Blog Post Quality = #FAIL

Some very kind person was nice enough to leave this comment on my wall not too long ago.  When I read it I was on the bus on the way to see my tutor, so I couldn't respond to the post as quickly as I would have liked too.

To whomever this user is, please don't be "sorry" to say it.  If that's what you feel no need to preface with an apology because the "sorry" doesn't lighten the blow of you saying the quality of my blog posts seems to be declining.

But in full disclosure... I'm going to agree with you.  I mean CLEARLY the blog posts are not as full and lengthy as a couple months ago.  I will give you that much.

The real question that should be asked is "Why is the quality of your blog posts declining?"

The answer there is... How can I possibly justify spending an hour to two hours writing a blog post when I have so much to accomplish in order to hit the submit button on my application?  Also... my GMAT is on the 20th.  So do I spend an hour or two writing a post or study?  Cost/Benefit analysis says study.

The truth of the matter is for me.. and many applicants out there trying to get everything done for Round 2 Consortium Deadline, there is nothing glamorous about the last couple of weeks in December and I'm not going to pretend like it is.

Everyone has heard me complain about the GMAT, Essays, finding Recommenders etc etc.  To tell the truth I'm actually tired of writing about it.  And you know what?  That's the life that I'm living right now - my reality, which is the whole reason for my blog.  If one has followed the cadence of my excitement from the beginning of my blog, he/she would understand.

Yes it's fun researching schools... visiting schools..... talking to current students... establishing new friendships prior to business school.  That's all well and good, but then you get to a point where you are simply over it all.  That's where I am now and it is reflected in my posts - and that works for me.  The quality of my life has declined this month so it's natural that the quality of my blog posts will decline.

But don't fret - Just give me a week until after I take the GMAT and I will back to blogging with more conviction.  But right now... yeah... for the next week...  you'll have to be fine with the posts I do make.

With that being said, thank you for your comment and for reading my blog.  Contrary to popular belief, because I did consult some people and ask "What did this person mean by this?", I hope I did not offend you.

Over and Out!

PS - These types of "venting" posts only take me 15 minutes to write,

Addendum to WTF CR = Death (below)

As per my post below here is an addendum - I just watched the first 10 slides of the CR 2 lesson and already realize where I made my mistakes...  I was focusing on the content within these more advanced sections rather than the LOGIC behind them...  I threw the whole SWIMMER categorization out the window.  This is my own fault and oversight...

so what I've done is put SWIMMER on my wall and I'm going to make notecards with each component.  I will NOT tackle CR again until I have these memorized!

So when I'm laying in bed watching Hulu or Studying or just playing around on the internet this is what I stare at in front of me on the wall on three big posterboards.

The SWIMMER poster was just added tonight after my little hissy fit haha... the other two have been up there for a while...

Thanks for bearing with me through my little hissy fit bout!  Back to the CR 2 Lesson.. hahaha...

Signing off,

Hot Mess Overreactor

The Calm b4 the GMAT Storm - 4 DAYS!

So first off... I would like to thank everyone for wishing me good luck on Saturday.  I truly get excited when I check my email and see that I have another post on my blog...keep'em coming!  You guys are definitely helping me through this process!

Kulmiye - your post gave me a slap in the face - much needed i might add.  I need to be confident.  I've realized that I do know what I know.  I know all of the information that will be thrown at me on Saturday regardless of my scores.  Saturday will just come down to me putting it all together.  The ONLY way I'll be able to put the pieces together is by staying calm... I can do this right?  I mean it's just a test with a buncha questions that are worded awkwardly to throw me off?  I just need to see through the matrix.

I did not take the Kaplan exam on Sunday because the moderator guy said that it was not a CAT exam.  I didn't feel that I needed to take 3 hours away from studying, to do a non-cat exam.  So I just did a MGMAT CAT exam instead.  This was the beginning of my short lived depression.  I scored the lowest on this CAT than I had EVER.  The only good thing that came from taking this CAT exam was that I got 12 out of 14 SC corrections right.  I was very thrilled about that.  I proved to myself that I could do SC at the caliber that would be needed to score well on the Verbal section.  Now for the downside.... I think I had been drilling SC so much that I completely underestimated CR, which had been my best section out of all GMAT problems.  Actually that's not true... I have about a 95% hit rate in Geometry, but CR was always one of my highest scoring sections.  Here's a picture of my studying on my deck when I went home this weekend:

I think on that last CAT exam I got 4 CR's correct.  I decided not to read to much into that and just call it an anomaly.  I've realized that I do the best on sections that I'm looking forward too and that I'm calm for.  During one of my MGMAT Cat exams... out of the first 18 questions.. I had 1 sentence correction.  I don't think that will happen on the real exam... at least I hope not... or... maybe I hope so... because I like SC now.  OMG I didn't think the day would ever come where I would say that.  I guess I can say that about the test as a whole... I like trying to figure out the pieces to the puzzle.  Now I see why some people score 750 and try to take the exam again to get 800's.  I don't agree with it... but I can see why they would have that drive.

TEST CENTER DRY RUN 

So I've heard horror stories about people going to the wrong testing center...  not being able to find parking.... etc etc blah blah... so I decided to do a dry run to the test center.  I don't have to worry about parking or anything since I live in NYC.  I'm not even going to take the subway for fear of it breaking down with me on it.  I live in Hells Kitchen (Midtown west(ish)) and my test center is right by Bryant Park.  So on Monday - on my day off.. I was "sick"  ::cough cough::  I decided to time myself and take a walk.

Now I'm sure you guys heard about the bomb scare in Times Square on Saturday.  As a result of the bomb scare I decided to try to avoid Times Square.  Getting blown up on my test date would not be an ideal situation.  So I took a different route and encountered another issue... the issue being.. Mario Lopez filming something... so I had to dig through a crowd of people.  Of course I had to take a picture just to show you guys that I'm not lying.

So I took a couple of pictures and kept it moving...  I got to the Pearson building on 5th avenue and thought... ok that's enough... then I wanted to see what would be required for me to get up to the floor.. all I needed to do was show my ID at the security desk and he said 31st floor.  So I go to the elevator...  go up to the floor... saw the office where I would go... and clocked my time at 35 minutes.  I was walking really slow.  I could easily do that walk in 20 minutes, but I'm not going to be rushing on Saturday.

So that's that... last but not least... and this is my favorite part haha... So last week I got an email from the Kaplan center up the street from me...  Apparently Dartmouth is having an admissions event at the Kaplan Center on Saturday from 11 - 1.  I think it's basically an information session.  I WILL be in attendance.  Yes I know you're asking yourselves "Isn't your exam Saturday?"  Yes it is... So I will wake up around 9:30am... eat breakfast which will probably be Dunkin Donuts - I'm addicted... Then I'll go to this info session until 1... come home... probably go over things like what to do for AWA and stuff like that... then 3:15pm I'll start walking over to the testing center.  

After the exam I will come home... update my blog - MAYBE!  and then I have to hop on a train to go back to Jersey to go out with some friends... either way a drink will be in order.  If you don't see a blog post from me on Saturday you know it didn't go well.  If I do post.. it will just be my score!

OH!  I almost forgot... I'm kinda upset that Avatar isn't rentable on itunes!  I was looking forward to watching that Friday night.  Do you guys have any other ideas?  Nothing serious... 

Dartmouth Tuck Visit

Hello everyone... I know it's been a while since I've written but I've been very busy.  Todays post will simply be about my visit to the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.  I will warn you now that this is going to be a very very long post.

Day 1

So I took the Dartmouth Coach up to Hanover on 3/24.  I arrived at the Yale Club by Grand Central Station at 1pm to catch the bus up there.  The bus was a luxury coach with about 20 seats total.  It had flat screen tv's, reclining chairs, refreshments in the back, a coffee machine, and of course a bathroom.  4.5 hours later we pulled up in front of the Hanover Inn, which is directly across the street from the Dartmouth campus.  I went inside the hotel to wait for the shuttle to the Courtyard Marriot that I was staying at.  About 10 minutes later, I hopped into the shuttle and was whisked off to my hotel 3 miles away.


After checking in and unpacking, I went downstairs to the lobby/bar to order dinner and study by the fire and watched bball.  I had a nice tasty bacon cheeseburger and went through my PowerScore SC Bible.  





Upon finishing I went back upstairs, ironed my clothes, and got ready for the next day.

Day 2

So I wake up in the morning, go downstairs to the hotel lobby and eat breakfast at the buffet.  I request the shuttle to take me to Tuck around 11:15.  I had set up three meetings with Tuckies.  The official visitors tour would be held on Friday, so Thursday was just the day that I had given to myself to check out the campus.  This ended up being the BEST part of my trip!


Arriving on Campus - As I sit on the hotel shuttle, on my way to Tuck, we drive through a little section of the Dartmouth campus.  The main landmark that we pass by is the Baker library.  This is the image that I've seen 1,000,000 times on the website and other Dartmouth promotional material.  About a minute after passing the library we make arrive on the Thayer School of Engineering and Tuck campuses, which border each other.  I get out of the shuttle and walk around a bit to take some pictures before entering any buildings.


I go inside of Stell hall and sit and wait to meet the first Tuckie.  Stell hall is a gorgeous study hall.  It has incredibly high ceilings, big overstuffed couches and chairs, and large tables.  I had seen pictures of it online but thought it would be a little bit bigger than it was.  Don't get me wrong it's a great size though.  Stell hall isn't at the end of a hallway, but it's in the middle of two buildings students walk through.  I say this to say that even if a student doesn't have the intentions of studying at that juncture, they may be passing through to get to their next destination.  This makes Stell hall a great meeting place.    This was a perfect example of the Tuck community.  I saw many occasions where students would be walking by, and see someone else studying and go over to them to say hi...and then when they would be walking out they'd see someone else they knew and would talk to them briefly.  Everyone definitely knows everyone and everyone was all smiles!

First meeting - So the main reason Tuck is my first choice is because of the Center for Digital Strategies. I've had reservations about removing myself from the digital industry/world for 2 years, because of it's dynamic nature.  When I found out about the Center for Digital Strategies at Tuck I happily put the school at the top of my shortlist.  I reached out an CDS MBA Fellow a couple weeks before my trip to see if I could pick his brain for a couple minutes about the Center and all that it has to offer.  The response I got was inviting me to listen to a quest speaker.  I naturally jumped at the opportunity.


I meet the MBA Fellow and he tells me that there's an MBA Fellows luncheon that we would be attending.  Initially, I thought that meant that we'd be sitting in the Pepsico dining hall at a table with the rest of the Fellows.  In actuality, it meant that we'd be sitting in a nice room with a catered lunch.  There were about 7 other 2nd year MBA students in the room and someone directly from the CDS.  The discussion topic for that meeting revolved around coming up with a theme for the CDS for the '10/'11 school year.  The plans need to be finalized for two reasons. 1. the 1st year MBA students wishing to apply to become 2nd year MBA fellows need to know what to write about in their applications.  2. potential speakers need to be reached out to.


It was absolutely amazing for me to participate in this lunch.  The reason I say participate is because I did just that.  I gave my input and could tell it was from a different perspective than some others.  I did not feel intimidated at all because the discussion was very open and everyone was very friendly.  I'll leave the exact discussion to the imagination.  Wouldn't want any 1st years to have an unfair advantage!


All in all - I could definitely see myself sitting in that room in a couple years going through the same process again!


Second Meeting - I reached out to a member of TAABA who is also a Consortium Fellow, to see if I could pick her brain for a little bit.  After going back and for through email, trying to finalize a time to meet, I had a meeting set up with another member since the first student was unavailable to meet.  What ended up happening was so typical of the Tuck community.  About an hour before my meeting with the student, I got an email from another member/consortium fellow who was curious to know if anyone had reached out to me.  I told him that I was all set but I also asked him if I would be joining us and he said sure.


I met the two 1st year students outside of the dining hall and we walked into town for some coffee.  The walk into town was about 10/15 minutes, just because we were taking our time.  I ended up getting tea and one of the students opted to pay for me which I thought was a nice gesture.


From this discussion I got a great sense of what it's like to be a 1st year student at Tuck.  We talked about everything... literally... EVERYTHING.  We even got into a discussion about the veribification of companies like Google and Xerox!  It was refreshing...


I asked about the first year living situation and they told me that I wouldn't get to see what a room looks like on the tour the next day.  One of them offered to show me his room, even though it was dirty, but it was great that he offered.  Of course I took him up on his offer and we walked back to campus.  We walked into one of the first year residence dorms.  I was so gorgeous I felt like I was in a hotel!  I'll explain more about the building later...  He took me upstairs to show me his room.  It was a good size with a HUGE desk that spanned the length of the room.  I didn't get a look at the bathroom, but just seeing the room was good enough.  Another piece of information that you wouldn't find on any website is that the beds in the rooms are actually SLEEP NUMBER beds!  I thought that was pretty cool.  The closets were big too... so much so that even I think I could fit all of my clothes in them.


Waiting for Third Meeting - In between the 2nd and 3rd meeting with students, I had about 3 hours to kill.  I didn't want to go back to the hotel because I wanted to walk around Hanover.  I walked in a couple of the Dartmouth apparel/bookstores...just checking things out.  I also went into GAP because I saw it as familiar territory..haha.   I didn't buy anything though.  I decided to spend my time in the Bookstore studying for the GMAT.  Ultimately, if I want to go to Tuck, I need to score high on the GMAT.  I was in the bookstore studying for two hours then decided to go back to Tuck to meet my third Tuckie.


Third Meeting - The third meeting that I had set up was with a member of the Gay/Straight Alliance or GSA.  I was to meet him outside of the Pepsico dining hall, so I grabbed a magazine and just sat and waited for him.  Now let me explain this area outside of the dining hall.  You can enter this common space 1 of 5 ways.  You can be coming from Stell Hall, coming from the entrance of the dining hall, coming from the exit of the dining hall, from upstairs, and from downstairs.  Needless to say this area has a lot of traffic.  With this traffic comes a lot of student interaction.  Imagine a scene where there are people coming from every which way, running into each other, saying hi... chatting for a bit... then going their separate ways.  This scene was played out over and over again...it was quite comical actually lol.  Like I've said before... everyone knows everyone.


So anyway, I met the student from GSA, and we go into the dining hall and grab a drink.  He proceeds to tell me that he had invited another GSA member to sit and talk with us too.  After the earlier events in the day, this did not surprise me and it was more than welcomed.  The main reason I wanted to meet with GSA members was to find out what it's like to be out at Dartmouth.  Again, it didn't seem to be an issue.  Essentially, if you wanted to "queen out" you could.  If you wanted to remain low key... you could.  Being gay would never be an issue.  He also said that with that being the case, dating becomes tough/non-existent... there are less than 15 out students between 1st and 2nd years combined.  From three that I had interaction with (two at the lunch and one prior) 2 of the 3 had partners.  I guess this tells me that I need to get a partner prior to attending Tuck, if I get in and go haha.


I sat and talked to these two students for about an hour...and one had to leave to attend a meeting.  It was about 7pm and the 2nd student (that had been invited by the other one) said that he had to go meet his friends for dinner, but that they were going to the movies later and I was more than welcome to join.  I was slightly taken back by this invitation but told him that I would take him up on his offer.


I then called for my hotel shuttle, and went back to the hotel to change into some comfortable clothes.  I called for the shuttle shortly thereafter and took it back into Hanover.  We saw The Hurt Locker.  The movie was good, but it was a little long in my opinion.  After the movie, the student asked me how I was getting home, and I said I was going to call a cab since it was 11pm and my hotel shuttle wasn't running that late.  He said there was no need for me to call a cab and that he could drive me back.  Again, the hospitality of Tuck students is amazing.  I think any other student would have offered to drive me as well.


I got back to my hotel... watched some TV... and ironed my clothes for the next day.  The next day would be my official Tuck visit, but I was so thankful that I had gone up there a day early.

Day 3

I woke up in the morning...got dressed... didn't eat breakfast because I knew that at 12 I would be eating lunch.  I called for the hotel shuttle to Dartmouth, and headed to campus.  The day was jam packed with events, so I'll describe them here:

Waiting for Class Visit - So upon arrival, I went in to the admissions office waiting room where there was another prospective student sitting down reading.  She was from Washington state and came out east to visit Tuck, Cornell, and UPenn.  We talked for a while and then another prospective showed up. He was dressed in a suit because he was applying for R4, so he had his interview.  He was from Boston.  I told him that I had never been to Boston but would be up there on April 12th at Harvard for the LGBT Open House.  He was like "OH ME TOO!  I'LL SEE YOU THERE".... after about 10 minutes, two 1st year students come in and inform us that we'll be going with them to class.  

Class Visit - We sat in on Managerial Economic Accounting (I think that was the name of the class) or Managerial Accounting.  Something of that nature.  In order to get to the classroom, we go through Stell Hall, through the common area outside of the dining hall, walk downstairs, go through some hallways and go into the classroom.  

Our student guide said that she was going to introduce us to the professor first before class.  Richard Sansing was the professor.  He asked for our name and what we currently do.  I introduced myself and said that I do Search Engine Marketing for Bloomingdales.com.  He looked to the side, and I could tell he was thinking about something.  Then he said "______ Glassmeyer...she works in Marketing for Bloomingdale's.  Do you know her?"  I said that I thought the name sounded familiar but maybe she works in the marketing department for the store side, instead of .com.  He said "She used to sit right there... and her father is one of the people whom the Center for Digital Strategies is named after."  It's official name is the Glassmeyer/McNamee Center for Digital Strategies!  I immediately wrote down her name so I could research it later and reach out to her.  It goes to show how close knit the community is.  Not only could the professor recall the students name, but also WHERE SHE SAT.  And she had graduated in 2005 so it wasn't even like it was last year.  

After this interaction we went to the top row in the classroom and listened to the class discussion.  There were about 60 students in the classroom.  The professor introduced all of the visiting students and everyone in the class cheered and clapped as a welcoming.  It was very very tiered, and EVERYONE had their laptops out with the spreadsheet that they were analyzing.  Everyone was involved in the class discussion and it wasn't that the professor stood up there teaching.  It was very very interactive.  At one point in the day I made eye contact with the CDS MBA Fellow that I had met the day before.  He waved and I felt like I had a friend haha, as cheesy as that sounds.  

Lunch w/ Student - After our class visit we rushed to the dining hall to grab a table.  I think the 12pm hour is the busiest for the dining hall.  It was very crowded.  I got a cheeseburger and made myself a salad.  Unlike my Yale SOM visit, we did have free lunch vouchers, so we didn't have to pay for anything.  While I was waiting in line I was talking with a student and she said her name.  I realized that she was the initial consortium member that I had emailed, but hadn't met because she was unavailable.  I told her my name and she was all smiles and asked me how my visit was going.  She told me that if I had any questions for her, not to hesitate to email her.  I thought that was a great gesture but yet again... not surprising.

After that encounter I sat down at the table with our student guide and the other people visiting.  I'll be honest, I was just listening at this point because I basically had all of my other questions answered the previous day by the other students.  I basically just let the other visiting students, ask their questions.  I just listened and ate my nice cheeseburger and salad haha.  

Campus Tour - after lunch we went back into the admissions office waiting area to wait for our tour to begin.  Again we walk through Stell Hall...walk by the dining hall...go downstairs again past a couple classrooms... walk by a set of lockers which are for students living off campus...  we ended up going inside one of the newer classrooms. It was a very nice classroom...nicer than the one I had been in earlier.  From there we proceeded to go into the residence hall.  One thing to note is that all of the buildings are connected by tunnels so there is no need for a student to go outside.  The tour was about 25 minutes long since Tuck isn't that big of a school.

Admissions q&a - After the campus tour we went back to the admissions office waiting room and waited for the admission q&a to start.  There were 6 prospective students including myself.  One of the admissions committee members came in and closed the door.  She sat down on the couch and answered every single question that we had for her.  We asked her questions for about an hour.  She was not in a rush to get out of there, and I think she would have stayed there for another hour if we hadn't run out of questions.  I had two specific questions for her.  

- One question pertained to the Consortium application and whether or not students had a hard time trying to convey "Why Tuck?" since we only have the option of doing 1 school specific essay.  The answer she gave me made my whole trip worth it.  (If you want to know the answer let me know... I just don't want to post it here).

- The second major question I had for her was regarding my low GPA.  I told her that I was taking some marketing classes but was concerned that it wouldn't prove my quant competancy.  I didn't want to vocalize my GPA because the rest of the students were in the room, but she told me that I could speak to her 1 on 1, when we were done.  So after we were done, I told her my GPA and basically got her thoughts on me taking some additional quant classes.  She told me the exact classes that I should focus on taking and doing well in to prove that I can handle the workload.  I had heard before from other people that building an additional transcript isn't necessary, and that one should just look to do the best they can on the GMAT.  Well doing the best you can is a given, but in my case I feel that I need to take those additional classes so I'll be doing just that.  I also feel that her advice trumps all other advice since she is on the admissions committee!  

After the admissions q&a I traded b-cards with the other students on the tour with me.  I went outside, and ran into my student guide.  I lit a cigarette and she asked if I could have one we talked more about school itself and she insisted that I keep in touch with her.  

Day 4

Rest of Trip -.... packed... ate...  hopped back on the shuttle back on Saturday

All in all my visit went better than expected.  I feel that I have a couple people on my side now - should I score high enough on the GMAT.  I am in love with the school... the campus... and most importantly the students!  Their love for the school is contagious.  Some did say that had they gotten into HBS they would have attended there, but I think people would say that about most schools.  I'm sure I'm forgetting some other things but that's the gist of my visit!  

Getting the hang of studying!

So I think I'm finally getting the hang of this studying thing... I know took my long enough right?  My last MGMAT class is next week!  ahaha... but maybe after my venting session during my last post, just maybe THAT'S the reason why I'm getting the hang of it now.

I am no longer intimidated by different types of questions.  Now every time I finish a topic in one of the study guides.  I redo the couple of questions that I got wrong on whichever topics I covered that night.  It's a big confidence booster being able to immediately answer the questions correctly.  Now yes of course there isn't a time constraint, and I've seen the problem already (not that I remember them) but it's good to know that the questions I saw previously... no longer trick me.

What is concerning though is the fact that I haven't tackled any of the "advanced" chapters in any of the study guides.  But you know what?!?  I'll get there... I'm optimistic.

My 30 day game- plan starts soon.  I think G-Day (GMAT Day) will be May 1st.  If I give myself a deadline I'll be able to work towards it.

That's it for tonight... short and sweet... I have a long day tomorrow...gotta get some sleep.  BTW I KILLED the geometry study guide!  Just need to go through coordinate geometry again, but other than that... yeah I got it...

l8er

Bad News Bears...

Greetings Fellow whoever reads this...

So the other day I said that I would have a good post for (yesterday).  I forgot why I said that.  I wonder if I had some epiphany to update you guys on.  Maybe it will come back to me as I write tonight.

So first the Good News Bears... then the Bad News Bears...

Good News:  I'm putting the pieces together for my trip up to visit Dartmouth Tuck (which may not even be a reality anyway...will get to this later).  So initially I was planning on taking the bus up to Hanover on Thursday 3/25.  I would get up to campus around 8pm... check into my hotel... study in the hotel and get ready for the next day.  The next day I planned on attending a class, having lunch with Tuckies, touring the campus, and attending an Admissions q&a.  I would then hopefully talk with some students who weren't busy and then head back to my hotel, to be up early the next morning to catch the bus back to the city at 6:30am.

I wanted to reach out to some current students first to meet them for coffee while I was up there and pick their brains.  I emailed a member of the Gay/Straight alliance and a Fellow at the Center for Digital Strategies.  Both responded within 24 hours, which is more than I can say for other schools.  I spoke with the member of GSA last night and although she won't be around when I'm visiting, she said she would definitely make sure that I met some members and got to speak with them.  So that right in and of itself is amazing!

Like I said, I also reached out to a Fellow at the Center for Digital Strategies... he told me that on the 25th there is going to be a speaker.  He said that if I was sure to reach out to him again that it would be great if I could sit in on the event..  So of course at this point I'm jumping up and down inside.  There was one problem though... I wouldn't get up to Hanover until the 25th @ 8pm.  So what do I do?  well... easy...  extended my stay an extra day.  So now I will get up to Hanover on the 24th at 8pm... study in the hotel... go to the event on the 25th.. hopefully set up a line of meet and greets and coffee drinking.  I don't even like coffee anymore...so maybe I'll drink tea.  Then on the 26th I'll do all of the visitor(y) things and end my weekend the same as planned.

So that's the Good News Bears... the reason why all this may not even matter is below:

Today I studied modifiers... definitely not a fan.  A lot of them I can get but then they throw in Which and That and I say "Oh crap" and can't remember the rules for using them.  I think that is used when the modifier is necessary and which is used when it's non-essential.  I could just pick up my book and figure it out, but it's on the floor and I'm in my bed.

My list of things to review is growing longer than the list of things that I know.  This is very concerning and disheartening to be honest.  I'm hitting a wall and I'm not a fan.  I won't say that I thought this would be an easy process, but I thought I would be able to retain more information than I have.  I'm on information overload and none of it is straightening out in my head.  Frustrating = YES!

You see I'm the type of person that needs to do problems over and over again.  Sure I'll get frustrated when I don't get the answer right the first or second time, but I'm pretty solid at recalling processes after that.  The way the information is provided in my MGMAT class may not be the most conducive way for me to retain information.  I'm also beginning to think that the class isn't meant for material to be retained immediately.  I believe it's to present the information you will need to know to do well on the exam, and then when you do your month of self study post-class you'll know all of the tricks.  I've recently come to terms with this set up but it's beginning to frighten me.

I'm starting to doubt myself.  Will I be able to score a 710+ on this exam?  If so... what will it take?  If someone can tell me this information I'll be eternally grateful!  I think what I need is for this class to be over asap... and then I need to be able to make my one month calendar/study plan and stick to that.  It's going to have to be a realistic study plan WITH breaks dispersed throughout.

I will be taking my second MGMAT CAT exam on Saturday.  As much trouble as I've been having lately, I think I need this test to validate my studying, with an increased score.  You know how sometimes you've been in a bubble that you need a dose of reality to show you have you've been doing? Well yeah... that's where I am now...

My goal for this next CAT is 630.  That will be a 40 point increase since the first exam.  Tomorrow I need to skim through everything I've done up until this point and go through my notecards again.  Just to refresh my memory.

I don't have any more updates from my friends... but once I hear something I will let you all know!  ::sigh::  this is taking the energy out of me like it's nobody's business!  I need to get break 700 or I think my chances will be very very slim for any of these top schools.

sidnote - it looks like HBS is creeping up on Tuck in my poll!

I worked yesterday who cares about the rate?

So after my near meltdown earlier, I put in 4 hours [3 REAL] hours of studying...  I'm still trying to press through this Manhattan GMAT World Translations guide.  This is taking forever... Tonight I did Work/Rate problems and Ratios.  I can already tell that I'm going to have to go through this guide one more time.  That means that between Number Properties and Word Translations I have a lot of work to do.

After I did the problems a the end of the chapters I looked back at my first MGMAT CAT Diagnostic exam to see if I could do the work/rate and ratio problems that I got wrong.  I was able to solve them successfully.  It made me smile.  The curious thing though is that some of the questions that I found EASY on the CAT exam were the 700-800 level questions.  Now let me remind you that I took that CAT before the start of my class.  I made mistakes on the 300-400 and 500-600 simple questions.  I'm not sure what the takeaway there is but I'm going to assume it's good.

As I sit here in my livingroom, I'm staring at myself in the mirror on the wall on the other side of the room... i think i've lost about 5lbs... which would be noticeable on me - hhmmm odd...

I'm just rambling now because I'm waiting for my movie to finish downloading on itunes.  I'm addicted to the Saw thriller movies, and 6 is available to rent... so that's what I did.  I'll fall asleep... wake up... hop on a conference call... and then get back to studying.

You guys should be proud of me for not going out tonight, although I could have definitely used a:

Cheers!

Yale SOM Visit

So I just got home from my visit up at the Yale School of Management. All in all it was a success.  I got my first taste of the day in the life of an MBA student.  Ok here goes the recap...

I was at Penn Station by 6:30 and got on the train at 7.  At this point I had no idea what to expect.  I started thinking to myself... “Is this school going to be a fit?”  “How many other people will be in the group?” etc etc blah blah... ok fell asleep on train... 1.5 hours later I was in New Haven.

It was my first time being in New Haven.  I had driven by it before but never stopped in it.  Maybe going to McDonald’s or something but whatever.  So my first impression was “wow this is an old town!”  You really get a sense of it being a New England town, just from looking at the buildings.  They’re all brick and not very high... remember I’m used to NYC.  It was quaint, not much hustle and bustle but then again it’s Presidents Day.

So I go outside the train station and have a cigarette of course.  Yes yes I know disgusting habit that I’m going to quit after the GMATs!  ;-)  I get in a cab and tell him 55 Hillhouse Ave, which is the Yale SOM visitors center/admissions building.  Ok so I’m used to being in cabs, but this cab was expensive and I don’t think the Visitors center could have been more than 2 miles away from the train station.  The cab started at $3.25 and was $0.25 per 1/9th mile!  $8.75 and $1.25 tip later I’m standing in front of the Visitors center.  I go take a couple of pictures of some signs and have another cigarette just because I knew I wouldn’t be able to have one for a while! 

I was about a half hour early, so I walk in and introduce myself, get my name tag, and have a seat.  When I walked in there was another prospective student sitting there.  Turns out she was waiting to have her interview.  No wonder she looked a bit nervous.  People started trickling in and before you know it, they moved us to another room where we all sat and waited for a couple students to come in and give us an introduction.  We were all making small chat.  You know the standard “where are you from?”  “what do you do?”  “are you here for an interview and a tour or just an interview?”  I would say that about half of the people in the group of say 20, were there for an interview as well.  Another handful were applying for R3, and the rest of us were just getting an early start on visiting schools.

Now as a sidenote I will say the following for anyone going to visit schools.  Please dress appropriately.  I wore dress shoes, suit pants, a light blue button down shirt underneath a navy blue v-neck sweater.  I was dressed appropriately.  There were about 3 people in jeans and button downs or sweaters.  That wouldn’t have been weird had it just been me mixed in with them, but we were mixed in with people dressed in suits going in for their interviews.  So I would have felt inadequate had I been them.  

Since this was Yale... i would say 90% of people visiting wore blue!  Coincidence?  I think not!  

After a couple minutes, our student guides came in and explained to us the new (circa 2006) Yale SOM Integrated Curriculum.  This was definitely a high-point of the day for me, because honestly... I could not truly decipher the diagram on the website.  Can you?  http://mba.yale.edu/MBA/curriculum/pdf/diagram.pdf Didn’t think so. 

Well the student guides broke this down for us and it totally makes sense and energized me.  Instead of having multiple classes within each siloed discipline like Finance, Accounting, Marketing, etc.... you learn things from different perspectives such as... from the Customer perspective, Investor perspective, Competitor perspective, Employee, and so on and so forth.  You do get to learn the basics of Economics and Accounting and such in the beginning of your first year, but the Perspectives are the main ways of learning.  I really like this innovative way of learning.  It puts you in the position of each component to force you to look at things from a different angle, as you progress through the curriculum!  Very nifty!

After they explained the curriculum we went to sit in on a class.  I chose to sit in on a class called Employee.  You can basically tell what it’s about... they were going over a case about Harrah’s casino and how to motivate the cage workers and managers with incentives/bonuses.  It was obviously based on the case that they had read the day before.  The professor and class was very interactive.  No one was fighting for speaking time...it didn’t seem like anyone was worried about a Cold Call.  All answers were very genuine.  It turns out that tomorrow the protagonist of the case will actually be speaking at Yale.  So I thought this was very neat in that you can get inside his head to see why he made the decisions that he did.

One thing that stuck out in my head was when one student was answering a 2 part question, but couldn’t really get the answer so she said “maybe one of my classmates can help me out here” and immediately a couple other hands went up to help her out.  I thought that was very cool.  Yes there were people who just couldn’t be bothered because they were clearly tired, but that’s going to be with any school.  

I can definitely picture myself sitting in this type of classroom on a daily basis.  The discussions were not in some foreign language or uncommon business vernacular.  Some students threw in some business buzz words, but that's ok!  I have a few up my sleeve too.  This just comes down to a matter of being accepted!

The classroom was situated in a semi-circle of course.  It may have been slightly tiered, but it wasn’t intimidating by any means.  Very bright too!  Lots of windows.  The professor had two pull down screens on each side of the blackboard.  The blackboard of course could slide back and forth.

After this class we went back to the Visitors center and waited for the student guides to take us on a tour of the b-school campus.  The campus isn’t big, it only consists of 3 buildings, 2 of which are connected by tunnels, but considering that the the total combined student population is < 500, 3 buildings isn’t bad.  The facades of 2 of the buildings are older, since they were old mansions, and yes the floors do creak, but the newer sections of the buildings are nice and modern.  Here is a good time to remind everyone that the school of management will be getting a new home in 2013.  It’s gorgeous, there are only pictures available online.. 

here are some pics of the proposed buildings...  this won't be completed until the year I would graduate..

So after the tour, we went to lunch... standard cafeteria here... order food... pay for food... eat food... food was good.  After we ate, we went to another class.. the set up in this room was definitely tiered.  It was smaller than the previous classroom and the professor only had 1 projection screen.  This class wasn’t case based.  It actually seemed like there was a lot of reading that had been prescribed.  The students had a 2 question quiz at the beginning of the class.  The quiz would not be hard if they did the reading.  It was just two basic questions...  no big deal.. do the reading get a good grade.

This brings me to another point... about grades...  There are no grades at Yale SOM.  I knew this, but didn’t really understand it that well. The two categories are basically Distinctions and Proficient.  It’s very hard to fail, they said that you would actually have to try very hard to fail.  Most people get proficient, but distinctions are available.  A good thing about not having grades is... well the obvious... less stress... and you can take classes that you may be interested in without worrying about failing and ruining your GPA.  Also, not having grades fosters more teamwork, because you’re not competing with people.  

After this class, we went back to the Visitors center to participate in an Admissions Q&A.  When we got to this part I thought to myself “YES... THIS IS WHERE I’LL ANSWER MY QUESTIONS.”  So here are my notes from that conversation:

• There is a real sense of community because it’s small & diverse
• Core courses have 2 Faculty in the room @ the same time
• Yale SOM doesn’t want to just be highly regarding in comparison to other b-schools.  They are working towards being the best! 
• AdCom goes through undergrad transcripts line by line looking for quant classes, not just overall GPA.
• If you’re a career switcher, explain how you became interested in your future career path in the essays.
• If you are granted an interview, the interveiwers only see your resume prior to meeting you.
• In terms of the GMAT the AdCom looks at the range of scores but they take the highest score.

Now guys remember the question I was going to ask?  What are 3 adjectives that would describe the quintessential Yale SOM student?

• GENUINE - PASSIONATE - FUN - TEAM PLAYER

So after that, it was time to take the train back.  Another $10 later and another cigarette... I’m sitting in the train station and I see someone else who was in my group waiting for her train.  So she sits next to me and we start talking about everything.  Then we see someone else that was with us, so he sits down with us and we go through the same process.  Then we see someone else who was with us... same story...  Then as I realize that my train is here, I see someone else that was with us, so after the 4 of us exchanged business cards...  I ran over to the other prospective and exchanged information with him too.  Two of the guys live in NYC about 20 blocks from me, so maybe we’ll get to meet up some time.

Now... I must add this in because this was a concern of mine.  Being a gay male I was wondering how it would feel being back on a college campus again AND being OUT this time.  Well I can say that I think that people are just too busy to care at Yale.  (NYU also, but then again that's in NYC and here it's kind of an identity thing)... but at Yale I was comfortable being myself.  Not my New York self (more on that if you ask).... I was just me... didn't get any weird looks.. people were just being people.  It was nice.. very nice...  A+ in my book!

Ok that’s it for Tonight... this was a long one!  Let me know your thoughts...

Humbling first Prep Class

First Order of Business that I'd like to address is this GMAT Giveaway contest.  I've consistently been in 3rd, but yesterday I made it to 2nd... only to be pushed back down to 3rd today.

I'M MONEY9111 BTW

So I had my first MGMAT class today...and it was a very humbling experience to say the least. I was very excited to officially get this process started. I consider today the official day of my GMAT prep - even though it's been months and months, preparing for the class.

My class was from 6:30 -> 9:30. It didn't feel long or drawn out either, which was never a fear... but was a concern. There were were about 16-18 students in the class = very diverse bunch. I cant remember how many sets of 2 tables are on the other side of the room.

Tonight we went over the basic GMAT review... and tackled DS...I thought I had prepared well enough hat I would be able to tackle basic DS questions, but that was false. I definitely underestimated DS.

Now I heard that there would be a lot of work... but I didn't realize how much work. The syllabus is available online but it does not give you a sense of how much work there is. Don't get me wrong I'm not complaining at all... I'm actually thrilled because I'm willing to put in the time.

Also, I didn't realize how much additional material was available online... ie. hour long topical Lab videos (at least I think they're videos)... They're definitely going to be a great resource. I also get 30 minutes a week of online office hours w/ phone. You just have to sign up online... I'm definitely going to use this as well, because an hour of "tutoring" is quite pricey post-exam. 


The teacher is very good. Very energetic... i don't know if I could personally be 'ON' for three hours teaching this stuff.. but I suppose that's why they get paid the big bucks. If the initial explanations are tough to understand, they're broken down from another angle.

Like I said, we went over DS today, which as we all know is tricky. Everyone has their own mental process in approaching these problems. There was a situation where one person was thinking of an answer from one angle, and someone else the complete opposite from another angle. The teacher was able to get everyone on the same page, by realizing how each person arrived at their answers (one right and one wrong, but neither understood why they were right or wrong). Just this skill alone.. compared to another prep company I checked out would have sealed the deal for me. I think another teacher would not have been able to recognize the students' though processes and would have simply said "no... this is how you're supposed to do it."

Another thing about the class that I like is that, it's not all just a PPT. Sure the basic material and problems are in the PPT, but when working them out they're done on the board. I'm not sure how other prep classes do this but it's very effective.

If anyone would like to know who I am taking a class with.. send me a PM.. just don't want to post the name up here. It was the first class, so I'm sure people need to warm up and feel comfortable enough to ask more questions. Not I though, I don't care haha if I'm not getting something... might as well ask = get my monies worth! 


Hot to Trot!

Drawing a blank tonight...

So I'm becoming increasingly more excited about my GMAT class... does that make me a geek?  It begins next week, but a couple of things have transpired since my last post.

Last night I had a call with a Dartmouth Tuck Alumni whose background practically mirrored mine.  On the Dartmouth website there's a section where you enter your information, and what you would like to be involved in @ Tuck.  Then they send an email to someone who has a similar background...look at the great job they did.

Me - Undergraduate Degree = Economics

Him - Undergraduate Degree = Economics

Me - currently working for a major retailer's .com

Him - currently working for a retail retailer's .com

Me - I want to be a part of the LGBT club wherever I go

Him - He was part of the LGBT club @ Tuck

Me - previously worked for a digital marketing agency

Him - previously worked for a digital marketing agency

anyway you get the idea...I spoke to him for about an hour and he was very insightful.  The key takeaway was that Dartmouth is like (...I can use Like here because I'm comparing two things) Cheers - everyone knows your name.  He said that he didn't have a problem being out at school, which anyone who knows me knows that's important.  I cannot go back to the days where I'm scared to raise my hand or give a presentation being worried about what people are going to be thinking of me.

If anyone has encountered anyone that has graduated from Tuck, you may remember how adamant they are about their alma mater.  This has left a huge impression on me.  To hear nearly everyone speak highly of their school is refreshing...  Definitely don't hear that from Rutgers graduates... (...graduates is the noun at the end of the sentence... not Rutgers... Rutgers is the adjective describing graduates).

Anyway, he reitterated my wish to go up to the school and visit, so I plan on doing that mid March.  I know I'll have the opportunity in November for the Dartmouth Tuck diversity conference, but I want to experience the school outside of a "prospectives" bubble.  Anyone want to go with me?

As you may remember... I finished the PowerScore SC book last week.  Since then I have just been reviewing my notecards...  Tonight I attended an MBAmission webinar.  This was just basic information about applying to business school.  I didn't learn anything new, but it was good to keep my mind in the MBA mindset for the night...

An hour after the webinar ended, I cracked open the MGMAT Geometry book.  I wanted to add some notecards to my deck regarding formulas...and most importantly Triangle properties...  did you know that if you split an equilateral triangle in half, you get two 30-60-90 triangles?  If you wanted to figure out the area of that equilateral triangle it would be ((S^2)*(3^1/2))/4?  I didn't know that either.. but now I do!

I'm going to go through my notecards once again tonight... and then watch "The American Ruling Class" on Hulu.

Notecard Count = 93 (notecard count was 80... so I added 15 from tonight which is a 18.75% notecard increase)

Chigga Chigga...Slim Shady...

So tonight is going to be a fun night to type about... lots going on tonight.  First the title of this post is Chigga Chigga...Slim shady because that's what popped into my head when I was studying.  All throughout my previous GMAT prep, I would continuously hear about IDIOMS and how much trouble they were giving people.  For anyone that has forgotten...Idiom - an expression that does not make literal sense.  To native American speakers, these phrases make sense... but the GMAT is an exam taken globally and is in English... so imagine you learn the literal meanings of everything and then you see:

Hold your horses; I'll be ready in a minute!
That comment was below the belt and you should apologize.
The toddler screamed at the top of her lungs.
The news of their engagement came out of left field.

These generate a lot of confusion to non-native English speakers... so the reason for the Title came from the illustration that followed the above examples.  Our language has all kinds of quirks.  Slim and Fat are opposites, but slim chance and fat chance mean the same thing.

So that's the lesson for tonight...MORE IMPORTANTLY.. I went to a GMAT preview event and after that I picked up my MGMAT (Manhattan GMAT...for anyone coming in late) books.  It wasn't very informative because that was the 3rd one that I've attended.  Yeah, I know I did my due diligence...it was more out of boredom though.  In anycase... tonight I heard the stupidest questions asked about the GMAT.

Now I'm not saying that I knew anything about the GMAT prior to deciding to go to B-School.  BUT, I did research as much as possible online, before showing my face in public asking a bunch of dumb questions... So here are some of the questions that were asked, and why they were dumb (in my eyes).

- The GMAT is computer adaptive.  So if you answer a question correctly... the next question becomes harder.  If you answer a question incorrectly, the next question becomes easier.  With that being said.. the question a girl asked was... "So can you skip a question and come back to it?"  ... now let's think about this people... if the computer needs to know if you got the current question correct, before it gives you the next one.. how in the world can you SKIP it?  I shoulda told her if you wanna Skip It you better go back to the 80's and buy yourself one, and SKIP IT outside on the sidewalk!

hhmm what was another dumb question that I heard?

- Oh... this wasn't so much a question but these two guys kept asking about trying to cheat.  Ok so for you guys who don't know... when you walk into the testing center, you're not allowed anything but your ID. You get your picture taken....finger printed... and get your hand scanned.  These fools were asking all of these "what ifs.."  I'm sitting there thinking to myself "What if I hit you over the head with this pencil?"

- Also... not many people know this but 25% of the questions on the test are experimental... so think back to that adaptive nature of the test... you could be getting a bunch of hard questions and then all of a sudden a really really easy one...  so now you have to think... either those hard questions were really easy ones that i was getting wrong, which made me end up with this easy one... or this may be experimental... granted you cant think of the test like that...

the reason they do this is to test out new questions for the test, on real test takers - makes sense right?  So this girl asked "Can you skip the experimental ones?" - what is up with people asking if you can skip questions... NO NO NO... ok then another person asked .... "do you at least know which ones are experimental?" - again... NO... the test doesn't tell you anything... nothing... nada... zilch...

- I saved the best for last!  ... so at the end of the 2 hour session... he's taking questions...  this guy behind me asked if you know how you answered the previous question, as you're going through the test.  You can imagine my face when i heard this.  So I'm thinking, does he really think that if you answer the first question right it tells you "CONGRATULATIONS YOU GOT IT RIGHT".... and it turns out he meant something to that effect...

Disclaimer - now I know that I didn't know anything about the GMAT at one point in time... but maybe I just don't understand how some people can aspire to go to a top b-school without having done their homework on the exam needed to get them there.  All of those questions could have been answered simply by Wiki-ing (yes I made it a verb by adding *ing*, if it was used as a noun then it wouldn't be called a verb but a Gerund)

So that's my rant for tonight... until next time folks

Notecard Count = 71 (yesterday's was 66... so I added 5 from tonight which is a 7.5% notecard increase)

Caught in a Bad Romance...

So you ask why I chose this Title for the post?

Well..."I wrote a song about it.. like to hear it?  here it goes" (sidenote - if anyone can tell me what famous TV show that quote is from you'll get a prize!)  Anyway... as I sat on my bed, by my window studying with my window open... a car drove by blasting Lady Gaga - Bad Romance... at first I thought to myself "it's 1 a.m. turn that down!" then I just started bopping my head and singing the paragraph that I was reading... of course that wasn't enough so I had to  take a hiatus and throw on the song for some inspiration.

So I'll get into my studies tonight, because this should go fairly quick.  So tonight... I Studied for 2 hours!      I practically got yelled at when I signed onto Facebook because my other friend interrupted me.  Ms. Harris...I am calling you out!  Why are you all up in my business?  Am I not allowed a break every once in a while - I MEAN DAMN!

B-School Inspiration - Tonight I was watching CNBC since it's Tech Week, and tonight's episode was about the AOL Time Warner break up.  I watched this and it reaffirmed my reasoning for wanting to go to B-School.  The downfall of this whole merger was that the CEO of Time Warner didn't understand the internet fully.  To his defense, no one really did at that point, although this was his thinking.  Time Warner relied heavily on a subscription based business model (HBO, Magazines, Cable), so he saw potential in AOL since it was all subscription based.

Now this would seem like a great idea, but what happened is that as the companies merged the AOL execs got the higher executive job functions.  So now what we had was a major company Time Warner, with it's many properties, being heavily influenced and run by these "Internet Folks."

The real issue came when those "Internet Folks" started telling the Time Warner folks how to sell advertising to make money.  Remember, at first AOL was making all of it's money from the subscriptions, but then the advertising dollars kicked in.  So once these "Internet Folks" started dictating to the traditional media folks how to sell advertising... things got messed up.

The whole reason for the merger was for AOL Time Warner to simply do business with itself, but this did not occur.  So as a result, stock prices fell....  then as people started migrating over to faster internet speeds that eliminated the need for AOL, well the rest is history.

So how does this fit in with my B-School aspirations?  Companies are getting excited and antsy about the internet again, thanks to Google/Apple/Microsoft.  In the future I would like to be in the boardroom when major decisions are being made.  Coming from a digital background, I feel that I have a phenomenal grasp on the history...and more importantly... the future trajectory.

It's time for these old heads in the C-Suites to peace out and make room for those who truly understand what they would be getting themselves into.

Tomorrow I have an MBA information session to attend and I'm paying for my MGMAT course... Update to follow....

Notecard Count = 66 (yesterday's was 53... so I added 13 from tonight which is a 25% notecard increase)