Accepted.com Odds 'N Ends

Search Engine Optimization and Your Essay
I recently read an essay draft with lots of "key words." You know, words like "leadership," "communications skills," "initiative," "team work," "vision," etc. If the author had been seeking a high ranking in the search engines and these were search terms, he had done a good job. A few incoming links and these winning words, plus a good meta description and page title -- Google and friends would have been smiling.You might wonder, "What do these questions have to do with my qualifications for b-school? Or law school? Or med school? Or college?" Very little. But your answer can open a window into you, your interests, and your values-and getting to know you is what these essays are all about.

But it wasn't a Web page. It was an application essay. And this draft completely lacked personality. The author seemed to believe that if he repeated these key words enough, he would convince the reader that he indeed had these attributes.

It doesn't work that way at all. Repeating key words like a mantra is not effective. If anything, these phrases start to look a little like spam -- just as unwanted and meaningless.

At the same time, these qualities are valued by adcom members and your essays should convince the adcoms that you have them. How?

Demonstrate them.

Do you want to show initiative and leadership? Discuss the time you saw a need and organized a group to respond to that need. Do you want to show communications skills? Write about a tense team moment that you diffused or how you kept the peace between two short-tempered team members who just happened to have differing views on how to proceed.

Search engine optimization has its place. On Web sites. It has no place in application essays. Here you earn high rankings through show-and-tell.

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The Informational Interview: Networking's First Step
As the job squeeze of the past three years made clear, nothing beats networking when jobs are hard to find. Informational interviews are sometimes viewed as disguised job interviews -- last resorts when you're between jobs. In reality, they should be used as the first stage in networking, a process that smart professionals never really stop.

The leading business schools' career placement officers recommend that MBAs and MBA wannabes alike use the informational interview as an ongoing career tool, especially when contemplating a career change. "Networking and informational interviewing [are] the keys to success," says Texas' Career Center Associate Director, Jamie Belinne, in the UT McCombs chat at Accepted.com. Suppose you're an IT consultant seeking an MBA to transition into investment banking. Begin setting up informational interviews before you start business school. "If you know what you want to do already, take the time to do informational interviews before coming to school," notes Haas' Assistant Director of Career Services, Sheri Lockshin, at another recent chat with Haas representatives . "Things roll very quickly once school begins, and the more research and informational interviewing done before school begins, the better." Then, once you're admitted, you have entr�e to a larger, more influential, and ready-to-help pool of informational interviewees: your business school's alumni. These contacts can lead to summer internships, which often lead to full-time gigs.

In other words, the informational interview creates the initial relationship. After that, you're networking. When you call the contact or alum the next time, you'll already have established your bona fides as a job-seeker or career-switcher. As Michigan Business School's Al Cotrone notes, "it will be much easier to reach out to people once you are in a program and 'pick up' the conversation as opposed to having to start from scratch as internship season approaches. Networking with current acquaintances helps them to 'buy in' to your endeavor." And the informational interview is an excellent way to turn a stranger into a "current acquaintance."

Paul Bodine, Senior Editor

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Chat, Chats, and More Chats
Coming up:

International MBA Admissions Chat with Anderson, Darden, CMU, Cornell, and Indiana -- January 7 at 1:00 PM Eastern Time/6:00 PM GMT
MIT -- January 8 at 1:00 PM Eastern Time/6:00 PM GMT
Indiana -- January 29 at 6:00 PM Pacific/9:00 PM Eastern/2:00 AM GMT

Chats from the recent past:

Transcripts are now up for all the chats that took place during December, including USC, NYU, UMBS, UCLA, Haas, and Chicago. You can link to them from our chat transcript page .

To determine the time in our location, please visit http://www.timeanddate.com/ .

Decrease in GMAT Test Taking
Newly published statistics for GMAT test takers reveal that although the number of tests administered steadily increased from 2000 to 2002, 2003 has seen a marked decline of 13.02% thru November 30, 2003 from the previous year's figures. The decline puts test-taking levels in both the US and abroad at roughly 2001 levels.

The complete data can be accessed at:
http://www.gmac.com/gmac/TheGMAT/Tools/YeartoDateGMATVolume.htm

GMAT Sponsor Shifts Administration of the Exam from ETS to ACT
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that the organization overseeing GMAT administration has announced that it has chosen to end a 50-year partnership with the Educational Testing Service (ETS). Instead, beginning in 2006 and for at least the next seven years, the GMAT will be jointly managed by ACT Inc., best known for its ACT college entrance exam, and Pearson VUE, a company specializing in computer-based training.

The exam is currently administered at 550 testing centers around the world, but the change in sponsors will increase the number of potential testing centers more than six-fold.

• The ACGME's only method of enforcement -- revoking accreditation status -- is punitive for residents and discourages them from reporting violations.
• The regulations allow for averaging over a one-month period (so hours can be greater than 80 in a given week).
• Research suggests that physicians are impaired by sleep deprivation after 24 hours without sleep, yet ACGME rules allow residents to be held in the hospital for an additional 6-hour "hand-off" period after 24 hours of duty.

As AMSA National President Lauren Oshman, M.D., M.P.H. says, "It is time to rectify the excessive work hours that are forced upon residents. We hope that HoursWatch will serve as an independent 'watchdog,' monitoring and lobbying for enforcement mechanisms that offer better protections to residents."

To learn more about AMSA and CIR/SEIU, you can visit them online at: http://www.amsa.org and http://www.cirseiu.org

Increase in Medical School Applications, Particularly Among Women
After a six-year decline, the number of applicants to U.S. medical schools is on the rise, according to data released by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). Almost 35,000 individuals applied to attend medical school in the coming school year, a 3.4% increase over last year's applicant pool of 33,625.

An increase in female applicants accounted for most of the overall increase in applications: 17,672 women applied, an almost 7% rise over last year's total. In a related statistic, the sharp decline of males applying to medical schools, a trend that started in 1997, leveled off this year. Male applicants totaled 17,113, very close to last year's figure of 17,069.

CNN.com adds that women outnumbering men among U.S. medical school applicants represents a milestone in the slow but steady increase in the number of aspiring female doctors. Women have yet to surpass the number of men actually entering medical school. Nationwide this fall, women constituted 49.7% of the entering class of more than 16,500. The proportion of female applicants to men has risen steadily for years. In 1963, they were 8.1% of the almost 17,700 applicants.

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Columbia Law School Dean Appointed President of Rice University

In an announcement posted on the Columbia Law School website, Law Faculty Dean David W. Leebron has announced that in July 2004, he will be departing to take up a new post as the President of Rice University. Leebron, who is leaving after fifteen years of deanship, is excited about his new position, but sad to be leaving Columbia's staff, faculty, and graduate community.

To access the full text of the announcement, you can click on the link below:
http://www.law.columbia.edu/media_inquiries/news/Dec_2003/David_Leebron

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Women Take Lead in Number of US Doctorates Awarded; Total Falls Again
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that in 2002, for the first time, more American women than men earned doctorates at American universities, receiving 51% of all Ph.D.s awarded. But the milestone may not mark the ascent of American female academics, who have consistently earned around 13,000 doctorates for several years, so much as the descent of their male counterparts, who earned 15% fewer doctorates (about 12,800) in 2002 than in 1997.

According to the "Survey of Earned Doctorates," American universities awarded 2% fewer doctorates last year than two years ago. The 39,955 awarded last year are the fewest in a decade and represent a 6% decrease over the last five years.

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Dean of Yale is Named President of Duke

The New York Times reports that Duke University's next president will be Richard H. Brodhead, a 56-year-old Yale English professor and dean of Yale College. He will succeed Nannerl O. Keohane, 63, who will step down on July 1 after 11 years.

In a statement made via telephone, Brodhead said that he never would have left "but for a place that presented some exciting new opportunities and was consonant with my own values." As dean of Yale's undergraduate college since 1993, Dr. Brodhead has been its faculty chairman and chief administrator, with responsibility for undergraduate education, housing and social life, student services, undergraduate admissions, and financial aid.

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