About:

MBA Admissions Counselors

Sophie Hilaire

Sophie Hilaire

MBA Admissions Counselor

Academic Background

United States Military Academy at West Point, BS in Management, minor in Environmental Engineering
The Wharton School, MBA, Operations

Professional Background

  • Captain in the US Army, including a combat deployment to Afghanistan, and served as deputy executive officer to a three-star commanding general
  • 4.5 years at McKinsey & Company, including 3.5 years as a generalist strategy consultant and 1 year as chief of staff

Select Admissions Counseling Accomplishments

  • Over the past decade, Sophie’s deep exposure to a wide range of schools has helped candidates gain admission to top MBA programs such as Wharton, Stanford GSB, Booth, Kellogg, Columbia, Fuqua, London Business School, the Yale School of Management, and UVA Darden
  • Sophie also supported Wharton’s admissions team in screening applicants and preparing first-year MBAs for consulting interviews, and she assisted McKinsey’s recruiting team in screening veteran applicants. This gives her an extra layer of insight into what top MBA programs and firms are looking for, from an admissions team’s perspective
  • She also has valuable insight into merit-based scholarships, should that be of interest to you. Sophie’s clients have been awarded up to 100% of their tuition in merit-based scholarships

Location

Sophie homesteads on a poultry farm in Kentucky

You might enjoy working with Sophie if

  • You are an entrepreneur / founder. Sophie loves working with entrepreneurs and people with big visions, having founded and led two nonprofit CrossFit gyms herself
  • You are interested in a consulting career post-graduation. Having spent nearly 5 years as a strategy consultant with McKinsey & Company and supported their recruiting team, Sophie has valuable insight into what top firms are looking for and how applicants should position themselves
  • You are passionate about sports, the outdoors, or achieving big goals. Sophie trained and summited Mount Everest while working at McKinsey, and she holds the Guinness World Record for the fastest marathon in full military uniform. She loves helping clients tell the richness of their stories beyond professional and academic pursuits
  • You are a veteran. Sophie is particularly seasoned in translating the nuances of military experience into what top MBA programs seek in their incoming classes

What Sophie’s clients have to say about her

I had exploratory calls with 14 different counselors. Within the first 15 minutes, Sophie helped me identify strengths in my application that everyone else (including me) had overlooked. From the outset, I knew working with her was going to be one of my best decisions.
I got accepted to my dream school and received a generous scholarship offer, despite having a GPA and GMAT score lower than the school's average and I could not have done it without the help from Sophie and the rest of the Stratus team.