If you’re applying to a selective MBA program, chances are good that the people you are competing against have higher grades and test scores than applicants in prior years.
Steady growth in MBA graduates’ salaries and job opportunities has encouraged many talented individuals to apply to top business schools, experts say. That means applicants to elite MBA programs face stiff competition.
“Applicants should understand that as schools get more competitive, they have to keep developing their skills and show almost an unending passion for everything they’ve put their mind towards — business, community, and personal achievements,” Vishal Sandhu, a 2015 MBA graduate from Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business and founder of the LumoSquid startup company, said via email.
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Over the past decade, the average GMAT score among incoming full-time students at the top 10 MBA programs in the U.S. News Best Business Schools rankings has risen dramatically. That’s according to data the schools submitted to U.S. News in an annual survey.
Score increases at some elite MBA programs were particularly significant. For example, at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, the average GMAT score of admitted students jumped 26 points between 2006 and 2016, rising from 702 to 728.
“Rising test scores in highly rated MBA programs are a reflection of the increased demand for these programs and the resulting global competition for admission into these institutions,” Ashok Sarathy, vice president of product management at the Graduate Management Admission Council, the nonprofit organization that administers the GMAT exam, said via email.
However, U.S. News data show that GMAT scores at other business schools have not significantly changed over the past decade. The average GMAT score of incoming, full-time freshmen at ranked business schools outside the top 10 was 624.6 in 2016, only 2.5 points higher than it was 10 years earlier.
Over the last decade, the average GPA among admitted MBA students increased at business schools both in and below the top 10, but that GPA increased 50 percent more at top 10 schools.
Shaifali Aggarwal, founder and CEO of the Ivy Groupe, an admissions consulting firm, says grade inflation could be a partial explanation for the rise in GPAs among admitted MBA students. She attributes the rise in GMAT scores at top schools to recent changes to GMAT cancellation policies.
“Because candidates can cancel a score within 72 hours of taking the GMAT, (after knowing what the score is), and even reinstate a cancelled score, there is absolutely no downside for candidates to retake the GMAT multiple times to increase their score; and so this is exactly what applicants have been and are doing,” Aggarwal said via email.
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Aggarwal says MBA applicants who are unsatisfied with their GMAT score should consider taking the GRE instead, since a high score on either exam can improve their admissions profile.
Because of the rising test scores at top b-schools, Aggarwal says MBA applicants who want to attend these schools should recognize that getting accepted is exceedingly difficult and that they may need to apply to a wider range of schools than they might have in the past.
Dennis Yim, Kaplan Test Prep’s director of academics, says applicants should not be fooled into thinking that the GMAT exam has gotten easier simply because the average score at top b-schools has increased. “Some people have speculated, I’ve heard this, that the exam has become easier, and we don’t believe that to be the case,” he says.
Yim says the rise in admitted students’ scores at top b-schools is a sign of two things: that these schools are becoming more selective and that applicants to these schools are becoming more diligent about test prep.
[Check out five key qualities of successful MBA applications.]
However, some admissions deans at top b-schools say they worry that — because of the uptick in average GMAT scores — some strong applicants might feel discouraged from submitting applications to these schools simply because their score is a little below the average.
That’s a concern for Bruce DelMonico, assistant dean of admissions at the Yale School of Management, where the average GMAT score rose from 701 to 725 between 2006 and 2016.
“People see that number and they think if I’m not at that number I don’t have a chance, and that’s not at all the case,” he says.
DelMonico says it’s important for applicants to remember that the average score is not a cutoff and that some people who score below the average get accepted.
“As an applicant, you do want to take the standardized test seriously, you want to do a good job. But I think the one thing that applicants tend to overlook is that these averages are just that,” he says. “They mean that there are people above and below. And especially when we report median scores, there’s the same number of people above and below.”
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Test Scores GPAS are Rising at Top MBA Programs originally appeared on usnews.com