LACs for Wall St/State Dept. work

I've been advised that I should apply to a few of the following colleges because I want to attend a LAC, have only okay stats grades wise and want to work either on wall street or the state dept for a few years prior to getting my MBA (I want to try different things out prior to deciding on going from MBA -> BB associate).

Here's the list I was forwarded by my guidance counselor: bowdoin, brandeis, bucknell, colgate, davidson, hamilton, oberlin, univ of rochester, vassar, wake forest, washington and lee, wesleyan, bates, carleton, macalester, bryn mawr, swarthmore, kenyon, bard, occidental.

I have no idea what half of these colleges are, but they are apparently "prestigious" on par with more well known schools like Cornell, etc. I wanted to know whether any of these are good options at all for a career either in the state dept, s&t or ibd. In addition, I am also applying to amherst, tufts, vandy and usc. I'm looking to apply to 10 colleges in total, 6 from my GC's list. I sincerely appreciate any positive input.

 

Of those, the only ones I can say I've met alumni of are Wake Forest, Hamilton, and Wesleyan (in that order). The others are non-targets in that no major firm conducts OCR there. Of your other schools, USC has OCR as far as I know while Amherst is relatively well-represented on the street, you wouldn't have a problem finding alumni to help you in recruiting. Vandy, oddly enough for how academically strong a school is, is less represented than Amherst.

This is all for NYC positions, obviously. USC is clearly going to give you a far better shot at West Coast jobs than any other school you mention. Vandy will outplace all the others for southern finance positions.

I am permanently behind on PMs, it's not personal.
 

Amherst, Williams, Middlebury are pretty well represented, definitely semi-targets in terms of recruiting.

You get the advantage of a tight alumni network and not as much competition, per say (usually the kids aren't as interested, no finance majors, etc.). At the same time, there are less alumni overall and less resources for learning finance (no finance/business/accounting majors probably). Though usually they aren't going to grill a LAC student as much.

 

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