Is BC Carroll the real deal?
I'm attending BC's Carroll School next year and am trying to understand the reputation of Carroll students in IBD, and other competitive positions, now as compared to the past (when CSOM's reputation was only slightly above mediocre). Considering BC and Carroll are highly ranked in recent published rankings, I'd like to gauge how the school's prestige fares today.
Some background: Carroll is currently ranked 6 in Bloomberg's BBA ranking (I understand that most people ignore these rankings, but I've also heard that recruiters do at least consider them.) BC is also ranked above NYU in the US News Ranking (31 vs. 32) and Forbes (26 vs. 97), making Carroll students ranked higher in all 3 rankings. I'm using Stern as a point of comparison out of respect for NYU, which has a program that has been highly reputable for some time.
For those of you in prestigious firms and positions, are many (or hardly any) colleagues of yours from Carroll?
As a follow-up, when I look at the placement data for BC Carroll (http://www.bc.edu/content/bc/schools/csom/undergraduate/careerservices/…), I notice a lot of a big names: McKinsey, Barclays, Citi, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, UBS, etc. But having read some of the threads on here, I now understand that what this placement data is so glaringly missing is information on back-office vs. front-office placement. My premonition is that, since Carroll seems to be considered a semi-target, these are all back-office support positions. However, I'm obviously hoping that this is not the case. Hopefully, some of you have enough experience in the finance world to help me understand whether Carroll is placing in front-office positions, or whether Carroll's front-office placement capability is essentially worthless (relatively speaking).
If any of this seems naive, I apologize in advance. I'm a rising senior in high school, trying to immerse myself in a new field. I'm hoping to understand whether graduating from Carroll will serve me as well as the Carroll administrator's claim. Hopefully, you guys will be able to give me some accurate and realistic information; advice would also be seriously appreciated. Thanks.
I honestly think Carroll is a solid B school, and a strong semi-target. The most common undergraduate bschool names in terms of top wall street placement is
Wharton, Cornell AEM, Ross, Stern, Haas, Virginia McIntire, Gtown McDonough, MIT Sloan. It's not about publications, Wharton is listed as third in businessweek so I guess that must mean it's not the best? Not to mention Georgetown (which is arguably just as strong in recruiting, if not stronger than any of the ugrad business schools bar Wharton) is ranked horribly low in all rankings.
You'll definitely get access to firms from BC but if you're just talking about brand name and access to recruiting opportunities, then it's not really in the same league. Don't get me wrong, it's still a solid school in general.
BC is an odd school to me. Anyone in Boston who went to Harvard, MIT or even Tufts will see BC as somewhat fugazi but they have been flying up the rankings over the past decade and must be doing something right.
As far as Carroll, don't pay too close attention to rankings. What warren1 said is accurate, BC is a semi-target and getting an FO job will likely mean a fair amount of networking because there won't be OCR for FO positions for most banks. Decent amount of Carroll alumni on the Street though so if you're well prepared you should have more than a fair shot. Stern, regardless of what rankings say, sends more people to the Street.
No it's not the real deal.
Definitely the real deal. Had many friends who went there who received good traction from recruiting. At the least there are resume drops from low-tiers BBs. But I know BAML, Citi and Barclays have all been on-campus.
Ha, did you go to Tufts?
OCR IBD recruiting from Citi, Barclays, Blackstone, Deutsche, UBS, Jefferies, Baird, Harris Williams, and a few other MMs. Lazard does some unofficial IBD recruiting for the Boston office. Not to mention buyside research positions
My bank (BB) hired four BC students for summer analyst positions. Our incoming full-time class has 5 BC guys. In my first-year class, there are ~15 on the Street (all BB).
Not the strongest in terms of representation (for my bank it's usually Dartmouth, Duke, Georgetown, Princeton), but pretty solid.
By the way, banking sucks. Join a startup or something.
lol - create a new account just to defend/pump up your school. I see how this works now.
Tufts is probably a little more selective than BC, but I'm pretty certain BC sends significantly more kids to finance (even per capita).
Where I used to work we replaced outgoing pre-MBA analysts with fresh BC MBAs - 3 of these exchanges happened during ~2 years. This didn't look good for the school. It's probably a great education however the reputation doesn't command a premium. You'll still have to hustle like a non-target graduate to get into (A) a good, front office role and (B) into a good firm. If you can't get B, at least try to get A. Those people who got into BBs may have gotten into most ops roles.
To be fair, there's a pretty big difference between BC's undergrad program and its MBA program.
Not sure why someone threw MS at this. It's not the 'real deal". It's a solid semi-target, as others have stated. There is no equivalency with the OP's label.
Yeah it has pretty strong or at least decent representation at a lot of banks. In my BB class there is a good number of them. They're behind Penn, NYU, Georgetown, and Princeton but above places like Duke, Michigan, Cornell, and other more recognizable schools. Granted, this is one institution in one year, but it's definitely a strong semi-target at least.
exit options are fine, a lot of major banks and consulting firms recruit at BC - just gotta work for it. more importantly, the school is a ton of fun.
There were quite a few where I worked (BB), but I noticed a few got dinged on offers for FT. Still, can get you in the door, you just have to work harder than you would if you were at somewhere a bit better.
Get good grades, network sophomore and junior year with alumni and you will be fine. It is a solid semi-target
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I plead the fizzif.
BC probably does send more students per capita into finance. My comment was more about general academic level whatever that means. At least in Boston, there is a huge gap between how hard MIT/Harvard students work and how much Tufts students work. Then somewhat of a gap between Tufts and BC, and then again a gap between BC and BU. Northeastern is in its own world, the co-op system throws everything off.
BC Carroll+CFA= Real Deal (Originally Posted: 08/17/2014)
I see in past threads on here BC's MBA program ranks in the semi-target territory. I just did a LinkedIn search for BC MBA+CFA and ~90% of the people on the first few pages have ER or buy side jobs (mostly at mutual funds).
I'm taking this as a sign that BC MBA+CFA is a pretty legit combo for Boston based AM firms. What do you monkeys think?
BC MBA or ugrad ? Its definitely a good ug school.. Not sure if a lot of those BC ug guys are there or where
2 years for MBA and 2-3 years for CFA for ER job at a mutual fund paying $70k base and $20k year-end bonus (which is standard for Boston)? Is it worth it?
I'm not familiar with the Boston area but I have a similar background (M.Sc. Finance + pursuing CFA) and I started getting "more love" from HR when I got a few CFA exam under my belt..So keep up the hard work it will pay off.
@"shorttheworld" I'm referring strictly to MBA program. I set the school to "Boston College - Wallace E. Carroll Graduate School of Management" and the entire first page of results is BC MBA alumni. I'm guessing BC finance majors just list "Boston College?"
@"krazyk" I was sort of under the impression MBA grads come out as an analyst and not an associate. Maybe I'm wrong, I'm not too familiar with the mutual fund industry.
Not sure I agree - recently checked this out myself. The biggest advantage is the network.
Regardless, there are other programs that will do the trick
BC MBA isn't a target for the large asset managers, not worth the time or money if you are using it to get in to Wellington, Fidelity, Putnam...
Correct. The large boston mutual funds pretty much only recruit at M7 programs and maybe a little from Tuck. BC undergrad is good, but MBA has weak placement in finance.
BC is known as the Harvard of Massachusetts for a reason.
Originally from Boston. BC Alumni are very strong in the Boston area, not nearly as strong everywhere else. Unfortunately, many of the big finance players seem to be moving out of Boston as well.
carroll kids are like the leftovers for BBs after all the strong schools have been vetted, some kids stand out(a lot) and they got picked, simple as that, BC recruits better in boston than anywhere else.
Strong OCR from MM and some BB from what I can tell.
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@GoodBread - As an FYI, in addition to BC Carroll, I was also admitted to Tufts. I chose BC CSOM because recruitment is weak at Tufts and the students are too quirky for me. I think A&S students are pretty comparable and CSOM students are probably slightly stronger. In the past, Tufts was ranked higher so that makes sense, but now they are on equal footing, and this despite BC having schools of education and nursing that inevitably lower the avg. GPA and SAT.
*edited for conciseness.
Not sure how Harvard got dragged into this. I think it's a losing battle to compare Tufts/BC against Harvard. Certainly, no disrespect to Tufts/BC, because they are good schools with smart kids. I also believe the top 10-20% of kids at Tufts/BC could academically blend in at Harvard with no issues.
But, yes, I do think Harvard students are on a different level than Tufts/BC kids overall.
As far as I'm concerned, Tufts and BC are peer schools. Pointing out differences in rankings/SAT scores/GPA/backdoor entries/etc... is simply splitting hairs.
Absolutely. I went on a tangent. I have edited my previous post for conciseness.
By the way, thanks for all the responses so far. They have been very enlightening!
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