Researching schools

My school research continues. I am leaning even more toward an international focus. So much so that I've started looking more carefully outside the US. At first glance, London Business School (LBS), IESE, and ESADE seem to be my top choices. I know INSEAD is great, but I'm just not feeling it when I look through the website. I think it would be so much fun to go abroad for school and would definitely give me a chance to explore my interest in international business. I've talked about it with my husband and he thinks it's a great idea too. We both love Spain (never been to London, though) and I think we'd be happy there. He doesn't speak much Spanish, but I think he'd learn pretty quick. :P

I have decided that if I don't go overseas for school, I definitely want to take part in an exchange program so I at least get the international flavor. Several schools offer that option. I don't believe I've seen much in the way of study abroad opportunities at HBS, so that might knock it out of my target school zone (though it would be hard not to apply b/c I love Boston and the area offers a lot of opportunities for my husband).

So, at the current time, here is my list of top schools. It's rather large, but I definitely plan to cut it down over the next few months to get it to a reasonable size.

The "I'll cut my left arm off to get in" schools:
- Wharton
- Stanford
- LBS
- Duke
- Kellogg

The "I'll still be pretty psyched to get in" schools:
- Harvard
- IESE
- ESADE
- Dartmouth
- Chicago

The "Eh, at least I'm in business school" schools:
- UVA
- Cal
- Michigan

Not to say that any on the bottom of the list aren't great schools, but I'm just not sure they fit what I'm looking for as much. That's why I'm still doing LOTS of research. I hope to only apply to 5 schools, so I seriously need to whittle the list down. I know I said this before, but I just really want to apply already. Enough waiting. Of course, come application time next fall when I'm scrambling to get my apps in, I bet I won't be saying that! :)

BTW - if you happen to be another future MBA student reading this blog, you should definitely check out www.clearadmit.com or http://mbaleague.blogspot.com. Both have some great insight and links to other blogs! I love reading those! Makes me feel like I'm not alone. ;)

That's all for now - I hope that it won't be so long between blogs next time!