INTOTHEBEST's Blog

by Meghan Reersleev

Your skills, intellectual capabilities and future success will never be determined in an aptitude test. Your creativity and determination will take you far in life, no matter what score you got on a test during high school. The knowledge asked for on such tests can be memorized, but your writing skills are a talent that you were born with. Not everyone can write, or learn to write like you. I hope you realize this, and proceed to share your intelligence and talents with everyone around you— prove those scores wrong by reaching for your hopes and aspirations!

Plainedge, NY – Congratulations to Susan Coverston from Azusa Pacific University for winning a $1,000 scholarship and to Cold Stone Creamery for winning the 2004 INTOTHEBEST ScholarshipFrenzy.com Business of the Year Award.

Nomination:
Cold Stone Creamery #543 cares not only about its customers, but also about its community. It takes a person with a child’s heart to own and operate an ice cream store, and everyone knows children are the most generous type of human beings. I have had the pleasure of working for Cold Stone in High Point, North Carolina, where I have experienced first hand how much this corporation really cares. Cold Stone #543 has gone out of its way to please its customers, and its neighbors, with a great product, and an even better love. Brian Henry has been involved with fundraising for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, Southwest Guilford High School, Southwest Middle School, World Vision’s 30 Hour Famine, The Pathways Center, a division of Greensboro Urban Ministry, local church youth groups, the Special Olympics, Marine Toys for Tots Foundation, and other local charities. What’s most amazing is Mr. Henry’s store has been open for less than a year! The truth is Cold Stone cares. In a work environment focused on people, it is not a surprise that when those people bring forward a need, Cold Stone jumps into action. Ice cream is the one product that can soften even the hardest heart, because everyone loves it! Thus, the success of the fundraising events is remarkable, everyone is glad to help. With everything Cold Stone has done in such a short time, imagine what will be achieved in ten years! It will be an ice cream revolution! Cold Stone is one of the fastest-growing ice cream companies in the world, and with everything they do for the communities they’re in, it is safe to say we could all use a few more. People like Mr. Henry and his employees bring joy to every child’s heart, regardless of whether they are 1 or 100. Every person who enters Cold Stone #543 is treated like royalty, since the customers have made them who they are. Fortunately, this is one business that is not afraid to give back to those who matter most, the people. In my mind, Cold Stone is worthy to be called the Business of the Year, because it has old-fashioned values intertwined with new-age taste, providing the Ultimate Ice Cream Experience™!

Note: Brian Henry no longer works for Cold Stone Creamery #543. Steve Widner is the new manager.

About INTOTHEBEST ScholarshipFrenzy.com
Founded in 2002 by Stephen W. Edwards and Timothy P. Van Hooser, the company provides access to educational materials that have historically only been available to wealthy families. INTOTHEBEST is the College Counseling Expert for LongIsland.com. The company can be reached at 866-877-BEST (1-866-877-2378) or http://www.intothebest.com.

About Cold Stone Creamery
Cold Stone Creamery is one of the fastest-growing ice cream chains worldwide. They focus on customer service by greeting each customer, providing top quality service, and thanking each customer. They also sing short songs for tips, and serve each customer with the utmost respect.

CONTACT INFORMATION:
Timothy Van Hooser
INTOTHEBEST, Inc.
866-877-BEST
516-731-3677
http://www.intothebest.com
http://www.ScholarshipFrenzy.com

Steve Widner
Cold Stone Creamery
(336) 882-2653
www.coldstonecreamery.com

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Study Finds College Guide Raises Writing Scores

Plainedge, NY – An INTOTHEBEST Inc. study showed the INTOTHEBEST College Guide improved writing scores by as much as 12% in high school students.

Students found the writing advice helpful in addition to high school English classes and SAT preparation courses. One-hundred-thirty-three students participated in the study.

Students with the highest scores showed a 12% increase in overall writing score, while average students increased their writing scores by 3%.

The new SAT is a rite of passage for 2.8 million students nation-wide. Students who used the INTOTHEBEST College Guide’s writing advice improved their writing scores in the five areas tested on the new SAT: content development, word selection, effective sentences, focus and organization, and grammar, usage, and mechanics.

About INTOTHEBEST
INTOTHEBEST is one of the largest personalized college counseling companies in America. Founded in 2002 by Stephen W. Edwards and Timothy P. Van Hooser, the company offers scholarships, supported by advertising and consulting revenue, providing access to educational materials that have historically only been available to wealthy families. Over 145,000 people have downloaded the INTOTHEBEST College Guide since 2004. The company can be reached at (516) 731-3677 or http://www.intothebest.com.

CONTACT INFORMATION:
Timothy Van Hooser
INTOTHEBEST, Inc.
866-877-BEST
516-731-3677
http://www.intothebest.com

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On September 7th, Tim Van Hooser met with Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor, at the Princeton Club.

Dr. Reich is an entertaining speaker and one of my favorite economists. I read his book The Work of Nations as a sophomore in college. It gave me a better understanding of macroecnomics and helped my grade in macroeconomics improve from a C to an A.

During his first week at college, Dr. Reich auditioned for a play and met a beautiful girl named Clare. Neither of them got roles and he was very sad that he would never see her again. Then, he had one of the most brilliant ideas of his career. He would direct his own play. He made posters and put them all over campus inviting people to audition for his play. The first day of auditions, 40 people auditioned, but Clare did not show up. Then he became nervous, since now he had to have the play, he had never produced a play before, and Clare wouldn’t be in it. Fortunately, the next day, Clare auditioned. He asked her to read a passage and then, playing it cool, said “Just in case we need to call you, can you write your name, phone number, and address on this 3x5 card?” He cast her as the lead in the play and she is still the lead in his life as they have been married over 20 years.

Dr. Reich also cautioned about believing ecnomists when they use statistics, as the average of his height and Shaquille O’Neal is 6′ 2″ and Robert Reich is only 5′ 2″. So if you only looked at the average, you would expect Dr. Reich to be taller. Similarly, when economists say that the average wage increased, that can be deceptive if the wages of the high-income earners increased drastically, but the low-income workers did not see their incomes increase, the overall average can go up even if some of the people did not see their incomes rise or actually saw their incomes decrease.

Dr. Reich also said he knows he can make an audience’s eyes glaze over if he starts talking about “earned income tax credit.”

When asked if he understood Republican’s economics, he said “I will try to be bi-partisan here, I don’t understand what they are doing.”

When I asked Dr. Reich about why the U.S. spends $187 Billion per year to pay farmers not to farm and why we don’t use that money to pay for everyone’s college expenses in the whole country, he said he didn’t know but that is a good idea. He also expressed concern over the fact that the U.S. spends $49,000 per prisoner to keep them in prison. One of his sons works with prisoners in NYC.

Dr. Reich spoke about how he met Bill Clinton on the boat over to Oxford when they were both Rhodes Scholars. Dr. Reich was sick and Bill Clinton stopped by to bring him chicken soup.

Robert A. Specht, Human Resources Manager, Corporate Training at the Telephonics Corporation hosted an evening presentation for the Young Professionals Chamber of Commerce

Here are the notes I took from his talk.

Start early. Follow up. Ask when you should call the employer back. When are you going to make the decision? When should I follow up with you?

Don’t ask about open positions. That’s your job, do your homework.

Don’t say “I want a position in management.” People don’t start in management, they work their way up.

Benefits - When do benefits start? 401(k), retirement, medical benefits.

If you send a resume, follow up. Send an interesting subject: Bob, I met you at Newsday’s job fair.

If you really want a job, send your resume FedEx and make them sign for it. FedEx is like a Christmas present for HR people, they’ll open it.

If the employer asks an inappropriate question, say “You know, you’re not allowed to ask that question.” If the question is really inappropriate, maybe you don’t want to work at the company.

Experience - HR managers look for a progression from job to job. Gaps typically stand for problems. HR people look for gaps. If you took 3 years to have fun, write - “I toured Europe for 3 years.”

Cover letters:
HR reps read the cover letter.

Thank You notes:
Get a business card from everyone you meet with and write them a thank you note.
Proofread your Thank You note. More than 2 typos can get your job offer retracted. A small percentage of people send Thank You notes, but a larger percentage of the people who send Thank You notes get hired.

Telephonics has a 4% attrition rate. Engineers at Telephonics usually start at $50,000 to $53,000.

25 Reasons to Join Telephonics

Resume advice
Do your homework.

The top of the resume should contain:
Your Name
Your Address
Phone Number
E-Mail Address

Objective: I want a job at Telephonics in Sales
I want to go to Harvard Business School

List your strengths
College education - GPA

Relevant Courses:

Awards: Honor Society, Eagle Scout

Job Experience: work for church, temple, religious organizations, volunteer work at Chamber of Commerce, Red Cross

DO NOT PUT HEALTH down - Things employers can’t ask: Age, religious background.

Telephonics is business casual, but on an interview or at a job fair, you have to be dressed up in a suit.

Bob Specht sees 500 people at a job fair. How is he going to remember you?

At a job fair, a girl with the last name “Gorbachev” asked Bob Specht how he would remember her. He said “I don’t know, how should I remember you?” She said “Turn my resume over, and write a big number 1 on the back.” When he reviewed the resumes back at the office, of course he remembered her.

Interview Skills:
Be early. Be clean. Don’t smell. Brush your teeth.

Don’t wear a lot of perfume or cologne. If your hands are sweaty, get a paper towel and dry them. Nothing is worse than a wet handshake. No chewing gum.

Employers can’t ask when you graduated from high school, but they can ask when you graduated from college.

If you are going to be late, call the employer to tell them you are going to be late.

By Kristen Bergh

Hey! You wrote about how you’re doubting yourself–don’t give up NOW!!!! Nobody peaks at 17 and keeps looking back. Besides, colleges really care about your grades; if those are good, other stuff shouldn’t matter. Think if you’re just the opposite–bad grades but brilliant assessment scores. “Here’s a bright kid who doesn’t try and doesn’t want to get anywhere.” You’ve always had dreams and great grades. (Besides–and this is a secret–my mom was valedictorian of her high school and got an SAT score 500 points lower than mine and still made it!) Anything’s possible!

I attended the Stanford Graduate School of Business information night at Goldman Sachs on Tuesday.

Here are my notes:

Siebel scholars are the top 5% of students at the end of the 1st year.

At Stanford, classes are 60% case, 25% lecture, and 15% simulations.

Stanford’s focus is:
Leadership
Entrepreneurship
Global Economy
Social Awareness

Derrick Bolton, head of MBA Admissions at Stanford, said “Entrepreneurs are the ultimate general manager.”

Stanford offers a Global Management Certificate, Global Management Immersion Experience (GMIX) that includes 4 weeks of working internationally, International study strips (2 weeks), Global Speaker series, and regional clubs.

SMIF is a loan forgiveness program that is essentially a social sector job subsidy.

What matters most in applications to Stanford’s Graduate School of Business?

1. Demonstrated Leadership Potential
Employment history, extracurricular or community activities, 3 reference letters. 2 professional (current direct supervisor or reason you didn’t choose a direct supervisor, 1 client)
1 peer or teammate

2. Intellectual vitality (no academic reference) Stanford’s GMAT range was 530-790.
3. Diversity
Class of 370 people - different perspectives. Who are you, why you’ve done the things you’ve done. Look back at people who have influenced you and changed your perspective.
Write about what makes you a person, don’t try to show how you stand out.

2nd essay.
Whom do you aspire to be? 20 year goals, 5 year goals.
Why do you need an MBA? Why should that MBA come from Stanford?
Looking for forethought. Why is Stanford the best fit for you?

Round 1. October 28th 2004 (decision Jan. 18th, 2005).

Interviews are by invitation only. They only see your resume and not your application.

Need-blind admission. Annual tuition is $37,998. 1/2 of students receive fellowship funds, 2/3 borrow to finance their MBA. 20-25% of financing is in scholarships, the rest is in loans.

The Partnership 4 Diversity Program provides scholarships for students that work at the companies in the summer with no requirement to return to the company after graduation.

The alumni panel consisted of:
Before Stanford GSB Now
Farrah Kahn ‘04 analyst Goldman Sachs, private equity venture capital
someone else NAVY Goldman Sachs/hedge fund
Allasandra i-banking Goldman Sachs
Don Cornwell ‘98 McKinsey, NFL Morgan Stanley
John Abamondy ‘04 NAVY pilot Major League Baseball

Did any of your classmates go on to work at the World Bank, International Management Group, or become sports agents? The panelists didn’t know, but referred me to a CMC Web site that lists number of students at each company. I called Rebecca at the Stanford CMC office and she helped me find the list of recruiting organizations. It turns out that the International Finance Corporation, and the World Bank recruit at Stanford and actually hired some people from Stanford. International Management Group and Octagon Sports did not hire anyone from Stanford. Rebecca was not aware of anyone becoming an agent after graduation from Stanford.

Last night I attended the Harvard Business School (HBS) information session at Citigroup on Park Avenue in Manhattan.

I attended the later of 2 sessions. Both were packed with 200 to 250 people at each session.

The best part was the panel discussion of alumni from HBS who spoke about their experiences, answered questions, and gave advice.

Here are my notes:

Recommendations:
Send a letter to people you want to write recommendations for you, include a copy of your resume, what you want them to address, and a draft of an essay - Why Do I Want to go to Business School?

What to focus on in your application - “How you as a person can make the school a better place.”

What is the thing about you that your section mates are going to rave about?

Harvard is looking for multidimensional people who are leaders. One panelist, Cabin Kim, wrote about his pro-bono work for 2.5 years in his application and thinks it helped differentiate him from the other applicants that had consulting experience. I think what set him apart is that he worked as a campus minister at Duke, helped a church out with accounting, and wrote a business plan to help the church get $10 million to buy a building.

A panelist from Princeton shared how a few of his HBS classmates got an idea to create DVDs with Choose Your Own Adventure themes. They called the owners of the Choose Your Own Adventure series, were invited to Vermont for lunch, and returned to Harvard with the rights to create the Choose Your Own Adventure DVD series. Coming soon!

Harvard Business School’s goal is developing leaders.

There are opportunities to cross register with classes at the Kennedy School of Government, MIT, and other schools in Boston during the second year of the HBS program.

Each class has 900 students, broken up in to 10 sections with 90 students/section. People become very close with their section mates.

Leaders are responsible for driving the direction of an organization or company.

Katie Solomon of career services at HBS spoke about the use of a program called Career Leader that helps students evaluate their strengths.

What does Harvard Business School look for in applicants?
Academic Ability(school, rigor of classes, GPA)
Leadership Experience (most important, distinguishes who gets in and those that don’t)
Personal Qualities (work, extracurricular activities, activities in college)
The GMAT range of last year’s admitted class was 500-800.
HBS wants collaborative people who contribute and enhance class discussion and those who can learn in that environment.

Essays are the most important part of the application.

For 2 months, carry around a notebook, write down notes of what you’ve done.
Reflection - what you want to get out of the experience and what you’ve done.
Recommendations - people who will take the time to sit down and write you a good recommendation.

Celebrities and people of prominence are less important than having people who know you really well write for you. One or two recommendations can come from people who know you in an extracurricular context from your work in the community.

Interviews are necessary and mandatory.

Interviews may be in 4 different forms:
Boston - with the admissions board
phone interview
local city - NY
alumni interviews in smaller towns

Never let funding be an issue if you are admitted to the college of your choice.

Citigroup and HBS have a deal where Citigroup will provide a loan for the entire amount of HBS. Admissions at HBS are need blind.

Harvard Business School

For more information, write to:
mba_questions@hbs.edu

Other qualities that are important to have: a global perspective, the spirit of entrepreneurship, listening ability, the ability to understand other people’s strengths and weaknesses.

My cousin Keith got married at Yale a few weeks ago. I have driven past New Haven plenty of times on my way to go skiing in Vermont or to visit Boston or New Hampshire. It was great seeing the family again and being there to celebrate with Keith and Gretchen.

After all the Yale-bashing that goes on at Princeton, I had heard that the school was falling apart and in the middle of a ghetto. I was pleasantly surprised to find that New Haven is an All-American city and that Yale has a style all its own. Seeing a group of tourists, I joined the official Yale tour and learned that the library is in the shape of a chapel because the architect was retiring and wanted to build a chapel because all great architects built chapels in the 1700s. The tour guide explained that the tapestry behind the circulation desk is symbolic because the person’s coat is blue, signifying Yale, and the man is standing on a crimson carpet, showing that Yalies are better than people from Harvard. What I didn’t understand was why the part above the Yale blue was orange. Perhaps that shows Yale’s acknowledgement that it is below Princeton?

Seriously though, the campus is beautiful, it is spread out in an urban setting, and the people are very friendly. On the lawn, I saw a student fighting with a Yale employee. I always heard that Yale was in a bad neighborhood. But as you can see from the picture, the student and Yale employee are members of the Freestyle Dueling Association and are playing with foam swords. Note: The Yale employee is the one with the mullet and the non-mulleted individual is the Yale student and perhaps president of the Freestyle Dueling Association.

The moral of the story is that you should visit as many schools as possible to get a feel for the campuses, to eliminate myths and rumors, and to make more informed decisions.

I visited Stony Brook University a few months ago on my way back from Brookhaven National Labs. Although the admissions office was running on summer hours, which means that they only offer tours on Mondays and Wednesdays, I learned that Stony Brook offers full scholarships to valedictorians and salutatorians. Last year, only 17 or 18 Stony Brook students graduated with these awards. Averaging above 1200, Stony Brook students have the highest SAT scores on Long Island.

The president was out of her office, but I walked over to the student center and had lunch. The food was great, the service friendly, and the student center was large, but mostly empty since it is the summer and most students are off. Stony Brook offers summer classes, which are helpful for high school students looking to prepare for college and college students who want to get ahead or lighten their load during the semester.

If you plan to visit, call ahead to make sure they have tours and schedule an appointment with the Dean of Admission.

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