Accepted.com Odds 'N Ends

We have decided to publish this newsletter as a service to our clients and others who register for it on our web site. Accepted.com's Odds 'N Ends will bring you our tip of the month, admissions information for grad, law, MBA, and medical school applicants, and news about Accepted.com.

We also welcome contributions from readers. If you have comments, questions, or perhaps an article idea, please e-mail our editor. We cannot publish everything we receive, but we will try to respond to everyone. And as always, we appreciate feedback.

Index

What's New at Accepted.com
Tip of the Month
Grad Admission News You Can Use
Law Admission News You Can Use
MBA Admission News You Can Use
Medical Admission News You Can Use
Our Services

What's New at Accepted.com

Best Wishes for the Holiday Season

The entire staff at Accepted.com would like to thank you for your patronage and wish you a joyous Holiday Season and great New Year!

Chats

Come & check out the chats! Accepted.com chats are chock full of info! Visit our transcript page to catch up on what you missed in earlier chats.

Save the Date!

On March 15 2000, Linda Abraham, Odds 'N Ends editor and Accepted.com's president, will give a presentation at the American Medical Student Association's Annual Convention in Washington D.C. Ms. Abraham's presentation is entitled "Ace the AMCAS Essay."

She would love to see you there. Please say "Hi."

For more information about the premed activities at the convention, please visit http://www.amsa.org/premed.

Tip of the Month

Snapshots
When interviewing clients and asking questions about their reasons for pursuing their degree or about their current job responsibilities, I often hear intriguing answers such as, "I admired my supervisor and she said I should go to UCLA for an MBA as she did," or "I'm at the cutting edge of technology and need to overcome the human need to find comfort in the status quo so I can be a visionary." When I follow-up and ask what exactly the applicant admired in the supervisor or what that tension between wanting things to "normalize" and wishing to create new concepts feels like, the applicants sometimes don't know what to add. I want to ask so many other questions in the interview and yet I don't want them to feel pressured. I frequently suggest that over the next week they e-mail me what I call "snapshots," little anecdotes about work or about people that illustrate the points they would like to make. The applicants brighten at this idea. A way to do some writing without feeling pressured, the snapshots are also a way to generate the specifics and details that will strengthen their outline and thus ultimately their essay.

The same concept of snapshots, taking note of specific situations that illustrate a point, can help you in your writing. I really want to encourage you to use images and specifics to make your writing interesting and unique. The snapshots allow you to show instead of tell and add interest and power to your writing.

Grad Admission News You Can Use

Number of Ph.D.s Grows

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the number of Ph.D.s awarded in 1998 hit a record high, as it has every year since 1985, but the increase this year was miniscule. In 1997, 42,555 Ph.D. degrees were awarded; in 1998 the number increased to 42,683 - an increase of only .3%.

While the total number of Ph.D.s increased only slightly, the make-up of those earning the degree changed more significantly. Women and under-represented minorities increased their representation among freshly minted Ph.D.s. Members of minorities earned over 4000 Ph.D.s in 1998. Their increasing representation will help universities increase the diversity of their faculties.

Professionally, the bulk of the degrees were earned in engineering and the sciences, with the percentage of engineering and physics doctorates declining and life science Ph.D.s increasing. In the social sciences, psychology showed the most growth; in the humanities, language and literature showed an overall decline.

Law Admissions News You Can Use

Pre-Law Handbook

I was recently doing some surfing - the sedentary, behind-the-desk, warm and dry kind - when I stumbled across a real law school admissions gem: The University of Richmond Pre-Law Handbook. Written by the University of Richmond pre-law advisor, Dr. Ellis West, the handbook is well organized, concise and extremely informative. While certain comments are clearly directed only at U of R students, the rest of the handbook should be required reading for all law school applicants.

I want to particularly recommend the appendix on writing personal statements. It contains outstanding advice on writing these critical essays from someone who has obviously read many himself.

MBA Admissions News You Can Use

Time's Running Out!

For you to win a Palm Pilot! MBA wanna-bes share your opinion on Accepted.com's expansion plans and you will automatically be enrolled in our Top Secret Drawing. Just fill out the short questionnaire.

Hurry!! The contest ends December 31, 1999. You could be the winner!

B-Schools and Social Conscience

The World Resources Institute and the Aspen Institute have published a report grouping 313 of the 355 accredited U.S. MBA programs according to their preparation for "social stewardship" i.e. their commitment to social and environmental issues.

According to the WRI report the following b-schools are on the cutting edge in providing support for study of "topics at the intersection of society and business":

1. Case Western
2. Harvard
3. Loyola Marymount
4. Kellogg
5. Stanford
6. University of Michigan at Ann Arbor
7. University of Notre Dame
8. Wharton
9. Katz (University of Pittsburgh)
10. Darden

At the cutting edge in "incorporating environment-business issues":

1. Cornell
2. George Washington University
3. Rensselaer Polytechnic
4. Tulane
5. University of Michigan at Ann Arbor
6. University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler)
7. Wharton
8. University of Texas at Austin
9. Vanderbilt

The report criticized the overwhelming majority of the schools for not addressing business-social issues.

You can find the full report at http://www.wri.org/wri/bschools/.

Interviewing

'Tis the Season . for MBA admissions interviews. Before you go for your interviews, take a look at the feedback given by those who preceded you. Visit Accepted.com's Interview Feedback Database.

After your interview, please share your experience by taking a few minutes to fill out a questionnaire. Filling out the questionnaire will automatically enroll you in our It's a 10! Contest.

Internet Goldrush Tarnishing MBA?

The New York Times recently reported a decline in applications from 1997-98 to 1998-99 at a number of top MBA schools emphasizing high-tech and entrepreneurship. Notable among these schools are Stanford (-6.4%), Berkeley (-10.6%), and MIT (-8.3%). The article also observed that the number of American citizens taking the GMAT has declined by approximately 17% over the last four years and that the schools are suddenly dealing with an increasing number of students who leave after the first year. In contrast schools like Harvard and Columbia are still dealing with increasing number of applicants.

What is causing these contradictory trends? The Times argues that the gold rush mentality of the Internet and start-up economy are causing would-be applicants to think twice about postponing entrepreneurial dreams for two years while pursuing the MBA. These aspiring entrepreneurs are increasingly deciding to stake their claim in e-commerce immediately — before it is too late. The schools with a growing number of applicants are attracting more international applicants and U.S. citizens who want to pursue more traditional MBA career paths in management consulting, finance, and investment banking.

A fascinating interview with the director of Wharton admissions, Bob Alig, supports the Times' conclusions. Alig also reports a big increase in international applicants that is keeping the overall Wharton application numbers high and like the Times discusses the phenomenon of students leaving after the first year.

If you are applying to Wharton, read this interview.

Med Admissions News You Can Use

From our Mailbox

I recently saw an excellent post on the AMSA premed listserve and received permission from the author, Steve Turner of San Diego State University, to quote it. Here it is:

"I have been on this list-serve for less then a year now and have heard your question [about quantity of volunteer work] asked many times and in many ways. In short, what are the med schools looking for exactly ... how much [volunteer work] is enough?

"The answer I have heard repeatedly... and which was unknowingly echoed by Dr. Robert Resnik in speaking to a group of premeds from SDSU and UCSD. Dr. Resnik is the Associate Dean of Admissions for UCSD School of Medicine. If I should be so bold as to paraphrase him, he said simply that it's not the volume of what you do (research, volunteer work, etc), its the quality of what you do. THAT (Steve's emphasis) is a reflection of how you are as a person. Does it help to have a diverse background? Yes, it helps. Is the decision by the med schools based solely on how much you have done or your grades or your MCAT scores? No, not at all. In a most candid response, Dr. Resnik said that if he can envision you (the candidate) as a doctor, that's good. If he can envision you as his doctor, that's better.

"So to all you (myself included) who find yourself worrying and fretting over meeting some secret cut-off point for volume of activity, step back a moment and ask yourself whether the volume of work will make you a better person and doctor ... or will the quality of work? Then pick something that makes you feel like you've contributed to others and your community.

"Just my two cents."

That advice is worth a lot more than he thinks.

Tell a Friend

Please share this issue with friends and colleagues who share your interest in graduate school admission. Tell a friend or two about Accepted.com's powerful array of online pre-professional resources. They will thank you and so will we!

Our Services

Writing a personal statement is a tough challenge. A former client, an NBC journalist with over twenty years of experience in the field, once said that his personal statement "was the toughest thing I ever had to write." He sought our help. Shouldn't you?

Accepted.com's editors are here to help you write your best essays — eloquent, compelling essays that distinguish you from the competition and transform you from a transcript and test score into a competitive applicant and unique individual.

Check us out. Complete information on our services, including prices, testimonials, and information about our top-notch professional staff, can be found at Essay Help. If you have any questions please feel free to contact us at info@accepted.com or Phone.

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