Evaluation for M.S. Finance

[rcowan2]

mbaMission Admissions Consultants,

I'm targeting a specialized master's program at the University of Memphis and need your need understanding their admissions criteria regarding my GMAT scores. I recently took the GMAT and my scores were as follows: 590 total 37 Quant 34 Verbal 6 IR and 3.5 AWA. The avg. GMAT for an accepted student in the university's full MBA program is 587, and admission is based on a competitive basis; however, the specialized program I'm looking at does not have admission on a competitive basis and states that a student must have merely a "satisfactory" GPA ( I got a 3.1) and a "satisfactory" GMAT score. I'm hoping that you guys can explain what this means. Here is a linked to the university's grad program's http://www.memphis.edu/gradcatalog/degreeprog/fcbe/fcbe.php. The MBA program admissions are list at the beginning; however, the Master of Science program I'm looking at starts at the bottom 1/3 of the page. Please let me know what you think?

Secondly, I think my scores should be good for admission if they meet the "satisfactory" line; however, I'm concerned about the 3.5 (12th percentile) in my AWA although I was in the 70th percentile for my verbal. I simply ran out of time to fully develop my conclusion. How would you look at that? Will it be necessary for me to retake the test?

[mbamissionjenK]

Hi there,

It does seem like you should be in a good position, with your GMAT being close to the average at the full time MBA program, but I also think it is a fair question to ask-- you can get in touch with the admissions office and ask what the average GMAT was for that particular class last year, does not hurt to ask, and would help your mindset perhaps. I would not worry too much about the AWA especially the percentile-- given that there are only a small # of possible AWA scores, the percentiles jump hugely with each point. Ideally sure you could do better on the overall plus AWA, but maybe start off asking about the averages. Good luck and keep us posted!