Please share your short term professional goals. What role does a Notre Dame MBA play in helping you achieve these goals? (max 100 words)
This is a straightforward career goals essay in which you must write about your desired post-MBA role and what aspects of the MBA program will help you reach your goals. 100 words barely allows you any freedom to describe details about your goals or career plans- so you will need to be very focussed in your answer.
The University of Notre Dame was founded in 1842, by Father Edward Sorin, C.S.C, with a mission to become “one of the most powerful means for doing good in this country”. In 1879, Father Sorin's vision for Notre Dame appeared to be at a sudden, abrupt end. A massive fire destroyed the building that housed virtually the entire University. Instead of giving up, Father Sorin interpreted the fire as a sign that he had dreamed too small, and decided to rebuild, bigger and better than ever. That Main Building still stands today, topped by the gleaming Golden Dome, not only as an iconic campus building, but as an ongoing symbol of perseverance and vision.
Tell us the story of a time in your own life or career when you had to overcome an obstacle, start over, or rebuild.(500 words)
For this essay, the school is asking you to give an example of a failure or a challenging time you have experienced. As in most failure essays the key to getting it right is to begin your thought process about how you overcame it. Choose an example with inspirational learning - a significant and credible incident that has left it's mark on you. Mendoza, with it's admirable focus on the individual, wants to know your personal reaction to the event and the lessons you learnt from it. If the essay convincingly portrays a person who can face difficulties, overcome challenges, learn from mistakes, handle pressure, understand complex situations and continuously learn, you might have written the perfect essay. Never forget that the failure essay is in reality meant to be a success story where you learnt, improved and readied yourself to be a better professional, better leader and (perhaps!) a better person.
While the qualities that you reflected while fire-fighting the incident or it's aftereffects remain the core reason for the essay, please take care to choose a failure that is "real".
The foundation of a Notre Dame business education is the vision of the College’s founder and first dean, John Cardinal O’Hara: “The primary function of commerce is service to mankind.” Students choose Notre Dame because they are willing to Grow the Good in Business™. They look beyond profits and shareholder value and drive decisions based on values and a greater good. Please describe what “growing the good in business” means to you.(500 words)
Mendoza is a values-driven school and looks for students that possess strong leadership traits and align with certain core values and would fit well with the culture of the school.
Since this application question is about sharing an example- we suggest using the CAR - Context, Action, Result format. First describe the context and how you arrived at the vision, then take the reader through your thought process and what steps you took to make the vision a reality and finally showing the impact created on your own life, your organization or your community.
Mendoza MBA application requires you to submit a one-page resume along with details about your employment and academics. The typical MBA resume format consists of employment, education, and extracurricular details.
In your Mendoza application, you will be asked to provide two MBA letters of recommendation - from you current or previous supervisors. Like many top business schools in the US, Mendoza MBA application constitutes of letter of recommendation questions from the GMAC MBA letter of recommendation template.
As is the policy with most top business schools, Mendoza MBA interviews are conducted only by invitation. Students typically would receive an invite 4-6 weeks after submitting their MBA applications.
