Kaneisha Grayson's Blog, page 25

Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #6

Welcome to the 6th and final secret of our six secrets to multiple Ivy League acceptances series! We can’t believe we’ve made it to the end already!

So are you ready to jump right in? Here’s Secret #6:

Invest in mentoring.

Here at The Art of Applying, we believe that every person applying to graduate school should have a mentor, and here’s why. A mentor will provide two things: new ideas and accountability. Even throughout this blog series you’ve learned secrets that you wouldn’t know without some form of mentorship from us. We follow the results of the people who commit to working with us, as well as the people who reach out to us but ultimately employ a DIY strategy or purchase a lower priced package from one of our competitors. When we checked back in with the people who used a cross- your-fingers DIY strategy or a la carte services from another company, we consistently found people had been admitted to less prestigious schools than our clients with similar profiles, they received less funding, or they weren’t admitted at all.

A good mentor is going to give you great ideas and make sure that you act on them.

A great mentor will also put together a powerful group of individuals that are all working towards similar goals. By gathering high-potential people and having them working together toward a similar goal multiplies everyone’s effectiveness exponentially!

In our client roster, we have individuals who earn $500,000 a year working in finance as well as individuals who earn $60,000 a year working at non-profits. When they’re all working together, learning together, and pushing each other, everyone wins. The difference between the people who get good enough results and the people who get head-over-heels exiting, life-changing, happy dance results are that the second group of people considered themselves worthy enough to invest in their future.

Our clients know that if they aren’t willing to believe in and invest in themselves, they can’t expect anyone else to be. You only get one chance to be a first time applicant to your dream schools and if you don’t get the application process right the first time, you will have to reapply, or you might just give up on your dream of an outstanding grad school education entirely. You may have been able to get this far without much mentorship and just doing things on your own. The strategies and resources that have gotten you this far are not the same resources that will get you where you want to go from here.

Let us tell you a story about one of our clients who realized that before it was too late.

Here’s the testimonial that she wrote at the end of her application process. She was someone who was going to be a DIY applier and who ended up deciding to invest.

Working with The Art of Applying does make a difference. I had read every single post on Kaneisha’s blog, and had applied to over 10 universities in the past. Yet none of it compared with a good consultant looking over my application. My first drafts were all over the place. I wrote my story and the things I wanted to do, but I had no filter. I tend to write a lot and didn’t know what to cut. When we read our own stories we just don’t see the holes in them. My consultant saw these missing pieces and played with my essay paragraphs until it became a cohesive narrative. The most important, however, was being asked the right questions. The whole process gave me confidence on my story and on my strengths. Kaneisha convinced me I should go for it when I was thinking of waiting another year. Then throughout my essays… my consultant just knew what parts of my story I should make the most of. So if you have insecurities about whether to apply, or how to present your story, hire them. It’ll be worth it.

She worked with us and she got into Chicago Booth, Tuck, and Ross; both Tuck and Ross gave her scholarships.

Now you have a choice.

You can either take this information from the last six weeks and eventually forget all about it. You can stay stuck where you are and roll the dice with your dreams. Our guess however is that if you’re on this blog post, you came here for a reason. You know that your application process could be much more efficient and effective, and that you don’t want to risk applying the wrong way. Or you can take action now to turn around your application process so you can move towards your dream school and the extraordinary life and high impact career that you know you can have. You will keep progressing in your career, reach your full potential, and make your mark on the world.

So which path will you choose?

Book a free Breakthrough Session with us and speak to our team today!

On the call we’ll help you get total clarity about exactly what you want your application process to look like, and the exact steps you should take to achieve your goals. If you want us to help you and if you think we’re a good fit, we might invite you to be one of the clients we take on this month in our Application Accelerator.

We’ll teach you the same application strategies that our clients who were accepted to Harvard Business School, Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard Law School, Harvard Graduate School of Design, Stanford Graduate Business School, London Business School, INSEAD, Princeton Woodrow Wilson School, Northwestern School of Education and Social Policy, Wharton, and Columbia Business School and SIPA, and other top graduate schools used when they worked with us. And we will show you how to apply to your dream schools just as effectively as they did.

Now’s the time to make your decision to move forward and change your life.

We look forward to speaking with you soon.

The post Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #6 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #5

Welcome back to our blog series, Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances!

Any guesses on what secret #5 might be based on the picture?

If you’re thinking the essays, you’re right. Secret #5 is:

Essays are almost everything.

Something we’ve found to be true for all applicants is that even if everything else in your application is perfect, but your essays are lackluster, you will not get into your dream school. Every year when we’re reading about the clients of other consulting firms, we see people with these extraordinary GMAT scores and really high GPAs, and they’re baffled as to why they didn’t get into their dream schools. Many of these individuals ask us to review their submitted applications and tell them what went wrong. And you know what it almost always is? It’s that they underestimated the importance of the essay.

Schools like Harvard, Columbia, and Wharton could easily fill their classrooms with students who have perfect GMAT scores, but they don’t. Now why is that? It’s because every one of these top schools is building holistic and diverse classrooms, and not armies of accomplished robots.

Once you understand that essays are almost everything when you’re applying to these schools, you can focus your time, energy, and attention on what we think is the most fun part of the application: getting to share your story, your passions,  dreams, and plans! It’s simple. Do your best on the other parts of the application and start as early as possible gathering your essay prompts, brainstorming what you’ll write about, and drafting your essays.

In our example today we’re going to tell you about one of our clients, Kenny. Kenny had a 3.05 GPA in industrial engineering from Purdue University, as well as a 710 GMAT score. His work experience was in what he studied, industrial engineering. After working with us, he was admitted to Cornell Johnson with the Park Fellowship, which is a full scholarship that is very prestigious and competitive. He was also admitted to Cornell Johnson with the Consortium Fellowship, which also happens to be a full scholarship. Because he couldn’t accept both, he ended up taking the Park Fellowship for the prestige, and didn’t take the money from the Consortium, but was still a Consortium Fellow.

Dream story, right?

But Kenny had an incredibly long journey to get those results. Before he came to work with us, Kenny had been rejected 10 times over the years from different top business schools despite his great GMAT score. You know why? It was because Kenny was doing everything else right, but was neglecting the most crucial part of his application, his essays! After the devastation of getting rejected 10 times over several years, Kenny came to work with us and we helped him understand the secret that essays are almost everything. And we were able to turn his application process around and send him to Cornell on a full scholarship.

Check back next week to learn our 6th and final secret!

The post Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #5 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #4

Hello, and welcome back to our blog series: Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances.

We can’t believe we’re already halfway through! So let’s take a quick recap of what we’ve learned so far. Secret #1 was that honesty is the best policy. Secret #2 was that aiming high can make it easier to apply, and get in. And secret #3 was that aspiration beats achievement. With these secrets alone you are well on your way to multiple Ivy League acceptances. But we’ve got three more, so are you ready? Here’s secret #4:

Any weakness can be overcome.

That’s right. You have the power to determine just how ready the admissions committee thinks you are for the Ivy League experience. We know that everyone thinks you need to have an insanely high GMAT score to get into Harvard Business School, but we’re gonna let you in on a bonus secret. This simply isn’t true. Our founder, Kaneisha, got into Harvard Business School with a 620 GMAT score. We had a client this past year who had a GMAT score in the 500’s, and he was also admitted into Harvard Business School. Our Indian American client who was our example in the second blog post of this series had a 650 GMAT and she was admitted into HBS, and many other top business schools as well. How can this be, you ask?

When you take strategic actions that counteract the story that a low GMAT score or a low GPA is telling about you, you are able to significantly decrease the importance of your low GPA, low test score, of whatever else it is that you might be worried about in your profile. Those weaknesses no longer matter as much, and the AdCom can focus on your unique strengths. However, when you get this wrong and you don’t take contrary actions, you raise red flags about your application. You come across as a person who is not self-aware, who is unwilling to work on their weaknesses, or someone who thinks that if they just don’t mention the weaknesses, the admissions committee will somehow magically overlook them. Guess what? Not so.

So what do we mean when we say take contrary action?

It means to take an action in any and every part of your application or profile that tells the exact opposite of the weakness that you’re worried about.

We’ll use our founder, Kaneisha, as an example. She was just a senior in college when she applied to Harvard for her business and policy degrees, and was extremely worried that the admissions committee might think she wasn’t mature enough to hold her own among the more experienced students. She therefore took contrary action to focus her extracurricular activities during her senior year on opportunities that required her to work on teams with the school administrators, who were people in their 40s, 50s, or even older. She successfully showed that she could be a valuable contributor to a team of people much more her senior. This eliminated any questions they might have had about her being intimidated by people who would be just two or three years older than her. Her age was no longer an issue, so she could focus on demonstrating why she was a great fit for Harvard.

She did end up going to Harvard, and had an incredible experience, never letting her age, or any other perceived weakness, hold her back from reaching her full potential. We know that you can do this too. Because when you take contrary action you show the admissions committee that even though you may not have been able to ace a stressful three hour test, you can handle the rigor of the Ivy League classroom. They will know this because when you submit your application, you will have proactively completed other actions that prove you can hold your own in the fast paced atmosphere of Harvard or any other dream school you’re targeting.

Please make sure to come back next Thursday for secret #5!

The post Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #4 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances – Secret #4

Hello, and welcome back to our blog series: Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances.

We can’t believe we’re already halfway through! So let’s take a quick recap of what we’ve learned so far. Secret #1 was that honesty is the best policy. Secret #2 was that aiming high can make it easier to apply, and get in. And secret #3 was that aspiration beats achievement. With these secrets alone you are well on your way to multiple Ivy League acceptances. But we’ve got three more, so are you ready? Here’s secret #4:

Any weakness can be overcome.

That’s right. You have the power to determine just how ready the admissions committee thinks you are for the Ivy League experience. We know that everyone thinks you need to have an insanely high GMAT score to get into Harvard Business School, but we’re gonna let you in on a bonus secret. This simply isn’t true. Our founder, Kaneisha, got into Harvard Business School with a 620 GMAT score. We had a client this past year who had a GMAT score in the 500’s, and he was also admitted into Harvard Business School. Our Indian American client who was our example in the second blog post of this series had a 650 GMAT and she was admitted into HBS, and many other top business schools as well. How can this be, you ask?

When you take strategic actions that counteract the story that a low GMAT score or a low GPA is telling about you, you are able to significantly decrease the importance of your low GPA, low test score, of whatever else it is that you might be worried about in your profile. Those weaknesses no longer matter as much, and the AdCom can focus on your unique strengths. However, when you get this wrong and you don’t take contrary actions, you raise red flags about your application. You come across as a person who is not self-aware, who is unwilling to work on their weaknesses, or someone who thinks that if they just don’t mention the weaknesses, the admissions committee will somehow magically overlook them. Guess what? Not so.

So what do we mean when we say take contrary action?

It means to take an action in any and every part of your application or profile that tells the exact opposite of the weakness that you’re worried about.

We’ll use our founder, Kaneisha, as an example. She was just a senior in college when she applied to Harvard for her business and policy degrees, and was extremely worried that the admissions committee might think she wasn’t mature enough to hold her own among the more experienced students. She therefore took contrary action to focus her extracurricular activities during her senior year on opportunities that required her to work on teams with the school administrators, who were people in their 40s, 50s, or even older. She successfully showed that she could be a valuable contributor to a team of people much more her senior. This eliminated any questions they might have had about her being intimidated by people who would be just two or three years older than her. Her age was no longer an issue, so she could focus on demonstrating why she was a great fit for Harvard.

She did end up going to Harvard, and had an incredible experience, never letting her age, or any other perceived weakness, hold her back from reaching her full potential. We know that you can do this too. Because when you take contrary action you show the admissions committee that even though you may not have been able to ace a stressful three hour test, you can handle the rigor of the Ivy League classroom. They will know this because when you submit your application, you will have proactively completed other actions that prove you can hold your own in the fast paced atmosphere of Harvard or any other dream school you’re targeting.

Please make sure to come back next Thursday for secret #5!

The post Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances – Secret #4 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #3

Welcome back to our blog series, Six Secrets to Ivy League Acceptances!

For today’s post, we’re going to be discussing secret #3. Ready for it?

Aspiration beats achievement.

So what does that mean? It means that your past matters; but the way you communicate the past matters way more than what you’ve actually done.

The way we see it, there are two ways that you can apply to graduate school. Let’s say you spend years and years doing everything perfectly. You got a 3.8 GPA even though it meant sacrificing your social life. You landed internships at all the most prestigious companies, even though you hated the work you were doing. You studied for months on end to get the perfect score on the test. You’ve kept in touch with every person you’ve ever known in hopes of getting the best recommendation letter possible. And by doing all of these things to this level of perfection, you’re hoping that it’ll be enough to get you admitted into your dream school. We like to call this a cross your fingers application strategy.

There is however, a new way to complete your applications.

It combines a few different things: passion, persistence, performance, potential, personality, and perspective. A brilliant application to an Ivy League graduate school is going to combine evidence of your academic preparedness for the Ivy League classroom as well as communicate the diverse and impactful experiences you’ve had at work and in your life. You are going to submit letters of recommendation that are congruent with your essays, interview, and every other part of your application. Of course, you are going to submit outstanding essays and successfully convey how you both stand out from all the other people applying, and that you’ll also fit in with the students on campus once you get there.

Our secret weapon for getting this done is called the wounded warrior strategy (boxing gloves starting to make more sense?).

We encourage you to live your life, do your best, and make the decision that now is the time to go to your dream school. Then when it’s time to apply, come as you are, scars and all, showing the real flawed warrior of life that you are. Frame your past as exactly what you needed to get where you are today, regardless of GPA, work experience, age, race, etc.  Your imperfect past is what has made you the courageous, resilient person that you are, and that person is 100% ready to make the most of an Ivy League education. That wounded warrior actually needs an Ivy League education and the opportunities that come with that more than someone who did everything perfectly.

So here’s an example of what we mean. We once had a client from Mexico that came to us with a 2.0 undergraduate GPA. And although most people would never even dream of applying to graduate school with that low of a GPA, especially an Ivy League, we saw potential in him and taught him the wounded warrior secret. We worked with him to write about his past in a way that made his low college GPA not a liability to his candidacy, but the exact reason he was now ready to make the most of an Ivy League education. We worked together on his application and he was admitted to his dream school of Columbia with a 2.0 GPA!

So what we’ve found is that even if you didn’t do everything perfectly in the past, you shouldn’t let that hold you back from pursuing your dreams. As long as you apply the secret of focusing more on the future than on the past, you will be well positioned to submit outstanding applications to your dream schools.

Be sure to check back next week as we reveal Secret #4!

The post Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #3 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances – Secret #3

Welcome back to our blog series, Six Secrets to Ivy League Acceptances!

For today’s post, we’re going to be discussing secret #3. Ready for it?

Aspiration beats achievement.

So what does that mean? It means that your past matters; but the way you communicate the past matters way more than what you’ve actually done.

The way we see it, there are two ways that you can apply to graduate school. Let’s say you spend years and years doing everything perfectly. You got a 3.8 GPA even though it meant sacrificing your social life. You landed internships at all the most prestigious companies, even though you hated the work you were doing. You studied for months on end to get the perfect score on the test. You’ve kept in touch with every person you’ve ever known in hopes of getting the best recommendation letter possible. And by doing all of these things to this level of perfection, you’re hoping that it’ll be enough to get you admitted into your dream school. We like to call this a cross your fingers application strategy.

There is however, a new way to complete your applications.

It combines a few different things: passion, persistence, performance, potential, personality, and perspective. A brilliant application to an Ivy League graduate school is going to combine evidence of your academic preparedness for the Ivy League classroom as well as communicate the diverse and impactful experiences you’ve had at work and in your life. You are going to submit letters of recommendation that are congruent with your essays, interview, and every other part of your application. Of course, you are going to submit outstanding essays and successfully convey how you both stand out from all the other people applying, and that you’ll also fit in with the students on campus once you get there.

Our secret weapon for getting this done is called the wounded warrior strategy (boxing gloves starting to make more sense?).

We encourage you to live your life, do your best, and make the decision that now is the time to go to your dream school. Then when it’s time to apply, come as you are, scars and all, showing the real flawed warrior of life that you are. Frame your past as exactly what you needed to get where you are today, regardless of GPA, work experience, age, race, etc.  Your imperfect past is what has made you the courageous, resilient person that you are, and that person is 100% ready to make the most of an Ivy League education. That wounded warrior actually needs an Ivy League education and the opportunities that come with that more than someone who did everything perfectly.

So here’s an example of what we mean. We once had a client from Mexico that came to us with a 2.0 undergraduate GPA. And although most people would never even dream of applying to graduate school with that low of a GPA, especially an Ivy League, we saw potential in him and taught him the wounded warrior secret. We worked with him to write about his past in a way that made his low college GPA not a liability to his candidacy, but the exact reason he was now ready to make the most of an Ivy League education. We worked together on his application and he was admitted to his dream school of Columbia with a 2.0 GPA!

So what we’ve found is that even if you didn’t do everything perfectly in the past, you shouldn’t let that hold you back from pursuing your dreams. As long as you apply the secret of focusing more on the future than on the past, you will be well positioned to submit outstanding applications to your dream schools.

Be sure to check back next week as we reveal Secret #4!

The post Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances – Secret #3 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Six Secrets To Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #2

Welcome back to our blog post series Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances!

If you missed Secret #1, you can read it here. 

Today we’ll be discussing the second secret of multiple Ivy League grad school acceptances, and we hope you’re just as excited as we are. If you’re wondering what mountain climbing has to do with your graduate school applications no worries, I promise it will all make sense soon enough.

Ready for Secret #2? Here it is:

Aiming high can make it easier to apply, and to get in.

Now which way do we climb a mountain? That’s right, up! Cheesy, we know, but we think it’s helpful imagery.

We have found that there are two reasons why high-potential high-achieving applicants don’t plan to apply to the very best schools:

1.They believe they are not worthy of going to an excellent school.

or

2. They think they are worth an outstanding education, but they fear that if they do apply, they won’t get in.

Let’s address both of these problems at the same time.

You are not going to get into Harvard or any other Ivy League or elite graduate school of your dreams because of your GMAT, GRE, or LSAT score.

You are also not going to get in because of where you went to college.

This is because what you are selling to an Ivy League admissions committee is the total lifetime value of the accomplishments you will achieve once you have that elite education.

Aiming high and confidently applying to a top grad school with an outstanding application, regardless of your GPA and test scores, actually reassures the admissions committee that you see yourself as and know that you are are one of the best of the best. Otherwise, why would you even waste your time applying?

We’ll let you in on a little secret.

Schools that are at the very top of the rankings such as Harvard, Wharton, Princeton, Stanford, and Columbia have the flexibility every application season to take on a few wildcard entries. Schools who are in the middle of the rankings who are desperately trying to claw their way up and maintain their prestige do not have that flexibility.

So what does this mean for you? It means that sometimes if you are a nontraditional, wildcard, dreamer applicant, you might have a better chance at getting into a top school such as Harvard Business School or Harvard Kennedy School, than a school that needs to vigilantly protect their precarious ranking.  

Once you start focusing your energy on top tier schools, you are going to be more motivated to persist through the application process, because you won’t be working tirelessly to get into a school you aren’t even excited about. You are going to give yourself the best chance of getting into a school that is truly worth the investment of time, money, and energy for the next 2-3 years.

If you’re a wildcard applicant that is aiming too low with all of your target schools, you’ll still be competing with the brightest and the best, but you will be easily out-shined by their perfect GMAT scores and high GPAs. There will be less motivation for the schools to admit you, because you’re going to drag down their rankings. You will actually see worse results than if you had used the six secrets and aimed for higher schools.

We’ll tell you a story to demonstrate what we mean. We once had an incredible Indian American client who came to us in a panic because it was time for her to apply to business school. Let’s call her Sara. She had a sister who had attended Booth, and her family was expecting her to follow in her sister’s footsteps and attend a prestigious school as well.

Although Sara was extremely smart, she had a low GMAT score of 650 and was worried about her chances of getting into the top MBA programs. We encouraged her to use the secret of aiming high with the belief that she is one of the best of the best, and she was admitted to NYU with a full scholarship for her first year and was also admitted into Harvard Business School—even with her score of 650 GMAT score. Incredible, right?

Every other company Sara had reached out to had discouraged her from even applying as an Indian American with a 650 GMAT and we were able to help her get into her dream school of HBS as well as NYU with a full scholarship for her first year.

So here’s what we recommend for you: Apply to 3-4 match schools. Match schools are schools that you would be excited to go to, and to which your profile matches up with or exceeds the profile of admitted students. For all the other schools to which you apply, aim high and use the six secrets we’re teaching you right now to submit an outstanding application that makes you their wonderful wildcard admit.

Be sure to come back next week to learn the third secret to multiple Ivy League grad school acceptances.

The post Six Secrets To Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #2 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #1

Welcome to the first post in our blog post series titled “Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances”.

We’re excited you’re here.

So who is this blog post series for? It’s for anyone who has their heart and mind set on attending top-tier schools such as Harvard, Stanford, U. Penn, Columbia, Princeton, Dartmouth, Yale, Cornell, Brown, U. Chicago, MIT, or any other elite graduate schools for professional degrees such as MBA, MPP, MPA, MIA, JD, MUP, M.Ed, MSW, or a joint degree.

If you are interested in attending a top graduate school in order to take your career and life to the next level, this series is for you.

Throughout the next six blog posts, you will learn how to apply to the most prestigious schools while getting better results then if you applied to second or third tier schools. You will learn how to convince the admissions committee that you are prepared for the Ivy League classroom regardless of low test scores or a low undergraduate GPA.

We’ll also be looking at how to find the time, motivation, and insight to write outstanding essays even if you feel you are not a strong or confident writer. You’ll also learn how to get the guidance and the support that you’ll need in order to keep the many moving parts of your application process organized and keep yourself encouraged and focused on your singular goal of getting into the best graduate school you can.

We’re guessing if you’ve made it this far in this post, these are probably things that you’re dying to know right?

So let’s jump in. Ready for the first secret of the six secrets of multiple Ivy League graduate school acceptances?

Secret #1: Honesty is the Best Policy

We always tell our clients to be the best applicant they can be and to have everything in their application accurately reflect that. In short, the strategy of authenticity and honesty is at the heart of everything we do.

We tell our clients they should never pursue any goal that they don’t actually want to achieve, whether it be getting into a school, getting a prestigious fellowship, or any other kind of award. This is because when you operate in your application process with complete integrity, you will end up having complete clarity on why you are applying to graduate school, which schools you really want to go to and what it will take on the school’s side to get you to come to their school.

Think about it this way: the application process is a mirror for your entire life.

If you are applying to schools that you don’t actually want to go to, you’re going to attract communication from schools that will encourage you to apply even though they have no intention of actually admitting you. Or if you lie or understate what your career goals are in your application, the admissions committee will underestimate you and not feel compelled to admit you. If you don’t operate in a state of total integrity when applying to graduate school you’ll be in the terrible position of having to juggle the multiple lies you’ve told to yourself, your recommenders, and to the schools in your essays and interviews.

Here’s a story to illustrate what we mean:

We once had a client from Latin America who was a former Congressman in his country. He was not running for Congress; he had already served in the position. He started working with us after he had been rejected from Harvard Kennedy School despite having letters of recommendation from high up individuals, including an alumnus from HKS. He was devastated and in shock at his rejection and couldn’t understand what had gone wrong. After some careful digging on our part, we learned that his ultimate career goal was to eventually become president of his country, which is a huge deal. But is this what he wrote in his essay?

Nope.

He instead wrote something more humble and realistic even though it wasn’t the truth; much less the highest version of the truth—that he wants to one day be president of his country—an ambition that would resonate deeply with the Harvard admissions committee since he already had a political career. After sharing this first secret (Honesty is the best policy) with him, we were able to help him get admitted into Harvard Kennedy School, where he has since graduated, and is now on his way to running for president in one of the most powerful countries in Latin America.

So what have we learned so far about honesty being the best policy?

Don’t tell lies in your application.

Don’t downplay or overstate your accomplishments or what you want to do with your career in life.

Don’t apply to schools that you don’t actually want to attend.

And most certainly, do not tell a school you’re coming, take a spot, and then not end up going.

Always remember, when it comes to applying to the world’s top graduate schools, honesty is the best policy.

Check back with us next week to learn the second secret of multiple Ivy League graduate school acceptances!

The post Six Secrets to Multiple Ivy League Acceptances: Secret #1 appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Mindset Practices and Rituals to Help You Get Into Your Dream Grad School

We know what you’re thinking. What on earth are mindset rituals and what do they have to do with my ability to get into my dream school or get off the waitlist of my dream school? Isn’t that something that’s up to the admissions committee—not me?

In the simplest form, the manifestation mindset is a way of thinking that is in tune with the Universe that starts with your subconscious and allows you to harness the energy of the Universe to get what you want. We get it, we know it sounds wacky, but it’s something that we here at The Art of Applying have found works.

This post was inspired by a recent conversation between Kaneisha and one of our customers. She is on the waitlist at Columbia, and is eager to get admitted from the waitlist. In addition to a list of strategies, Kaneisha also encouraged her to focus on her mindset.

So here are four ways that you can use the manifestation mindset to help you get into your dream schools and/or get off the waitlist:

1. Get absolutely clear on what it is you want:

You know which school(s) is your dream school but go even deeper. Which classes are you going to attend? Which professor will be your mentor? Where are you going to live? How are you going to get to school? Which flights will you take, or which truck rental service will you use if you’re driving? By knowing the specifics, this will allow you to create a clear and consistent vision for your life to better harness what you want.

For example, here is a list of the elective courses at Harvard Business School. Which ones would you take during your time there?

2. Write down everything:

Write down your responses to each of the questions above and place everything where you can see it on a daily basis. Print out your mock class schedule and your mock flight reservations. Start seriously looking for places to live and leave the apartment listings up on your computer to look at every day. Make a list of all the experiences you want to have while living and thriving at your dream school, and put images of those experiences where you will be sure to see them and be inspired by them.

3. Create a huge emotional connection to your school:

Buy $250 dollars of gear from your dream school; gear that you would want if you were 100% sure that you were going. If you aren’t up for spending the money on the swag, you could keep it simple and add something as small as a sticker from your dream school to your favorite water bottle. Voila! Now you have school swag. Take a picture of yourself with everything you bought and place it where you can see it every day. Start packing your apartment in anticipation of heading off to your dream school. Begin documenting your tasks and knowledge at work so you can easily hand off your responsibilities when you head off to your dream school. Get yourself in a place where you are 100% confident that you are going.

4. Obsess over your new life DAILY:

You need to be visualizing yourself at your chosen school all day, every day. This is your way of letting the Universe know that this is what you want, and that you are opening up your life to allow this to happen. By taking intentional control of your thoughts and transitioning from a “I hope this happens” to an “When this happens” mindset, you are able to manifest the growth that you want out of life.

Continue doing these every day while you wait to hear back from your schools, and don’t be surprised when your life starts changing in a positive direction towards your dreams.

 

Want to learn more? Suggested reading:

Mindset: The New Psychology of Success – Carol Dweck

The post Mindset Practices and Rituals to Help You Get Into Your Dream Grad School appeared first on The Art of Applying.

Executive Assistant Application

Work from Home for a Woman Entrepreneur Helping Make People’s Dreams Come True

Position: Executive Assistant to the Founder & CEO of The Art of Applying

Compensation: $30,000 per year with 10 paid vacation days

Work hours: Full Time: 9 am – 6 pm Eastern Time with an unpaid one-hour lunch.

Please note that working part-time or working nights and weekends only is not an option.

Location: Remote (must be located in the United States or Canada)

Deadline to apply: Wednesday, February 7 at 8 am Eastern Time

Start Date: March 1, 2018

The Art of Applying is a fast-growing education company that helps people from all over the world get admitted to their dream graduate schools with funding to pay for it.

We’re looking for an enthusiastic, reliable self-starter with excellent communication skills and a willingness to learn user-friendly technology such as WordPress, Google Docs, Google Sheets, Basecamp, and Zoom to join our 100% remote team (yes, you’d get to work from home!) as the Executive Assistant to the Founder & CEO.

How would you like to be with a company that helps people get into their dream graduate schools with funding that is at the very beginning of a significant growth phase?

A company that is willing and able to teach you everything you need to know to succeed?

A company that is more concerned about who you are as a person than about your job history or your experience?

A company that wants to give you the training and the opportunity you’ve been looking for?

A company that has twice-yearly all expenses paid company retreats? Our last retreat was in Austin, Texas and included beating a difficult Escape Game, touring the city, one-hour massages, and eating the world’s best BBQ. Yeehaw!

With hard work and a willingness to learn, you will have the opportunity to build your skills, contribute to an amazing mission, have fun with like-minded people, and do it all while working from home.

Examples of job duties:

respond to incoming email inquiries from prospective clients using Helpscout
listen to one call recording per week of our Breakthrough Coaches to check that they are providing the absolute best service possible to prospective clients during their free 90-minute Breakthrough Calls
schedule professional and personal meetings for the CEO
conduct 45-minute onboarding calls with new clients via Zoom to help them understand how everything works in their client portal
manage the company’s business Facebook and Twitter accounts using a tool such as Edgar
help create the schedule and then serve as the logistics point person for the next team retreat (It will most likely be in New York City in June 2018)

Who we aren’t looking for:

people afraid of technology or who are proud to be “not computer savvy”
people interested in a remote role so they can travel several months out of the year
people who want to start their own business or build their own brand

If you like what you’ve read and are excited to join us at The Art of Applying, submit your application below:

Deadline to apply: Wednesday, February 7 at 8 am Eastern Time

Name*



First




Last


What would you like us to call you?*Email*

Phone*How did you find out about this opportunity?*Please submit your results from the DISC assessment.*There are a lot of places where you can take the DISC assessment.

Please only submit results from the DISC assessment at this link: http://tonyrobbins.com/disc

Drop files here or





Please attach your resume as a PDF.*Accepted file types: pdf.What about our company, The Art of Applying, appeals to you?*Why are you the best person for this job?*What makes you confident that you will be able to work efficiently, effectively, and consistently in a remote role?*Tell us about a time when you were successful while working in a fast-paced environment.*Tell me about an experience that demonstrates a high attention to detail and followthrough.*What are two mistakes, typos, errors, or areas of improvement on our company website (http://theartofapplying.com)?*Be as specific as possible.Draft an email response to an inquiry from a prospective client named Jyoti.*In the email response, you need to accomplish the following:

1) Introduce yourself.
2) Tell the prospective client that we don't offer free coaching via email.
3) Let the prospective client know that the best way to speak with our team about working with us is to have a free 90-minute Breakthrough Call.
4) Invite the prospective client to join our free Facebook group called Applying to Ivy League Graduate Schools.An important part of your job will be conducting quality assurance on call recordings of Breakthrough Calls between prospective clients and our Breakthrough Coaches. We will train you on what you should be looking for while listening to the call recordings. What are at least four questions you would ask during training to make sure you can confidently assess the quality of the Breakthrough Coach's performance on the Breakthrough Call?*What questions do you have for us?

The post Executive Assistant Application appeared first on The Art of Applying.