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With a satellite campus in Center City, Philadelphia, the Villanova School of Business (VSB) at Villanova University specializes in part-time programs for working professionals, allowing them to enjoy the benefits of a full-time curriculum without leaving their job. In this vein, the school offers an accelerated, two-year, part-time Fast Track degree option, for which students meet twice a week, as well as the more customizable Flex Track degree option, which typically takes three years to complete and accommodates varying course loads.

One advantage of the accelerated option is the opportunity to partake in the school’s three-part capstone project, which includes the “Social Enterprise Consulting Practicum,” “Global Practicum,” and “Global Strategic Management” courses—each lasting 14 weeks. In the “Social Enterprise Consulting Practicum,” students work with local nonprofit organizations to identify strategies in such areas as branding, funding, and membership retention. Alternatively, the latter two courses entail working with a multinational corporation to gain firsthand experience analyzing market issues. VSB also hosts a variety of elective international immersion courses, through which students may travel abroad over winter break or during the summer.

Another option for professionals is Purdue University’s Krannert School of Management, whose two executive MBA programs focus on helping professionals gain their advanced business degrees while maintaining a career. Students can select the traditional executive MBA program, which features five residencies at Krannert and one abroad, or the IMM Global Executive MBA program, during which students are divided into cohorts and take part in residencies in each of the five IMM partner schools (including Krannert). Locations for the residencies include Brazil, the Netherlands, and Italy. Both of these executive MBA programs take place over the course of 19 months and include online learning modules in addition to in-person studies.

Over the years, many MBA hopefuls have come to us with one resounding question:

Which admissions consulting service is right for me?

Maybe you are just getting started with the GMAT exam and admittedly have not even thought about your business school applications yet. Or maybe you are already well into the application process but are seeking some last-minute advice from an honest professional. Or perhaps you are a reapplicant who cannot understand what went wrong the first time around.

No matter where you are in the application process, mbaMission is here to help you. If you are unsure about which service might be the most beneficial to your candidacy, read on. In this blog post, we provide several different scenarios (one of which you might find yourself in now) and the corresponding best mbaMission service for each one.

“I need help with my MBA applications, but I don’t know where to start!”

• The Complete “Start-to-Finish” Package (our most comprehensive service)

Best for: Those who are (or plan to be) committing themselves fully to the MBA application process
The cost: Flat fee per school, starting at $5,900 for a one-school package with a Senior Consultant
The commitment: Extensive—This flat-fee option gives you unlimited brainstorming assistance, ongoing feedback and advice, and as many revisions to your essays, resume, and other application elements as you feel you need to craft the most successful application possible.

Our package services work best for those who are beginning the MBA application process and have committed themselves wholeheartedly. mbaMission’s package clients benefit from having no limitations on the amount of time spent brainstorming for essay ideas, the number of essay revisions allowed, the number of rounds of changes to resumes, and so on. If you intend to devote significant time to the application process, our Complete “Start-to-Finish” Package is for you.

With the Complete “Start-to-Finish” Package, you have the option to add additional schools to your purchase at any time within your contract agreement (May 1–April 30). So, if you decide to apply to another school (perhaps in a later round), you can do so with the help of mbaMission.

“I’ve started my applications, but I need help with a few elements.” 

• A la Carte Hourly Services

Best for: Business school applicants who need help with discrete tasks rather than their overall application
The cost: Starting at $385 per hour to work with a Senior Consultant, with special “bundle” pricing available for clients purchasing five hours.
The commitment: Flexible—Use your hours however you choose, whenever you choose. Start with our minimum of two hours, and if you require more guidance, you can add hours to your purchase at any time within your contract agreement (six months from the purchase date).

Hourly services are a great option for applicants who need help with a few application elements rather than their entire application. For example, perhaps you feel your essays are strong, but you are unsure of how to assemble a compelling resume to accompany them. Or maybe you have been invited to interview and could benefit from some practice and feedback beforehand. Or perhaps just one essay is giving you trouble, so you feel you need assistance only with that portion. Whatever the task, we can serve your needs through our a la carte hourly services.

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At most top business schools, aspiring MBAs apply in one of three application rounds: Round 1 in September, Round 2 in January, and Round 3 in March or April. As an applicant, you might be wondering when the ideal time to apply is. In this video, we explain the differences among the MBA application rounds:

Round 1 is generally considered the best time to apply for several key reasons.

• The class is wide open, and the MBA admissions officers have fresh eyes.
• Applying early indicates your interest in your target MBA program.
• If you are an overrepresented applicant (e.g., consultant, private equity analyst), or if you have a weak point in your application (e.g., a low GPA or GMAT/GRE score), getting your application in front of the admissions committee as early as possible can help you stand out.

We recommend that you apply in Round 1 if you are ready to submit your best possible application by your target school’s deadline. However, if you believe you can significantly improve your application in some way, such as boosting your test score or earning a promotion, if you had a little extra time, then applying in Round 2 is also a solid option. Similarly, if you got a bit of a late start on your application and do not want to rush, opting for Round 2 would be a prudent decision. If you would be a strong applicant in Round 1, you should still be a strong applicant in Round 2.

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Being rejected from business school can be incredibly disappointing. You spent a year, or perhaps even longer, studying for the GMAT, GRE, or EA; completing applications; preparing for interviews; and waiting for the schools’ decisions, only to learn that you did not get in. But all is not lost! Not only can you reapply, but reapplicants can, and do, get accepted!

If you are a business school reapplicant, you need to do a few key things before you submit a new application. If you have what could be considered an obvious flaw in your candidacy—a low test score, insufficient work experience, a lot of job movement—you need to take steps to rectify the problem area if you are to succeed. This might require, for example, investing in a class or tutor to help you study more effectively for the GMAT, GRE, or EA. Or, you might consider switching to a different test altogether or looking at programs whose average scores are in line with yours. Perhaps you need another year of work under your belt. Whatever your particular area of weakness is, you can most likely fix it with some time and effort.

If your profile does not have an obvious shortcoming, and you were perhaps surprised by your rejection, you can still find ways and opportunities to improve. The leading business schools generally have incredibly low acceptance rates, which unfortunately means that many deserving applicants must be rejected each year. We once asked an admissions officer at a top-ten MBA program how many more candidates she could admit without negatively affecting the quality of the class, and she estimated that should could add 50% more students or even double the size of the class! So, you might have simply been the unlucky victim of a uber competitive applicant pool and some tough choices on the part of the admissions committees. But if this is why your original application was unsuccessful, you could nevertheless benefit from taking a quant class to shore up your analytical capabilities, deepening your commitment to a community organization, or working hard toward a promotion at work. Even if you were—and are—a strong applicant already, you should take advantage of the opportunity to bolster your candidacy even further.

One very practical step to take is to make your target program(s) aware of your determination. For example, if you have a contact at a school—such as a waitlist manager who has come to know you or a member of the admissions team you have networked with—let them know that you plan to reapply in the first round (and yes, if you are a reapplicant, applying in Round 1 is crucial). By showing them that you are, in a sense, not taking no for an answer, you are indicating that you will very likely accept an offer of admissions from the school. Because admissions officers care about yield, this is a useful and appealing bit of information for them to have when evaluating your application. They also appreciate resilience and determination and would be far less likely to say no to an applicant who had previously been on the cusp.

Know that at many top MBA programs, reapplicants make up 5%–10% of the class, so you might have been knocked down, but you really have no reason to stay down. Pick yourself up, and reapply with confidence!

If you have been rejected or “dinged” by an MBA program and want to improve your chances for success the next time around, we can thoroughly review your original application to identify potential areas for improvement. Read more about our Ding Review/Reapplicant Strategy service here.

With regard to the GMAT, raw intellectual horsepower helps, but it is not everything. Manhattan Prep’s Stacey Koprince teaches you how to perform at your best on test day by using some common sense.

Has this happened to you? You have ambitious plans to study a ton of things over the weekend. You get tired, but you are determined to push through, so you keep studying. You begin to get a bit anxious because you feel you are not learning well (and you are not!), so you study even more. You get even more tired, and that makes it even harder to learn. By the end of the weekend, you are exhausted, frustrated, and demoralized.

Time magazine published a fascinating little article back in 2012: “To Boost Memory, Shut Your Eyes and Relax.” Go take a look at it. Do not worry; I will wait.

In a nutshell: your brain makes better memories when it is not tired.

The Time article quotes Michaela Dewar, the lead author of a research study on this topic. She notes that we are “at a very early stage of memory formation” when we first start to study new information, and “further neural processes have to occur after this stage for us to be able to remember this information at a later point in time.”

The italics are mine. Note what Ms. Dewar has said: more “stuff” has to happen in our brains after we have studied this info for us to be able to recall that information later on. In the meantime, we have to go do something else that does not involve learning other new things. Eat lunch. Take a walk or exercise. Listen to some music while cleaning the house. Get a good night’s sleep.

How can we use this in our GMAT study?

There are many ways to study, but do not plan to study for more than about two hours at a stretch. Cut yourself off earlier if you realize that you are feeling significantly mentally fatigued. If you do hit that two-hour mark, stop. You can study more today, if you want, but first take at least a one-hour brain break.

Next, if you plan to study on days that you also have work or class, see whether you have the flexibility to study before or during the class/work day. You could get up a little earlier than normal (warning: do not try this if you are a night person) or possibly arrange to get into work a bit later than normal a couple of days a week. You could study on your lunch break. These sessions might only run 20 or 30 minutes, but that is fine—you are just trying to get some studying done earlier in the day, while your brain is more fresh!