absoluteyellow

Thanks a lot for your comment. The irony is that I did 4 masters degrees only just because my applications for phd in Finance 2 years ago weren't successful. I had 2 masters back then(Quantitative finance and Operations Research). I had two options, either stay in school (and thus do more masters) or work in the industry. Staying in school seemed to be a better choice for me as it's more relevant to PhD study than working. Frankly, I have never thought that any adcom would have doubts about my determination in doing a phd. Thank you for pointing this out.:D One more question, should I mention in my SOP that my first attempts 2 years ago were abortive? I can see how it could hurt my chance, but at the same time it could tell adcom how determined i am.

I'm applying for PhD in Finance programs this year. Bachelor in Mechanical Engineering :GPA 3.12 (From the best university in my country-but not well-known internationally) Masters in Quantitative finance:GPA 3.80 Masters in Mathematics :GPA 3.90 Masters in Operations Research :GPA 3.80 Masters in Economics: GPA 3.90 I also took all core courses for PhD in Statistics. I will complete these 4 masters in 4 years from a very good engineering school in the US. RA: 1.5 years of Research experience TA: Numerical methods in Finance(Masters Level) : Micro economics(Undergrad) GMAT 750 Q(50) V(41) Thanks guys. Do you think I have gone too far with my 4 masters degrees? Do I have any chance at top 20 schools?

Wow awesome admit!! congratulations I was sure that you would get the admit.

Congratulations!! BTW, what about the other schools? Still waiting?

Congrats on your super score!!!!

Hi Mindcraft, nice to know that there is a guy in the same boat as me. These are schools I applied/am applying to. Princeton (MIF) Michigan (MFE) Georgia Tech (QCF) Wharton (MBA) --likely to get dinged :( UIUC (MIF) I got a conditional admit. LBS (MIF) I've just known that this field is very competitive, according to what you guys said. Since I havn't finished all of the applications, I'm wondering if it is too late to apply at this time. any idea? I'm really nervous now. GMAT 750 50Q/41V:) 3.5 AWA:mad: GPA 3.12 Mechanical engineering 3 years experience in a financial institution

I will keep my congrats for your admit to Columbia. :)

Oh, roborob Could you tell me which round you applied for (Wharton)?

Congrats Roborob Good luck with the rest.

Whether you should retake the GMAT or not depends on your personal goal. If you wish to get into a good school, you'd better take it again. Don't give up anyway, no matter what you are doing. Cheers.

Wow, congratulations

Congrats shaq on your awesome score..

Dear manasi4gre. Yeah I would love to.. but I don't know how to upload. If you know how, post here, I will upload the materials ASAP. Cheers.

Vijayaprashanth Thanks I wish I could help you, but first, I don't have the Quant section of [tooltip=Official Guide]OG[/tooltip] in soft copy format. (I think that every GMAT taker should have the [tooltip=Official Guide]OG[/tooltip]. If you don't have it, you should buy one or borrow it from a friend) second, eventhough I have some useful materials, I don't know how to upload them. If interested, please tell me how, and I will upload them as soon as possible. Cheers.

Congrats man, awesome score. Good luck on your applications...

Hi guys, I took the toefl yesterday, and the result was: Listening 28 (more than expected):D Structure 13-30 :D Reading 25 :hmm: How come? I thought I could have got ,at least, 27. BTW, I will not complain much since the listening and Structure parts were more than I expected. Phew, what a relief... Do you guys have any idea how hard it is to get 6.0 on TWE? I did a 5-paragraph essay, but I realized that I did some grammartical errors? Do I still have a chance of getting the perfect score? PS...Are there any thai guys here? If any, I just want to tell you that I have some GMAT and TOEFL CDs, which I want to distribute for free. If interested, just let me know.

Congratulations. awesome score, awesome advice.

Hi CBS it's nice to see you here.. Congrats on your awesome Q score.. Since I know you personally, I encourage you to take the GMAT again or until you get 650 up. With the combination of your 650up score and your good GPA, you will be competitive in applying to top schools. Work hard on your Verbal and you will definitely get the score you want. I wish you the best of luck in your toefl...

Hi David, I think I need some help from you.. I'm also interested in top business schools, and I've done quite a lot of school research, trying to apply in the second round of those school. Let me begin with my background. I'm Thai, living in Bangkok since I was born, graduated in mechanical engineering. My GPA is 3.12 and I've been working in a corporate finance department at a bank-the industrial finance corporation of thailand. My position is engineer, but practically, I'm working as a c... redit officer. During my years in the university, I was an active member of engineering basketball club and quite successful in my club. I was also a member of the student government of the university. Actually, I was responsible for allocating limited budget to university clubs, arranging university fairs and more... Here are my questions: 1. I took the GMAT 2 weeks ago and got 750. I am definitely very pleased with the score, but the sad part was that I did really bad in AWA. So, with no surprise, I got only 3.5. in AWA. The question is what I should do? Should I take the GMAT again to increase the AWA score? If not, should I mention in the optional essay why I did bad in the AWA? Or I should pretend to forget it? 2. I've taken the toefl and got 257 (5.0 TWE), so I'm planning to take the TOEFL again. Do you think a good TWE score can compensate my bad AWA? Some told me that I should put my effort into my applications, but I can't help worrying about my AWA. 3. I realized that my experience is much less than average of top schools. So I always wonder if I should apply next year or next 2 years... Please advice me about my experience. 3. According to my profile, is there any chance I can get in to those top business schools? Thank you a lot. I appreciate what you are doing here. Best regards,

Hi, Vingmat,rude_boie,riteshb. Thanks for your advice. I'm sorry that I didn't make it clear. English is not my first language, and I'm a Thai guy graduted from a Thai-speaking university. I took the TOEFL long time ago, and got 5.0 from TWE. I think there is some room for improvement, so I decide to take the Toefl again. Do you think a perfect score on TWE will help? Or I will just waste my time and money... Comment please..

I got the official score today. As I expected, I score 3.5 in AWA. Do you guys have any comment about this? 1. Should I retake? If not, should I mention in the optional essay the reason why I did really bad in AWA? .Or just pretend to forget it? 2. I'm planning to take the Toefl again, and I'll try to do a perfect score on TWE. Can a good TWE score compensate my bad AWA score? Or I should stop worrying about it and put my effort into my applications? Please help me... I want some comments..

What a relief!!!!![banana] [bounce] [bounce] [banana] I took the GMAT a couple of days ago..But I just have a chance to share my experience here.Actually, I've been reading postings here for a while but I was not quite active.This is the first posting of mine. First of all I want to say "Thank you" from the bottom of my heart..to Erin, Ursula,kongo09, and every one here. You guys are really cool. This is my score Quantitative -- 50 95th percentile Verbal -- 41 93th percentile Overall -- 750 99th percentile About my preparation, I don't have much to say. I think Ursula and Kongo09 did tell everything we should do for the preparation already. I reccommend ones who aim to 750 up look at their postings carefully. I did so....and the result is just quite good. For ones who don't have much confidence about yourself..I have some facts to show to encourage you..I did full three GMAT CAT exams (Actually, I should have done 4- 5 more).And these were the results. Powerprep1 640...(touched 25% of [tooltip=Official Guide]OG[/tooltip] at the time) Kaplan 570...(Kaplan is far harder than the real one. Don't try kaplan before the real test unless you want to discourage yourself) Powerprep2 680...(touched 75% of [tooltip=Official Guide]OG[/tooltip] at the time, 2 days before the G-day) As you can see, I shouldn't have got 750 right? But after I read Kongo09's post, my attitude towards the GMAT has been changed. At the moment, I believed that I could get 700. And that the most important thing.His post is really cool!! Thanks again Kongo.. By the way, I did really bad in the writing part because of my really bad preparation of this part.. I didn't finish the second essay properly; moreover, the first one was not good. Frankly, I don't think I will get more than 3.5. Everybody, I want to read your comments about my writing part....Should I retake? How important is the writing part? Sorry for my grammartical errors. I barely write in English in my country.