Breaking down the New 2012 Essays for Ross

1. Breaking down the New 2012
Essays for Ross
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2. Breaking down the New 2012
Essays for Ross
Guide for 2012 Ross Essays
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3. Breaking down the New 2012
Essays for Ross
If a tree falls in a forest and there's no one
there to hear it ... does it make a sound?
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4. Essay 1 –
Introduce yourself to your classmates in 100 words or less
This is one place where we can see that the essays are different from last
year, as the introduction assignment is now focused on "classmates" rather
than an ambiguous audience. In what is becoming a theme (see: Columbia),
we were one step ahead of Ross on this one, as we insisted last year that our
clients not write about work or career goals or anything else that they might
have thought an admissions officer might want to read. Instead, we pushed
them towards the place that you should always default to when you are
thinking about Ross: MAP. Multi-disciplinary Action Project. This is Ross' pride
and joy and for good reason as it puts most other action-based learning
models to shame.
They love MAP, they love action-based learning, and they believe that the
classroom is a place where everyone teaches (and learns from) each other.
So when you apply there, your through-line has to be "what perspective have I
gained that I can come share with everyone?" That's your hook with Ross.
And this introduction is the place to state that right off the top.
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5. Essay 2 - Describe your career goals. How will an MBA from Ross
help you achieve those goals? What is your vision for how you can
make a unique contribution to the Ross community? (500 words)
There's not a lot to say here that we haven't said dozens of times about
career goals, but you basically want to nail the WHAT of your career
goals (stating them clearly), the HOW (offering proof of your transferable
skills), and the WHERE (Why Ross, your contribution to Ross). The
"contribution" angle is a new one this year and, quite frankly, one heck of
a challenge since the word count didn't change.
Our initial feeling is that it just means hammering more of the MAP
program and making sure to remember that "teaching others from your
unique perspective" is the ideal way to "contribute" in the Ross universe.
And since you won't really hit that on the nose in Essay 1 (rather it is just
informing your approach), you can lay it on pretty thick here without
getting overly repetitive.
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6. Essay 3 - Describe a time in your career when you were frustrated
or disappointed. What did you learn from that experience?
(500 word maximum)
This is exactly the same Essay 3 from last year. That said, we still want
to talk about this one for a minute. Consider it a Public Service
Announcement, but we'd like to see people far better on this question
(and others like it). Everyone seems to make the same mistake, which is
to "go negative." They arrive at a bad experience - a mistake, a failure, a
crushing setback - and then they never flip it. So it just winds up being
this big downer and a missed opportunity to write about an
accomplishment.
The key here is to take the negative experience or the disappointment
and flip it on its head. It goes:
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7. Situation
Crushing Disappointment
Lesson Learned
The Way You Turned It Around
Without that forth prong, it just becomes a sad story. Sure, you can
share a lesson and show some introspection, but why not prove that you
learned the lesson by then showing it in action? This one is a whiff for so
many people that we had to rant about it a bit.
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8. Essay 4 - Two Choices:
What are you most passionate about? (300 word maximum)
Describe a personal challenge or obstacle and why you view it as such.
How have you dealt with it? What have you learned from it? (300 word
maximum)
Ah, the dreaded choice essay scenario. What is interesting here is that
Ross lost the "be an effective teacher to your classmates" question that
apparently was too on the nose given what we know about the overall
tone and objective of this application. So that leaves the relatively broad
"what are you passionate about" question (always a good one) or the
stepsister of Essay 3, which is a more personal challenge or obstacle.
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9. Which one to write about probably goes like this:
• If you have something that you were planning on writing about in an
optional essay, find a way to make it work for 4B and turn it into an
actual, powerful essay rather than a tacked-on mea culpa in the optional.
• Otherwise, bring the passion to the table and end this thing on a huge,
positive note. Share the thing that makes you tick. Ideally (as with
Stanford's famous What Matters Most to You and Why essay) the thing
that makes you tick will connect with your long-term goal from Essay 2.
In many ways, 4A is your chance to write about the WHY of your career
goals (usually an anchor of career goals essays, but there's no room for it
on Ross 2). So take full advantage.
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10. We hope this helps many of you out there. Good luck!
If you are interested in our services for your MBA admissions
journey, email us at mba@amerasiaconsulting.com to request a
free consultation. Additionally, you can download our free guides
for applying to HBS and Columbia.
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