I would like to invite all 2009 MBA applicants to sign up for the second 2009 MBA Admissions Telethon on Tuesday, May 13th between 10:00 AM and 12:00 PM PT (1:30 PM ET - 3:30 PM ET; 6:00 PM GMT - 8:00 PM GMT). What is the MBA Admissions Telethon?

Two hours when 6 MBA admissions experts will be available to answer your individual questions via telephone. Prior to calling in, you will receive a brief, 6-question questionnaire and submit it along with your resume to a designated email address. (No essays, please.) When you call in, your consultant will review the information you provide, and you will have 15 minutes to discuss with him or her your most pressing MBA admissions questions.

Oh, by the way, the 2009 MBA Admission Telethon is free.

You can learn more details and sign up at 2009 MBA Admissions Telethon.

The US News released its 2008 Grad School Rankings today. I'm going to list the top ten for business school, law school, and medical school and provide links to the ranking methodology for each category. For other graduate specialties, please visit the US News site.

Business School Rankings and methodology 
1. Harvard
1. Stanford
3. Wharton
4.  MIT Sloan
4. Northwestern Kellogg
4. Univ. of Chicago
7. Dartmouth Tuck
7. UC Berkeley Haas
9. Columbia
10. NYU Stern

Law School Rankings
1. Yale
2. Harvard
2. Stanford
4. Columbia
5. NYU
6. UC Berkeley
7. Univ. of Chicago
7. Penn
9. Northwestern
9. Univ. of Michigan
9. Univ. of Virginia

( I am not including a link to the law school methodology because as I am writing the link provided is a bad link.)

Medical School Rankings (Research)  and Methodology
1. Harvard
2. Johns Hopkins
3. Washington U (St. Louis)
4. Penn
5. UCSF
6. Duke
6. Univ. of Washington
8. Stanford
9. UCLA
9. Yale

A few caveats: My strong recommendation is to use the rankings as a library of raw data  conveniently compiled in one location and not as a tried and true guide of educational quality. They are not the latter. They are the former. To the extent you are going to use the rankings as a guide to school reputation and brand value, you must understand the methodology behind them and what they are measuring. Be cognizant of the differences between what is important to you and what is important to the rankings.

A few observations on the rankings themselves:

1. There are many ties in the rankings, which implies that the differences in reputation are almost imperceptible when talking about closely ranked programs. For example the difference between being "in the top ten" and out of the the top ten (i.e. #11) for MBA programs is 1 point,  for the top law schools is 2 points, and for the top medical schools is 1 point. Don't get hung up on these differences.
2. The "top ten" changes little from year to year. In most cases, if you compare these rankings to the 2007 version, it looks as if US News just reshuffled the deck a little.

For more on rankings, please see:

• Rankings: Controversy and Magazine Sales
• Thoughtful Dean Looks at Rankings
• Law School Admissions: Study Says Rankings Influence Decision Makers

Yesterday I met with a LAMP client who is shrewdly starting now to prepare for his fall application. We went over his profile, and I made several suggestions as to what he can do between now and this fall to improve his chances of acceptance next year. He found the session very valuable. And again, I commend him for starting early to work on his application. I want to be able to commend and mentor and help prepare more of you.

For years I have encouraged MBA applicants to lay the foundation for their MBA application in the months before applications come out. That's why I wrote Best Practices for MBA Admissions, a featured ebook this month. That's why Accepted has hosted MBA Admissions Telethons and teleseminars. And that's why Accepted is introducing a new subscription form of MBA Admissions Consulting: Start Smart ™.

With Start Smart, you can meet up to one hour per month with your adviser, an experienced Accepted consultant and editor who for years has seen what works and what doesn't. Our experienced staff shares my frustration when talented but flawed clients come to us in September wanting to apply in Round 1 and hoping that a magic wand will make them competitive. We don't have that wand. We do have decades of collective experience that we would like to share with you on an individual basis through Start Smart.

With Start Smart, you can have a mentor guide you in:

• Identifying the core stories for your application.
• Focusing on specific schools.
  
• Strengthening your application and ameliorating weaknesses.
• Choosing recommenders.

We can even help you work out an application time table.

In addition, Start Smart is something that rewards your early-bird-gets-the-worm approach to your applications:

• You will pay less per month when you sign up for more months.
• Your credit card is billed on a monthly basis for the exact number of months you want. You do not pay for the entire service up front so it is more affordable.
  

A couple of important product announcements:

The Nine Mistakes You Don't want to Make on an MBA Waitlist, our most popular ebook ever, is on special this month -- 20% off. If you are waitlisted, this is the ebook for you. Short, concise, and to-the-point.

All ebooks are going up in price on February 1.

General Admissions

• Submit a Stellar Application: 42 Terrific Tips to Help You Get Accepted
  

College:

• How to Write Great College Application Essays and Stay Sane

MBA Ebooks:

• Best Practices for MBA Admissions
• MBA BlastOff: 45 Terrific Tips to Launch Your MBA Application to Acceptance
• MBA I.V. - Mainline to Top MBA Programs: MBA Interview Questions & Tips
• The Nine Mistakes You Don’t Want to Make on an MBA Waitlist
  
• The Consultant’s Guide to MBA Admission
• The Finance Professional’s Guide to MBA Admissions Success
• The Techie’s Guide to MBA Admissions
• Create a Better Sequel: How to Reapply Right to Business School

Medical School, Residency & Fellowship Ebooks:

• The Nine Mistakes You Don’t Want to Make on a Med School Waitlist
• Write Your Way to a Residency Match
• Write Your Way to a Fellowship Match

Law School Ebooks:

• The Nine Mistakes You Don’t Want to Make on a Law School Waitlist

Click on the links to gain access to this library of admissions info. Then beat the price increase. Buy the ebooks of your choice by January 31. That's this Thursday.

BW has published an informative and lengthy interview with Stanford's Director of Admissions Derrick Bolton. If you are a Stanford applicant either preparing for a R1 interview or drafting and editing your R2 essays, this really is a must-read.

At the same time, while I strongly recommend this interview to Stanford applicants and find much of the advice to be spot on, I vehemently disagree with a few points:

Derrick argues that applicants should not try to stand out because they will end up sounding like all the other applicants trying to do the exact same thing. I completely agree with him that the kernel of an individualistic, unique essay lies within you; unearthing that kernel requires introspection, reflection, and sincerity. Having advised applicants to top business schools for over a decade, I am convinced that most applicants will reveal that unique kernel only when consciously choosing writing techniques and wording that will distinguish them. For more on this topic, please see:

• "What are They Looking for in Your Application."
• "Personal Statement Flaw #4: Superficiality."
• "Personal Statement Tip: Umbrellas, Passion, and Resilience."
• "Starry, Starry Night."
• "Admissions: Checklist or Mosaic"
• "The Devil is in the Details"

Derrick's response to BW's question about admissions consultants is simply inaccurate and misleading. He says "This is a process that already is expensive and high-stress. In a lot of ways, [the admissions consulting] industry feeds on those two things, and it makes it more expensive and more stressful in a lot of cases."

Give me a break. The schools contribute to the stress and raise tuition annually.

It is specious to isolate the cost of the application process from the overall cost of an MBA because the financial benefits of an MBA justify both the much larger investment in a graduate business education as well as a smaller investment in GMAT prep or admissions consulting. The two biggest costs of pursuing an MBA are tuition and the opportunity cost of leaving the work force. Either one of these factors dwarfs any fees paid to admissions consultants. In the words of an Accepted client, "Your fees are a rounding error in the cost of my MBA." Tuition paid to the schools is certainly the largest out-of-pocket expense.

The stress that Derrick laments comes from the intense competition to gain acceptance to schools like Stanford. In fairness, the competition and consequent stress stem primarily from the higher ranked programs' reputation for educational quality and the significantly higher average starting salary earned by their graduates. I certainly don’t believe that Derrick wants to reduce educational quality or damage Stanford's reputation to lower applicants' stress levels. But the schools are not innocent bystanders when it comes to the stress of the MBA application process: They nurture that competition to enhance their reputations and brand and to ensure the widest pool of candidates to pick from.