Counselor Profile
Danielle is a former Director of Deferred Enrollment at Wharton MBA and Former Admissions Officer at University of Pennsylvania.
Danielle earned her BA in political science at UPenn, where she held numerous leadership positions as an undergraduate student. During her time at UPenn, Danielle realized that the students make a campus what it is – not the name or prestige of the school. This led her to put her political career plans on hold and take a job as an admissions officer in the undergraduate admissions office.
Danielle started as an admissions officer at UPenn, reading applications from regions along the east coast before serving as Northeast recruitment team lead and acted as a committee co-chair. She then worked as the Associate Director for Equity and Access before venturing into Wharton’s MBA Admissions Office. There she served as one of five admissions committee members, leading student engagement in the recruitment process and traveling across the globe recruiting professionals into the MBA program.
In her time in admissions at Wharton, she was tapped to build Wharton’s first deferred enrollment program from the ground up, including designing the application and evaluation process along with the leadership development components. Through this experience, she knows exactly what admissions officers are evaluating and considering when building the next MBA cohort.
She then served as the director of the Moelis Advance Access Program, crafting the recruitment strategy and chairing the selection committee. It was in this role that she discovered a love for the way STEM students think, approaching each day as a new problem that needs to be solved. This led to a leap of faith to join Amazon Student Programs, where she recruited MBA students then led non-tech undergraduate student recruitment and diversity partnerships.
She recently exited the student recruitment space and now serves as a Senior DEI Program Manager, but still gets excited witnessing the untapped potential in future generations.
As a counselor, Danielle enjoys helping students focus their leadership potential and find ways to use their individual genius to solve real world problems. Often times this manifests itself in helping students take an introspective approach to essay and resume writing, have a critical eye for what improvements in their school can impact the student experience or simply finding a unique career path of interest.
Danielle has a flexible approach when working with students. Students should demonstrate ownership of the process by meeting deadlines, but Danielle works to provide clear guidelines and tools to make this possible. She has a straightforward approach and works closely with students to lay out what needs to be done in order to accomplish their goals. Her ultimate goal is to encourage students to be themselves in the admissions process! As a former admissions officer Danielle knows that the only thing that will help you stand out is being yourself. There is only one you and admission offices want to see the peculiar traits that make you who you are!
When she’s not helping students achieve their admissions goals, you can find Danielle spending time with her children. Her free time usually consists of calendar management, hands on parenting and skill development, and endless runs to Target! Danielle enjoys traveling, and when things settle down in the evening, she enjoys reading some good historical fiction!
Counselor Features
Webinars
- A Look Inside HBCUs with Former Admissions Directors
- College Admissions 101 Series: The Role of High School Transcripts in College Admissions
Articles
- Undergraduate vs. Deferred Enrollment: How to Know When You Will Be the Most Competitive Business School Applicant
- Undergraduate Business School Essay Tips from a Former Admissions Officer