An open letter to ad-com members.

Dear ad-com members,

One of the greatest things that makes this world go round (other than inter-planetary forces) is hope. So it is with B school applicants. We are a unique breed who, come admission season, forget our differences and are united by just 2 things - B- school admission craze and hope. Post submission, we get divided further into 2 groups - the haves and the have-nots. The haves are the ones who have an interview admit and therefore are busy preparing while the have-nots are still sitting here, like me, twiddling their thumbs wondering if the ad-com have actually read their essays and tossed it into a trash can (not a favourable case) or whether their application has not yet been read (please god! let this be the case). It is on behalf of have-nots like these that I write this letter.

Within a week or two of submission, the have-nots usually need to have the F5 key on their keyboards replaced. They are usually seen biting their nails while reading student forums like those of Wharton and Chicago. They are not very different from relatives who wait outside the ICU when a loved one is undergoing a major surgery. It is just the anxiety and tension that keeps them from focusing on what they should rather be doing - moving on and maybe working on their next round applications.

The solution, dear ad-com members, lies with you. Why do you not just write a short mail to that unfortunate guy whose application you just tossed into the trash-can - telling him that he has been denied? Is this a logistics issue? Do you have to wait till the last day to send out declines? Or is it so that on the last day you count the number of interview invits, figure that you have sent a few too less and reach out to your trash can to retrieve a few randomly and call them for interview? If this be the case, then I guess the have-nots are doomed to suffer in the manner they have been traditionally subjected to. If not, I would request you to maybe take a few mins and hit the send button on those whom you have already decided are not good enough for your school.

On behalf of other have-nots,
The paw.