reapplicant essay if you’re trying again.

other snarkolicious stuff:

• Tuck made our 2014 list of 5 favorite business schools!
• Tuck Admissions interview on BusinessBecause (July 2013)
• Tuck is really reapplicant-friendly – here they publish a self-assess you can conduct for what went wrong – it’s a great checklist for fresh applicants, too (May 2015)

The 2016 Tuck MBA Application Guide is going to be pretty valuable if you’re trying to deal with the complexity of the questions that Tuck is asking this year. Talks in depth about a variety of strategies to show “global impact” with your goals, and also the second question about dealing with people who are different from you. Tuck did not pull the punch on the questions for the Class of 2019 application!

[end discussion of 2016 questions]

As we expected, the 2015 essays are nearly identical to what was asked in 2014, except now they’re making the “school fit” angles more explicit. Lucky you – because these are great questions to show the strengths of your profile! You can see this year’s version and what’s changed here:

Two essays, 500 words each:

1. Why is an MBA a critical next step toward your short- and long-term career goals? Why is Tuck the best MBA fit for you and your goals and why are you the best fit for Tuck? What are your short- and long-term goals? Why do you need an MBA to achieve those goals? Why are you interested in Tuck specifically?
2. Tell us about your most meaningful leadership experience and what role you played. What did you learn about your own individual strengths and weaknesses through this experience? How will that experience contribute to the learning environment at Tuck?

Tuck has always cared about career goals as an important element of your application, and they changed the wording this year from what they had previously – and now this is a great career goals question! one of the best of all the schools that ask about goals these days.

There’s also two other essays available for certain circumstances: one, if you’re a reapplicant, and two, if you have other things you must share with the adcom in explanation of details on your app. The optional essay is only to be used if you really need it. Don’t feel compelled to submit one simply because it’s there. That would be a strategic misstep.

The career goals question is really asking for the same thing as they have always wanted to know about. They’ve simplified the way they’re asking for it, in ways which we feel are very applicant-friendly. It’s going to be easier for you to handle this based on those subparts than it was for some BSers last year.

In 2014, Tuck stuck to its guns and kept its own recommendations; this school did NOT have standardized recommendation questions last year. This was, frankly, an advantage to applicants, in our opinion. We don’t yet have word on what they will do in 2015 though we hope they’ll keep that status quo.

[end discussion of 2015 questions]

2014 Essays – EssaySnark’s Analysis

2014 Essay Questions on Tuck’s blog

The 2014 essays are the same as 2013, just fewer!

Two essays, 500 words each:

1. Why is an MBA a critical next step toward your short- and long-term career goals? Why is Tuck the best MBA fit for you and your goals and why are you the best fit for Tuck?
2. Tell us about your most meaningful leadership experience and what role you played. What did you learn about your own individual strengths and weaknesses through this experience?

There’s also an optional essay, and a separate reapplicant essay if you’re trying again.

In question #1, they added the phrase “and your goals” to the “fit” part of the question.

The other key change from last year? Besides the fact that they lopped off one entire essay from the set?

They deleted the word “collaborative” from the second essay question. This was a one-year addition (only asked in 2013; see below) where they wanted an example of a “collaborative leadership experience.” Now it’s just your “most meaningful” one – without the teamwork element. This distinction is important. We go into detail on this in our 2014 Tuck MBA essay guide.

The only other change seems to be that they’ve standardized with other schools in ditching the “Confidential Statement of Qualifications” moniker and instead are now calling recs what they are: “Letters of Recommendation.” They’re still confidential, unless you opt otherwise, and it would still help you to keep that focus on “qualifications” throughout your application. Again, this is discussed in the new Tuck strategy guide. Thankfully Tuck hasn’t “standardized” the rest of their recommendations process the way many of their peers have.

Tip: Tuck has a separate application process for their scholarships, with an additional essay and deadlines shortly after the standard round deadline. We have a QuickSnark Guide for the Tuck Scholarship Essay that you can pick up when you’re ready to tackle that.

9/17/14: They ditched the separate scholarship essay!

In terms of deadlines: 2014 was essentially the same as they had in 2013 except that they moved the January 2015 due date to the first Monday after the New Year, which is a relief; in January 2014, they had apps due on the Friday when everyone was still in holiday vacation-mode.

[end discussion of 2014 questions]

2013 Essays – EssaySnark’s Analysis

These are REALLY OLD.

They give you 500 words each – woo-hoo!

Three essays plus an optional (don’t do the optional unless you have a very good reason):

1. Why is an MBA a critical next step toward your short- and long-term career goals? Why is Tuck the best MBA fit for you and your goals and why are you the best fit for Tuck?
2. Tell us about your most meaningful collaborative leadership experience and what role you played. What did you learn about your own individual strengths and weaknesses through this experience?
3. Describe a circumstance in your life in which you faced adversity, failure, or setback. What actions did you take as a result and what did you learn from this experience?

Great questions! Not too different! Classic Tuck! And they give you some room to actually answer them. These should be easy for you. You may even want to do your Tuck application FIRST of all your schools; this will be a good way to learn the ropes on what it takes to write a strong pitch. (We had heard rumors that Tuck was doing a video essay this year… doesn’t seem to be the case.)

[end discussion of 2013 questions]

2012 Essays – these are SERIOUSLY REALLY OLD

Three essays:

1. Why is an MBA a critical next step toward your short- and long-term career goals? Why is Tuck the best MBA program for you, and what will you uniquely contribute to the community? (We’re betting they keep this question again this year.)
2. Discuss your most meaningful leadership experience. What did you learn about your own individual strengths and weaknesses through this experience?
3. Describe a circumstance in your life in which you faced adversity, failure, or setback. What actions did you take as a result and what did you learn from this experience?

[end discussion of 2012 questions]