HBS Class of 2019 Profile Reveals Subtle Shifts, New GRE Details

The official Harvard Business School (HBS) Class of 2019 profile is now out—capturing in numbers and pie charts the real live students who started class for the first time yesterday. Not a lot has shifted since HBS released its preliminary class profile earlier this summer, although the Class of 2019 now includes 928 students, suggesting that 13 of those the school was expecting to enroll when it originally reported the class size at 941 made other plans. There are 942 students in the Class of 2018, by comparison.

The percentage of minority students also slipped slightly, from 26 percent reported in the preliminary profile to 25 percent in the actual class. (Last year’s actual percentage was 26 percent.) Women comprise 42 percent of the class, as earlier reported, again down one percentage point from last year.

In terms of median GMAT, 730 is still HBS’s reported score. That’s the same as last year—and as predicted earlier in the summer. The score range reported included a low of 580 and a high of 790, with the middle 80 percent of the class falling between 700 and 770. Last year, the middle 80 percent was a shade lower, coming in between 690 and 760.

HBS Joins Wharton, Yale in Posting GRE Scores

New in the actual profile posted today are stats on GRE scores, marking the first time HBS has published such data. Chad Losee, managing director of admissions and financial aid, also made a point of sharing this information in a blog post, revealing that 12 percent of the class submitted GRE scores and the remaining 88 percent submitted GMAT scores.

“The GRE and GMAT are different tests…and we are truly indifferent about which one you submit,” Losee wrote. “Really. We are familiar with each test. Choose the one that allows you to best show your strengths, then move on to the other parts of the application.”

According to the recently posted profile, median GRE scores for both verbal and quant at HBS were 164. The score range for verbal was 147 to 170, and the range for quant was 151 to 170. HBS did not provide information about the average writing score.

Wharton, too, shared GRE data for the first time this year, although specific details about what percentage of the class opted for one test over the other were not made available. Wharton reported average scores, not median scores: 163 verbal, 162 quant, and a 4.7 average writing score. Yale School of Management (SOM) also included GRE test scores in its Class of 2019 profile (median verbal, 166; median quant, 164; middle 80 percent verbal, 157 to 170; middle 80 percent quant, 160 to 169.)

If three makes a trend—then a trend we have of leading schools emphatically underscoring that they are indeed test agnostic by including GRE scores within their official class profiles.

“We Know You’re Much More Than a Test Score”

Losee, in his blog post, also took pains to underscore that much more than scores go into determining who joins the HBS class each year. “We know you are much more than a test score,” he wrote. “The whole application and interview process are designed to help us get to know you,” he continued. “We’re trying to imagine what you would contribute in the HBS classroom and community. As I’ve written before, our learning model depends on a wide range of talent and perspectives in each class—and we know that not all that talent is measurable in a test.”

Obviously unchanged from the preliminary profile were the total number of applications HBS received this year—10,351—a 6 percent uptick over last year. The profiles posted today and earlier this summer both cited an 11 percent admission rate—which would indicate that 1,138 students made the cut—and a 91 percent yield.

For more on how HBS’s Class of 2019 compares to its Class of 2018—as well as how it stacks up to the Kellogg Class of 2019—don’t miss this earlier Clear Admit story.

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