I have always been confident that with time, I must get a western education. After participating in an exchange of students and visiting Harvard ten years ago, I did not even issue what and why, just a dream which over time developed into a goal.
In this article I would like to share the experiences in preparing to enter and describe a few personal observations, which I think will be useful for those just starting their way to the top schools. I tried to focus on those factors that are especially important for children from the former USSR, in particular from the Ukraine. I hope my experience will help you quickly and successfully reach a goal.
A couple words about me. At the beginning of my preparation I was29 years old and I served as head of the marketing department in one of the foreign companies involved in telecommunications. First of all, I learned how to pass exams and how to prepare for applying for MBA programs.
Because the GMAT is the primary requisite test, I looked through the resources that it is desirable to use for training. The site www.admissionsconsultants.com contains a list and brief reviews of recommended books.
Necessary books for self-training book which I recommend are on the site: www.amazon.com.
For more independent training refer to the library resources of Kiev Centre American Council (Melnikova Str, 63) www.americancouncilskyiv.org.ua / AlumniCenter
In Kiev, there is an opportunity to engage in courses to prepare for the GMAT. But for me, they proved quite insufficient. The main result of attending these courses was my acquaintance with people like myself interested in getting a western education. Most of us continued to prepare ourselves by the exchange of information, and the friendly support and assistance in the use of the resources for training.
The total time of preparation for the GMAT took me around a year and a half. Perhaps, for some two years seems too long time to prepare for this exam. But by the time I was promoted and was responsible for marketing, not only in Ukraine but also in Eastern Europe and Central Asia (a total of 12 countries) and had quite a busy work schedule and a lot of travel. Accordingly, the time that I could give for the exam preparation, had considerably declined. Two years for admission is considered to be sufficiently long, and I do not suggest that it takes so much time to just start training. But looking at the result, I am very happy that I reached the goal, and will proceed to one of the top schools, which is part of the eight best schools of the world, ranking third in Europe after INSEAD and LBS of the study Financial Times 2008 - ie Business School www.ie.edu.
I have filed papers in several schools in the United States, Britain and Spain. Also consider the option of Australian schools (Australian market at the moment is developing dynamically, especially against the backdrop of slowing development in Europe and Japan, as well as the crisis in the United States). With the help of correspondence by e-mail, I could clearly imagine the attitude of various schools to the students. The point is that after communicating with some of the top schools, it appears that they relate to students as a means of statistics. These school is not interested in the student and his destiny, and are only interested in their performance ratings. As an Admission Director whom I met in Kiev said “Such schools render a person in the room with a figure.” I prefer the normal human relationships and the mutual interest of the school and the student. I should also mention that ie Business School is one of the few, in communication with which you feel full support in all matters, from filing to registration of the loan at the bank and the search for housing in Madrid. Incidentally, the school entered into an exclusive contract with the bank Caja Madrid, and in contrast to other European top schools helps students obtain credit in the bank for a very low percentage (about 5.6% per annum) In addition the list of scholarships is quite impressive. As far as I know, all the students from the Ukraine received scholarships from the school and I am also grateful to the school for a scholarship, which was handed to me.
At the end of June 2008 I had finally been released and I was able to visit for the first time IE Business School Madrid. At the first meeting at the school (the so-called "Open Day" gives prospective students information about the school, arranges a meeting with alumni and students and conducts tours of the school. Interestingly ie Business School has developed its own exam, which you can sit in place of GMAT. The school places great emphasis on its leading position in the training of entrepreneurs. Most of the polling of the programmes last semester focuses on entrepreneurship, in fact those students, who have chosen the profile of entrepreneurship, also have a chance to get a diploma and to develop their business ideas. To this end, the school attracts a large number of investors who are exploring business plans, the most interesting of which eventually get a good ticket in life. I also want to note one very attractive bonus for me in learning at ie Business School - despite the fact that the program is taught in English, all graduates of post-school are even fluent in Spanish, which, after English is one of the most popular languages in the world
Now a bit about the "most horrible" part - the exams. Upon the expiration of six months intensive training, I still was not satisfied with the achieved level. While my training schedule was tough enough: every night after work until 11 pm, every Saturday in the library of American Council, and Sunday, at home. In summers 2006 and 2007 the first years of my leave in the morning until late at night were also given to prepare for the exam.
Initially, I felt that my level of English was good enough - in fact I have almost all the time in the office communicated with foreign colleagues in English, leading to all business correspondence and presentations in English. So I tried to concentrate on the mathematical part, which eventually proved the wrong tactic. In fact, the exam is very important for the verbal part - just for a better score. The logic is simple - a huge number of people for who English is not their native language take the annual examination, and quite naturally, a large proportion of errors are accounted for in the verbal part of the exam (although fair, it should be noted that even native speakers have to prepare quite thoroughly, exploring rarely used words.) The overall score in GMAT is dependent on the results of responses to complex tasks, which increasingly are referring to verbal portion of the exam.
Giving special attention to the preparation of this part of the examination will greatly help to improve your score. Also note that the GMAT has its own criteria for the correct English language (this applies to section Sentence Correction)
Apart from the need to pass the GMAT language tests TOEFL or IELTS, very often the question arises which is better to sit first GMAT or TOEFL. From my point of view, if you have done a successful GMAT, the language test will seem easier.
I want to say a few words regarding the language test. As I have noted above, without perfect knowledge of English you will never have done a good GMAT score. Accordingly, the delivery of additional language test after passing the GMAT, I, personally, take it as a manifestation of discrimination of non-English language in order to attract additional funds to the budget of providers of the language tests. By the way, I was very happy when I saw that some of the schools exclude language tests from the number of tests required for admission (for example, it is MIT, Cambridge, and others). I hope that this will soon expand to other schools which will help save money, and, most importantly, time.
A few words about the preparation, at this stage it is very important that each and every detail of the emphasis is placed in the essay. Usually the schools require the disclosure of their order which rarely coincide with the themes of other schools. Often, given the limitation on the number of words, it is very difficult to accommodate all that they wish in 400 words, as, for example, I have been preparing an essay for Cambridge. How do you manage to adjust to their writing under the criteria of the school which will determine success. At this stage, it is desirable to have an experienced consultant who would take a third-party review of your «works», and help formulate your statement accurately and not distort with a style typical of you. Many advisers can write in your essay, give a lot of ready-stamps «how to», but very few are capable, while retaining the individuality of your style as a basis to explain to you the differences between your perception of words and perceptions of a representative western schools. I was lucky, my colleague recommended me is a consultant - George Allen Hill. (George Hill) UK. As a former police officer in the British Defence Police, he possesses not only the professional knowledge of psychology and a great life experience, but also important for the direction of the consultant's personal qualities: attention to detail, kindness and a great deal of patience.
In my case, George was also a consultant on school choice, giving a brief comparative review of UK schools. George has also successfully prepared one of my friends for an interview with Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, after which he received an invitation to study in the United States.
http://rankings.ft.com/global-mba-rankings
My additional advice and monitoring, present in this section is information based on my personal experiences and the experiences of others preparing for MBA. I would like to hope that it will be useful for you.
One of the most important factors when preparing to enter, in my view, is the contact with the school. Contact is important for several reasons - first, you are communicating with the school, have a chance to learn more about the school and to understand whether you really want to learn in this school. Secondly, the school has the opportunity to become acquainted with the new entrants and the opinion about you can be critical when considering the large number of documents which are required for the application. Thus, direct contact with the school can be a factor in the successful passage of all stages of the selection from the analysis of documents and ending with a final discussion of your candidacy Admission Board Members of your school.
Even if you do not visit the school to which you would like to continue to learn, do not despair - there are a number of MBA exhibitions and conferences, for example, The World MBA Tour www.topmba.com or The Access MBA Fair www.accessmba.com which are held annually in Kiev and other cities in the CIS. I visited several such exhibitions in Kiev and one in Moscow. Talk with representatives of business schools; you get more information than can be read on their websites of the schools or in brochures and pamphlets. From schools for these events come mainly directors and managers of the examining board, which is important not only to advertise their school, but look for potentially successful students. Communication with alumni can be particularly interesting - they can tell you things that school officials will never reveal. Pay attention to the fact that many schools engage in the creation of files for each contact with prospective students. Preliminary look at the list of schools taking part and select the most interesting. Visit the sites of selected schools and check out basic information about the school. I recommend writing a letter to admission departments with a request to reserve time during the exhibition to discuss your issues with the school. Attached to the letter should be a brief CV (resume). In this case, the representative of the school will already know the correspondence and give maximum attention to your questions and may give specific advice based on your profile. Plus, you thus demonstrate a serious interest in the school. Such preparation will command more respect. The World MBA Tour, where visitors are able to freely move from stand to stand is a good sourse of contact and I would recommend that you use the techniques described above, otherwise you will have a long wait to ask a single question. With respect to The Access MBA Fair, it’s organizers practice a very different approach - the school is in a separate room, visitors also should be received to communicate with a limited amount of time (an average of about 15 minutes). And, to save time, the organizers of the group arrange for 2-3 people at a time which also reduces your opportunity to ask questions.
Once again I want to stress - for both exhibitions is very important that you come prepared and the questions to be asked are already prepared, showing an interest and a serious attitude. Questions of the type: ‘And in what country is your school? Or ‘Will I have to learn in your school and at the same time earn a penny somewhere in the evenings’? Could show that you are not very much interested in the school, and this ultimately could adversely affect the decision taken by the school regarding your candidacy.
I do not just focus on the importance of communication with the school. All of my friend’s children were enrolled in schools with whom they met in person prior to the filing of documents. In my case, this theory also worked - and I received an invitation from two of the three schools, which I previously met
