Once you receive your offer of admission, you’re probably over the moon because you are only a few months away from embarking on a very exciting journey – and quite a memorable one! If you’ve been admitted to your dream business schools, celebrations are definitely in order!
After a week or so, reality will sink in! You will realize that there are many things you need to do before the start of the program. Sometimes it’s hard to know where to start. Here are a few things that you should do in the few months between receiving your offer of admission and beginning your classes.
- Pay your deposit on time to secure your spot in the class. Keep an eye on offer expiration dates and definitely don’t miss them!
- Create your profile on the student portal. This is a major priority, as all the important deadlines and announcements (including additional scholarships) are posted regularly. You’ll receive communications from the student life center and possibly an introductory/courtesy call from a career coach to check in with you and learn more about you, as well as answer any questions you may have.
- There could be an on campus event for admitted students a few months before classes start; make sure to attend it if possible! You can meet your future professors, class mates and a career team, and get to know the school and its environment.
- Brush up on your math skills! You may be saying “Didn’t I do that for the GMAT already?” Yes, you did, but the math you’ll need in the MBA program will be quite different from the math on the GMAT. If you have a liberal arts background and have had no exposure to numbers or Excel, you may consider enrolling in a course or getting a good book to prepare. There are some great Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) available, so take advantage of them to prepare you for the mathematical rigors of business school.
- Join a Facebook group for the incoming class if one is available; it is a great venue to meet your future classmates and get advice on moving to a new city, if your business school is not in your home town. Virtually bonding with your future classmates is a good stepping stone to bonding in person!
- Most schools will have an MBA Orientation Camp; this is usually a fantastic team-bonding event! The orientation camp is usually run either by the school or by the second year students, depending on the program. You will stay somewhere out of campus for a couple of days and will have lots of team building activities and fun games. After the orientation camp, you will have made lots of new friends and will feel a lot more comfortable with many new faces in class!
- Remember to continue giving your best at work. Not only will you gain great references for your future internship and post-graduation career opportunities, but you will also keep earning much-needed cash for your education.
- Remember to also continue your volunteer and social activities, be it singing at the church, making crafts, watching movies or reading books. The MBA program will be intense and the course load will be heavy; you may not find enough time for your social life. If you do, most of your social activities will be school-related, such as networking, meet-ups, case competitions, student clubs etc.
- Follow the news; keep yourself informed about what is happening in the world: from politics to economics to social events. You’ll be meeting students from all over the world and wouldn’t want to be ill-informed about world events.
- Last but not least, spend lots of time with your friends, as you may only be able to connect with them on Facebook throughout your MBA!! Take a vacation before the start of the program if you can. Relax and feel refreshed when you start the program. A positive mind goes a long way during this tough journey. Once you start the program, you will be loaded with midterms, exams, endless assignments and extracurricular activities; you will need a lot of energy to “survive” and “thrive” in the program.
Congratulations again on your offer of admission! Prepare well and enjoy your MBA program!
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