Notre Dame Decision

Not a great start by any means.... :(

After a waitlist from ISB, University of Notre Dame has also waitlisted my application. Not too sure of whats happening.... I thought (and so did my reviewers) that I did a good job on my essays.. Its time to scratch the basics now:

• Decent GMAT score (this bagged an application fee waiver for me from ND)
• Significant achievements at work
• Great extra curriculars
• Decent comm. service

The negative points could have been:

• Just two years of work ex and that too in IT...
• No intl work ex...
• 75 percentile in Verbal GMAT

As far as the recommendations go, I am pretty sure of them being well above average...

So... all in all... The waitlist decision seems to be based on more subjective terms.. There are some possibilities:

1. I might have committed a serious blunder in my essays or could have mentioned two contradictory characteristics
2. Probably, I was not able to highlight my plus points through my essays
3. I might have missed to convince them of the fact why Notre Dame...

There could be many other reasons, but at present my mind is blank... I expected an admit alongwith some schol from ND.... :(

Just pondering if it would be advisable to apply to lower ranked unis...
My mind says 'NO' -- my heart says 'I DONT KNOW'...