{"id":10104,"date":"2012-10-05T11:53:16","date_gmt":"2012-10-05T17:53:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?p=10104"},"modified":"2012-10-10T11:45:00","modified_gmt":"2012-10-10T17:45:00","slug":"friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/","title":{"rendered":"Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MBA students at the University of Virginia&#8217;s Darden School of Business are known to work quite hard amid the rigors of the case method. Each day, they are expected to read and complete their own analysis of a case (a narrative that details a business problem) and then compare and reason through their analysis with a diverse team of fellow students (their Learning Team). Often, students can spend two to four hours prepping on their own and then two to three more with their teammates to arrive at\u00a0<em><strong>an<\/strong>\u00a0answer<\/em>\u00a0(as opposed to\u00a0<em><strong>the<\/strong>\u00a0answer<\/em>). And, what can be the reward for all of this? You may just be selected for a \u201ccold call\u201d to start off the class.<\/p>\n<p>At Darden, most first-year classes and some second-year classes begin with a professor randomly selecting a student to lead the day&#8217;s discussion with his\/her case analysis. This student can be subjected to anywhere from five to 20 minutes of questioning, as the professor teases out key points of discussion for the broader class to explore. Many a student has sweated through a cold call, only to gain the applause of\u00a0his\/her peers\u00a0at the end. (Others, of course, may not do as well.) The cold call can be daunting, but it forces students to prepare thoroughly and think on their feet\u2014a key feature of the Darden learning experience.<\/p>\n<p>For more information on Darden and any of 15 other leading MBA programs, check out the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/shop.mbamission.com\/collections\/insider-s-guides\" target=\"_blank\">mbaMission Insider\u2019s Guides<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MBA students at the University of Virginia&#8217;s Darden School of Business are known to work quite hard amid the rigors of the case method. Each day, they are expected to read and complete their own analysis of a case (a narrative that details a business problem) and then compare and reason through their analysis with &hellip; <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/\">Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;<i class=\"fal fa-sm fa-angle-right\"><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uva-darden"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"MBA students at the University of Virginia&#8217;s Darden School of Business are known to work quite hard amid the rigors of the case method. Each day, they are expected to read and complete their own analysis of a case (a narrative that details a business problem) and then compare and reason through their analysis with &hellip; Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-10-05T17:53:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-10-10T17:45:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-fallback-image.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"675\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jeremy Shinewald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jeremy Shinewald\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","og_description":"MBA students at the University of Virginia&#8217;s Darden School of Business are known to work quite hard amid the rigors of the case method. Each day, they are expected to read and complete their own analysis of a case (a narrative that details a business problem) and then compare and reason through their analysis with &hellip; Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/","og_site_name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","article_published_time":"2012-10-05T17:53:16+00:00","article_modified_time":"2012-10-10T17:45:00+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":675,"url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-fallback-image.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Jeremy Shinewald","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Jeremy Shinewald","Est. reading time":"1 minute"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":["Article","BlogPosting"],"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/"},"author":{"name":"Jeremy Shinewald","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/74216774a1761e746e2426c9c8171f5f"},"headline":"Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden","datePublished":"2012-10-05T17:53:16+00:00","dateModified":"2012-10-10T17:45:00+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/"},"wordCount":258,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization"},"articleSection":["University of Virginia (Darden)"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/","name":"Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2012-10-05T17:53:16+00:00","dateModified":"2012-10-10T17:45:00+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/friday-factoid-prepare-for-cold-calls-at-darden\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Friday Factoid: Prepare for Cold Calls at Darden"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/","name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","description":"World&#039;s Leading MBA Admissions Consulting Firm","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"mbaMission","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-organization-logo.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-organization-logo.png","width":696,"height":696,"caption":"mbaMission"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/74216774a1761e746e2426c9c8171f5f","name":"Jeremy Shinewald","description":"In addition to being Founder and President of mbaMission, Jeremy Shinewald is a Darden MBA, published author, and the recipient of Poets&amp;Quants\u2019 Lifetime Achievement Award in MBA Admissions Consulting. With more than 20 years of experience and a background as a professional speechwriter, he combines deep industry insight and exceptional storytelling skills to help applicants create powerful, distinctive MBA applications.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/who-we-are\/team\/jeremy-shinewald\/","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/jeremyshinewald\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/author\/jeremy\/"}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10104"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10104\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}