Hi , just arranged for a telephone interview with CMU some time next week. Got the interview email today.

Anyone has any advice?

I submitted my application in early December; application was complete and under review on 5th Jan.

my profile can be viewed at http://www.global-derivatives.com/forums/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=3167&highlight=#3167

Most likely they just want to confirm their decision. I think they want to find out the following:

1. Your communications and social skills
2. Your career goals
3. Whether or not you have CMU as your #1 choice (you are a strong candidate, they also want to assess their chances of landing you)

Another words, they want to check out the 'soft' side of your persona. My humble opinion is that you have an excellent chance of gaining admission.

Congrats on the interview call, if nothing else they r interested in you. You also applied to UCB for 2007 MFE right? i saw ur post in a thread started by me .....

Best wishes

Congratulations! I applied to 1st round CMU MSCF too, but got no response so far.

Miniarcade,
Thanks for the advice. I'll keep them in mind for the interview.

Ajaykumar,
Yes I also applied to Berkeley. Think we'll be hearing from them soon.

quantroc,
I'm sure your interview is on its way.

Thanks for the advice/encouragement guys. I'm not taking anything for granted though. Will try to ace this interview and keep you guys posted.

Also they might also want to verify some facts stated on your applications: e.g. your relationship to your recommenders, more detailed information about the math/programming courses that you have taken.
Good luck with the interview!

Just called CMU MSCF , Jessica said they only interview about 30% of the
incoming students, that is, interview is not a necessary part of MSCF admission. That's a good news. I still have hope.
Waiting waiting waiting.......

What are the odds for a round 3 application (Deadline in March)?  Does anybody have historical figures for what percentage of seats are filled up in each round?
Here's my profile @
http://www.global-derivatives.com/forums/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1411&highlight=

Hi All

I have received an email for an interview as well. Just out of curiosity, will technical questions be part of the interview? What i mean is, will they be asking questions with regards to the financial industry?

I think it would be really great if you could tell us what they asked you during the interview. It could help a lot of us

Good luck!


Lucas

I think the most probable senario is: little financial industry questions to be asked because the interviewer will be the admission staffs who focus on interpersonal skills instead of financial knowledge.

How many stages you've got on the website before you get the interview email?

I only got to stage 1 so far.

Submission Status: Submitted
 Submitted Date: 1/7/2006 1:49:00 PM E.S.T.
 Stage 1: Application Received - Being Processed by Office Staff.

Quantroc

I didn't get the invitaion as well. No intention to discourage you. but this is an email from MSCF admissions team:

"We do generally interview a majority of the admitted full-time students, however, it's not a requirement of admission and every year we do have students who are admitted without interviews.  The percentage will differ each year depending on the applicant and the application pool."

However, since they say a majority of the students are interviewed, so there is still a chance.

Good luck.

Hi kurtzjs,

I've submitted my application on 1st Dec. Because ETS took a long time to send in my GRE, and also because of the festive season, my application was only complete on 4th Jan (You should see "Application under review by admission committee" at this stage).

The second deadline for MSCF was 9th Jan and I was quite surprise to receive the interview invite on 20th jan.

Will post about my thoughts on the interview soon.

Cheers.

Hi guys,

As promised, a run-down of the interview I had with CMU.

The first question was how I came to know the CMU program

Then it was why CMU (as opposed to Stanford for example, which offers similar program)

Then it was what future career am I targetting after CMU?

finally, due to time constraint, I was asked if I had any question. I asked 3 serious questions

Then, I finally pop the ultimate question on when will the admission decision be made.

The interviewer (Rick Bryan, the executive director) replied it'll be made at the end of the month. He then went on to say that he can tell me that I'm in.

Finally, he also mentioned that the interview serves two purposes: to guage the communication skills of the applicant, as well as the candidate's career fit with the program.

Hope this succinct run-through helps.

Cheers.