Age questions for MBA

So I am a really young college student, currently I am a sophomore and I don't turn 18 for around a month. Meaning when I graduate I will be only 20. So m questions is when I decide to apply to business schools will it help that I will be able to have say 3 or 4 years of work experience and be only 23 or 24? Basically, do business schools value adding younger students who still have work experience?

or would I be better off working 6 or 7 years and waiting until I was in the normal age category at like 26?

2 Comments
 
Best Response

Harshman, my (limited) understanding of b-school admissions is that the emphasis is on having the right amount of work experience 4-5 years. Being young when you've accumulated that amount of work experience won't hinder you at all.

What would hinder you would be to have too much work experience and wait too late to apply to business school. Ultimately schools want to believe that they can help transform you and send you off on an even higher career trajectory...the older you are/more work experience you have on the far end of the curve means you'll have to have demonstrated a greater amount of success and also have compelling reason for why you waited to go to b-school. Employers tend to want younger recruits with the requisite experience who have a lot of life left in their careers...people that they can still shape too.

 

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