You might be asking why schools are so interested in your academic background, particularly if you have been out of school for a while. An MBA is, in fact, an academic degree and requires academic skills. The last thing an admissions officer wants is to offer you a place in a class and then have you not perform well.

Most schools gauge your academic skills by looking at your Graduate Management Admission Test® (GMAT®) score and your academic performance, or grade point average (GPA). In a perfect world, both measures should be strong. If one is weak, the other needs to be strong enough to compensate. Did you spend more time socializing than studying when you were an undergraduate? Be prepared to explain if you feel your undergraduate record does not accurately reflect your academic ability.

Most MBA programs require applicants to have an undergraduate degree (or first university) from a four-year college or university and will expect you to provide transcripts from all the schools you attended as an undergraduate. Do yourself a favor and contact your undergraduate institutions early in the application process so you will know how to get a transcript and how long it takes. You wouldn’t want the lack of a transcript to hold up processing of your application.

There is no standard or preferred undergraduate major for applicants to graduate management programs. In fact, most schools are looking for people from all kinds of backgrounds to provide diversity. Successful applicants come from a wide variety of undergraduate and graduate studies, including engineering, fine arts, liberal arts, medicine, life and social sciences, law, business, and education.

Admissions professionals will review your academic record to help them predict your performance in graduate business school. Most schools consider all aspects of your academic experience, including:

• where you received your degree
• the difficulty of the degree/major requirements
• the competition you likely faced as an undergraduate
• your academic performance or GPA, both cumulative and within your primary area of study
• any trends in your grades from term to term (whether your grades improved as you progressed in school)
• any academic study after your undergraduate degree

If you plan to apply to programs outside your home country, be aware of the differences in education systems. Know whether you meet a school’s minimum requirements, both in terms of grading system conversions and the number of credits earned as an undergraduate.

For schools in the United States, all records must be submitted in English. If your school does not provide records in English, original-language records usually may be submitted if accompanied by a notarized English translation. Ask a school directly if you are unsure what you need to meet application requirements.

When they assess your academic performance, admissions staff will consider your graduate work, including course work that took place outside a degree program. Be sure to provide transcripts of all course work as part of your application.

Admissions staff may weigh your most recent work more heavily as a measure of your aptitude and maturity as a prospective student.

Graduate Management Admission Test® and GMAT® are registered trademarks of the Graduate Management Admission Council®.