<p>How much competitive a student be who has a 780 on GMAT and 3.6 GPA from a HYP undergrad college? Course load is very challenging as student took a Middle Eastern language, higher level math and major in economics. Student has very solid record in extracurricular activities that demanded 25-30 hours a week in extracurricular activities. </p>
<p>Student has done paid summer internship with hedge funds.</p>
<p>If the student is dumb enough to think with these stats, they have no chance at a good MBA, I submit they aren’t smart enough to be in said program. :)</p>
<p>hhahahahaha it is not the student but rather a parent asking. Thanks for the positive input though.</p>
<p>Coming straight out is always a challenging application. Of course, if anybody’s going to do it, sounds like this kid.</p>
<p>I would try to have the student get at least 1 year of full-time work experience (possibly 2), so that they will have 2-3 years of work experience by the time they enroll.</p>
<p>I used to think that it was best to get to school as early as possible because it bumped them up to a certain salary point, but that’s not how I think now.</p>
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<li><p>He will be at a disadvantage during internship and full-time recruiting.</p></li>
<li><p>He won’t be able to learn tact/savvy/political BS. As a young one entering the full-time workforce, many senior level (non-boss) employees will try to take advantage of you and have you do their work for them and/or have you do the due diligence (the error checking) so if something’s wrong, the new guy’s responsible. Bosses will also try to take advantage of you in certain ways (do more work than everyone else, etc.) I work in finance and I see this all the time.</p></li>
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<p>Being smart is one thing. Having political savvy and work smarts (similar to street smarts) comes from experience at the low-end.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>As much as he does as an internship, I bet his co-workers see him as the “intern.” We had an intern that was doing almost the same level stuff as our regular employees, but at the end of the day, he was the “intern.”</p></li>
<li><p>Search salary statistics. The avg. is ~90-100K with a range sometimes ranging from 60K to 250K. Who do you think is the one with the ~60K salary?</p></li>
<li><p>He’ll miss out on the “get out of jail for free” card. Once you pick a career and work for a few years, it is extremely difficult to jump careers and do something totally different. An MBA will help you do that. But if he didn’t have a career before MBA, then this advantage is gone.</p></li>
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<p>Given those stats, he should be able to land top undergrad jobs. Why not gain a couple of years of valuable work experience (and become even more well rounded in the process) and then apply to top business schools? </p>
<p>If he does that, he will have a better idea of what he really wants to do in life, will have a more rewarding business school experience, and will have put himself in a better position relative to his classmates when looking for internships and full time employment.</p>