Engineering at a Target: Good idea?

What do you mean by "good idea"? Your opportunities in Finance certainly won't be limited by the fact that you are a CS major instead of a Finance/Economics major, if that's what you're asking. Your summer internships matter a lot more than your major, although in a way your major determines what internships are initially available to you. You should study what you are interested in, though. It should also be very easy to parlay a CS major into interest in Tech finance/banking. A sample pathway would be something like this: cs/programming internship after freshman year -> business/finance internship at a tech company after sophomore year -> IB after junior year -> full time IB.

I meant like will studying engineering prevent me from having a career in finance? The reason I'm asking is because I won't learn anything business/finance related if I study engineering in college. I'm also considering electrical engineering or mechanical engineering.

Ask yourself if you are going to be a top performer. If you think you can be the exception and get a 3.6+ in a target engineering program then you will be fine (just take some accounting classes along the way and obviously do finance internships).

If you are going to be a sub 3.3 then you will be at a distinct disadvantage to business school kids (fair or not).

Engineering majors with 3.7+ can get finance opportunities.

Finance majors with 3.7+ cannot get engineering opportunities.

In terms of the quantity of doors, engineering is a good major if you can get a solid GPA. But if you already know you want to get into finance, why bother. Do what interests you. That's honestly what is going to get you a good GPA and make you an interesting person to talk to.

I went down that path. People on this forum overestimate the value of an engineering degree. The bottom line is that banks will want to stick you in their quant group (if you're really smart) but would really love it if you would just eat a dick and join their tech department. It's an uphill battle to get other roles. On the trading side, people will want to put you in some kind of algo group, so this sort of sucks if you're interested in other areas. In IBD, your resume won't be picked up through a resume drop without extensive networking.

If you must study engineering, I would go with something like mechanical or aerospace just to avoid being labelled as the programmer.

Is it true that of you're an engineer your resume doesn't even get picked up? I thought all kinds of majors get into IBD.

Engineering is never a bad idea. But if you're set on finance why make your life harder?

I could do a BBA+Engineering dual degree from UMich, but I'm guessing it's a lot of work. How about Computer Engineering from Dartmouth? It's my number one choice at the moment.

Engineering is fine, I know plenty of people on the street with engineering degrees. Networking is the main issue since target schools have OCR in their business schools with big banks. If you can do UMich Ross+Engineering that would be legit. Don't do IOE at UMich, that is a completely waste of time. It isn't even an engineering degree IMO.

At my school engineering rapes GPAs, so being an engineering major is an unnecessary hardship for IB hopefuls and certainly an uphill battle

Engineering is great as long as you are willing to study a bit of finance on your own. It will definitely not prevent you from going into finance as long as you have a 3.3 plus

I would get the engineering degree if you're capable and like the material. It'll open up more industries and opportunities for you, than an Economics degree, which as you'll likely see in Year 1 is the most common degree literally everywhere.

Besides, you're a high school senior. You might decide to work at a tech company, instead of investment banking. Having that CS degree will help you with that ambition. If I've learned anything in the past few years, keep your options open. It doesn't hurt to have many avenues, rather than a single-minded approach.

Alright, it looks I'll study engineering. Thanks for the advice everyone, it was very helpful. But which one of these options do you think would be best?

Dartmouth: Computer Engineering UChicago: Computer Science Williams/Amherst: Computer Science UW Madison: Computer Science UMich: Ross/Engineering dual degree Notre Dame: Engineering of some sort

The problem with Williams/Amherst is that they don't offer engineering...only Computer Science (which technically isn't engineering)

UChicago CS is pretty good but I have doubts about recruiting there...Hopefully I'll end up studying engineering at Dartmouth. I think Dartmouth has pretty good recruiting (correct me if I'm wrong).

As an engineer undergrad myself I think I can offer you some thoughts. Studying Engineering doesn't prevent you from going into banking at all, I know a lot of engineering grad who are working in IBD or S&T. Also I think you should seriously consider computer science as well since CS has a lot of room for development (especially in machine learning in my opinion) and CS students do have a relatively easy time finding jobs (personal experience). You're still in high school so why not keep your options open ;) banking is not the only career that makes money.

It can be a great idea if you do well. Then you get the benefit of a top school and all the recruiting perks associated with it as well as the being able to play the raw intelligence/quantitative skills/work ethic card. However you will have to have a good answer for the "why finance" question so would be best to pair your major with econ or something similar. I would argue that engineering/CS+econ from any of the top schools with a 3.5+ gpa will put you in a very competitive position vs your peers who did do-nothing majors like Toilet Paper Studies.

Computer Science UMich. My math PhD friends from UMich are all at Google and they hire their own, all the time.

Engineering is a great major but the course load is challenging. You will be looking at a minimum of 19 credit hours a semester. Michigan is by far the best engineering school listed in terms of engineering. Couple that with a top business school you should have the ability to take some finance/accounting courses. Engineering degrees generally demonstrate that you can critically think and apply high level concepts.

Full Disclosure: I went to a top ten engineering school and got a job as a trader, never tried for IBD so I can;t comment on that career path.

5 years ago, I came out and said engineering was underrated. In finance, it is sort of a practical liberal arts degree for quants. Today, perspectives have changed and I am starting to believe it may be overrated- there may even be an oversupply. I'm not sure that people will be in the street with "will design boosted learning machines for food" placards, but we've had tech crashes (2001 dot com) and engineering crashes (1991 post-USSR) before and there's certainly the possibility we could have one in the future. There's a lot of money flowing into tech startups right now, and if anything ever happens to that money, there will be a lot of people looking for work.

I'm not necessarily recommending this, just thinking out loud, but I honestly think that if you just want money and a job with a lot of autonomy, it may be better to just skip college and learn a skilled trade. (This is more a thought for the parents out there rather than the 17 year olds) Use the money you earn from working those four years- and what you would have spent on tuition- to start a business. If you would enjoy working on motorcycles, for instance, (and perhaps racing them on the weekend) my mechanic charges more for labor than most people in banking earn per hour. This is one of many reasons I change my own oil (and then return it to WalMart in the back of my rusty honda).

In other words, it's important to be pragmatic like your middle class parents want you to be (and like I will want my kids to be). Get an education that will give you skills that are in demand. But if you're passionate about finance- or carpentry- or nursing- you don't necessarily need to choose engineering if that's not what you enjoy. Find something that you enjoy- maybe you don't absolutely love it but you'd be happy doing it for 40 years- and make sure it can pay the bills. I think there are a lot of options out there and if everyone thinks that engineering is the degree for them, I suspect a lot of engineering majors will graduate without jobs and there will be a lot of welders earning >$100K/year.

Finally, the reason that some of the best ranked engineering schools are either state schools or engineering schools is that the good engineering schools allow people to fail. At a typical large state school, the class will start with 2000-3000 students in engineering and finish with half that many (some switching majors, others dropping out). The story is probably very similar (maybe even worse) at MIT, CMU, and Stanford, and I suspect the situation holds in STEM in general at UChicago or Caltech.

If you don't like writing, don't study English or one of the other Humanities. If you don't like math- if you don't find it interesting- if you don't have the wherewithal to push through some impossible Fourier transform or NP-completeness reduction at 11:30 PM on a Friday night while your friends are out partying and you have a midnight submission deadline, for heaven's sake don't study engineering or CS.

I'm an engineer who went to a target and will be beginning at an EB this summer. I think if engineering is something you want to do and is something you are passionate about, then definitely pursue that course of study. However, you need to keep in mind that the coursework is extremely challenging and your GPA may take a hit. I was in that position, but had a great, relevant internships and a strong network that allowed me to get over a dozen interviews and several offers. In terms of knowledge and resources, I was definitely slightly behind the business school kids, but with a little extra work I was able to find good opportunities.

A lot of people think engineering is overrated, but I would tend to disagree. Although it is hard to quantify, I truly believe that engineers have a much better analytical ability and much stronger problem solving skills as compared to cookie-cutter undergrad business students. Although you may have a slightly lower GPA, no one will EVER question your intelligence if you made it through an engineering program.

I'd also recommend looking at schools like Cornell or Penn, which have strong finance career opportunities and top notch CS programs.

I don't think anyone asked whether OP is interested in a quantitative finance position or investment banking.

If the former, Dartmouth, Chicago, and Michigan are the best options. Study engineering, computer science, math, ect. Something quantitative, and it doesn't matter what.

If the latter, Dartmouth or Chicago are the best options. Williams/Amherst are top LACs but they don't fare as well in recruiting. Study Economics.

Thanks again to everyone who chipped in. I think I'll study either CS or engineering. I still have a while to decide what major to pursue.

I actually started that route myself at a top-5 engineering school.

Word of advice: know what you're getting into. If I were you I'd make sure that you understand the difference between the two. Also know what MATLAB is and try to get a feel for it to make sure that it's something you'd enjoy using.