Please tell me if I'm being naive?

Although they may post at regional schools I would be curious to know how many of that schools students actually get jobs at the BB. Companies will often post at a wide range of schools for what boils downt to marketing purposes, and they hire the majority of their incoming class from a subset of that. It is a process that is highly influenced by alumni relations and is therefore a viscious cycle that is tough to break. For every one candidate that is selected for interview at the regional school, I would assume 20+ may be selected from the target Ivey. Do the math, the odds of an offer are not in your favour.

just curious but which NON target/NON-ivy school has JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Citi and Lehman all stopping there for IBanking positions(make sure they're not for ops)?

Goizueta School of Business at Emory
Katz School of Business at University of Pitt
McCombs at Texas Austin
Calloway at Wake Forest

...this is just a few that I know of personally, I have relationships with people at each of these places that are currently in school or have graduated and went on to BB firms.

Before we continue, let's be clear. I am by no means trying to compare Ivy/Target school opportunities to those from non-targets, I'm simply saying most guys make it seem like you don't have a shot in hell making it in IB with a respectable firm if your not from a target but that's not 100% correct.

First, boilerbanker certainly did not go to an Ivy because he cannot even spell the abbreviation. Second, while BBs may not take as many candidates as from top 5 targets, they certainly take a fair number from other schools, such as good state schools and top LACs

Are you trying to make an assertion that there is no such thing as a target?

Better school = better graduates = more offers

It's simple really. Of course it is a generalisation, but I would say a fairly good one.

global co head of bear energy-NYIT graduate. all it does is help you get your first job, after that it's all on you and how talented you are. it puts you at a disadavantaged usually for SA offers and for entry jobs in an analyst class. aside from that it's good stuff.

I go to a very non-target. My school has around 20,000 students. In the finance and engineering circles at my school, I would say there's about a total of 50 junior and seniors that off the top of their head would like to go into banking and/or consulting. Out of those 50, 25 are actually legit, solid students. We have one guy with a BB offer and we have one guy with an offer from M/B/B. Therefore, yes, it "can be done."

The difference is that out of the other 23 legit students interested in the field, there are 5 with offers from a very solid boutique and 3 with offers from a MM. And although that boutique is solid, no one could argue taking it over a BB (e.g. Lazard, Evercore, Greenhill). And that is where the yellow brick road ends, no one else will get any other offers, the fantasy is over for them. They will probably go work for some F500's finance department or go to law school and rationalize the situation by saying they didn't want to work that much anyway and didn't like the pretentious (allegedly) culture. Whereas the 2 heroes of the group will stand as shining examples of how it "can be done" and give hapless hope to the students below them who really don't understand how competitive it is.

Personally, I believe I will be one of the few that beats the odds (I'm a junior) and will add to the dreams of many (hopefully) who A)have no idea how hard I work B) have no idea how many connections I have made C) have no idea how much luck I have had in my favor (took college serious from day one so I have a stellar GPA, got a great internship sophomore summer, have met incredible connections that do more for me than I ever imagined, etc).

Being someone that use to argue the benefits of a state school, I now, have no problem saying that if you are someone who is much more concerned with your career than anything else, you should just go to a target. And as for the "it only gets you your first job" talk, I kinda think that's bullshit, too (no offense). My friends that go to ivies, the rest of their lives will have the school they attended, automatically included in any introductory conversation someone ever has about them ("Hi, meet my friend Patrick, he went to Harvard"), which instantly gives them power/prestige from the start and makes people think more positively about them. Whereas no one will ever include the fact that I went to so and so SEC school, unless they are talking to another southerner (in fact, attending a non-target will probably put me at a disadvantage in lots of circles because people will consider themselves smarter than me from the start). Until I get an MBA from a top school, the playing field will never be level for me and I will always be fighting the uphill battle.

In conclusion, you are naive (as I once was). The battle is damn near impossible if you don't attend a target, very hard if you don't attend a semi-target, and still hard if you attend a target (but much easier when compared to the others).

My two cents.