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Wharton or Penn? If Wharton, you should have no problem... about 10 Wharton guys every summer where I work... I think the same for most other banks. Penn will be more difficult.

Penn - I'm doing chemistry and economics.

I transferred to Penn last year and I couldn't go into Wharton's business program bc I hadn't taken any business classes at the time. As of now, though, I've taken financial math, financial accounting, and corporate finance. I've obviously also done econ such as econometrics and game theory.

In your opinion then, how can I proactively improve my chances of landing a banking gig this summer?

Thanks!

jump through the traditional non-target hoops - networking, etc.; has been discussed infinitely on this board. If you're a junior, you're starting a bit late though.

Penn is a different type of non-target, which kind of sucks for you; since Wharton is pretty much an uber-target, Penn tends to get overlooked, despite being a decent school.

Note: I'm not familiar with Penn recruiting and I'm not positive whether Penn is a non-target... I just know that in the past 2 years, we've only taken 1 non-Wharton Penn student - other banks may be different.

hey tomahawk518,
Whenever companies have presentations at Penn, they always bring someone who graduated from the College. IMO, a good bet would be to connect with these people since they are likely to push for you.

Do you actually go to Wharton / Penn? Because obviously if you did you would know the small army of non-Wharton Penn kids who are currently working at BBs, PE shops, hedge funds, etc. - right out of undergrad.

As an economics major in the college at Penn myself who has only taken one Wharton class (finance), I've managed to score 13 FT interviews so far this year with nearly every major bank on campus that is still recruiting as well as with some fairly prestigious boutiques, etc. I worked last summer at a BB in NYC - in my group, there were four Penn kids, three from the college and one from Wharton.

As long as you have a good GPA in a solid major like econ, math or engineering, recruiters could care less whether you were in Wharton or not. The notion that Penn outside of Wharton is a non-target is utter BS. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.

No, I don't, but I work at a bank that Penn students would die to get into, and I have access to class profiles where I can see from which schools each analyst is coming. As I said, there has only been only 1 non-Wharton Penn kid in the past 2 years.

...maybe you worked for a "tier-2" BB?

Wait... nevermind... now I can see from your past posts that you worked in ER over the summer... not banking. Not really in the same league there...

Regardless of where I worked this past summer (which was not, I might add, a "second-tier" bank), your comment about Penn recruitment being largely restricted to Wharton students was very misleading, especially considering that you don't even go here.

My decision to go into research was purely a matter of preference. When I interviewed last summer, I chose to turn down three IB superdays (one at a BB, two at boutiques) in favor of the research offer.