Just received my acceptance email from IU and was wondering if it would be worth going there without direct admit with investment banking being my goal out of undergraduate.
Thanks!
P.S. The only other school I have been accepted to and heard from so far is UAlbany and from what I've heard they have really been up and coming for IBanking FO positions, so I'm pretty excited about that. Plus instate tuition is always nice.
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Believe it's IU not U of I
Yeah you're right, thanks.
Please go with Indiana as it is an infinitely better school for banking, regardless of whether you are a direct admit. You will quickly discover that it is very very difficult to break in from a school that does not have a large alumni network and a presence of banks on campus.
I myself spent my first year at a non target before transferring to a target, which helped me realize the sizeable opportunity differences between non targets and targets. I have recently accepted an offer with a BB investment bank and looking back to my previous school, which is far better than Albany, only two people have been able to break into top banks. These two have incredible stories and are of an under represented background. I am not saying you will not be able to break in from Albany, but I assure you, you will have INFINITELY more flexibility coming from Indiana. It's just not even close. Plus Indiana will provide for a much more fun college experience.
I think you should really think about the importance of surrounding yourself with the smartest people you can, because you are who you associate yourself with. If you ever want to be at the top of your field you will need to learn to take risks, even if that means taking out loans to go to the best school. Your friends in college will come in handy someday, and the students in IU's business program are high caliber.
Although you are not a direct admit, you should be able to get in if you really and truly work as hard as you can to do well in some of the harder classes. The hardest classes are going to be accounting, finite math and calculus, but if you are confident you can do well, it's worth the risk.
As someone who has spent a tremendous amount of time thinking about the best schools during the transfer process, I strongly consider you take my advice. Feel free to look at my Comprehensive transfer thread on the best schools for investment banking. This list illustrates my findings throughout my transfer process/finding the right school for me.
+1 SB'd for the thorough thought out response, thank you.
But allow me to play devil's advocate and defend Albany. Albany's business school has one of the fastest growing reputations out there. Someone I've been communicating with landed a FO BB IBD position in LA and made me aware that just this year they had on-campus recruiting for FO positions from Citi, GS, Deutsche, BAML, Raymond James, C.L. King, UBS, Blackstone (not FO), all accounting firms, and many more. Most of the kids he know's form their Financial analyst honors program is doing something worthwhile.
And then there's this whole thing about IU Bloomington's IB network program being as selective as getting into Goldman Sachs itself. This worries me. I'm willing to do whatever it takes, get involved, and demonstrate a great passion for finance, but with such a low acceptance rate, their IB program seems like a lottery.
With that said, do you truly believe that IU Bloomington is worth 104k more? (I haven't factored in FASFA, scholarships, or Pell & TAP grants yet).
So while I will take your advice, I'm not sure that hastily dismissing UAlbany is the right thing to do.
I'm sorry, but this does not sound correct. I'm sure they exist, but I have never even seen a person from SUNY-Albany. There is no way they get BBs on campus for IBD recruiting.
I'm not sure if you are trolling or not. A+
Go to Indiana
PSU is the same deal as IU--their investment fund places well but otherwise it will be difficult. Go to the school which you think you will enjoy more for the next 4 years (except Albany).
Indiana is the obvious winner. If you apply yourself your freshman year, you'll get into Kelley. If you continue applying yourself your sophomore year and you network like crazy, you'll get into the IBW. If you do neither of the two, you'll still have a strong degree and if you network your junior year, you'll find work somewhere.
Thanks but I think I'm going to go with PSU.
But this post is so damn pre-mature. For all I know, I could be going to Duke! (probably not, but ya never know).
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