Seeking Advice: UW vs. Gap Year + CA Community College for MBB Path

I'm currently a senior in high school in Washington with a 3.8 GPA, 1490 SAT, and solid extracurriculars. Recently, I found out that my dad is getting a job in California, but he’s planning to leave me and my mom in Washington so I can graduate here and maintain in-state residency.

This situation has made me reconsider my options:

Option 1: Attend the University of Washington (assuming I get in).

Option 2: Take a gap year to establish California residency, attend community college for two years, and then attempt to transfer to a target MBB school like UC Berkeley or UCLA. The gap yr is necessary to establish residency. 

My ultimate goal is to work in MBB, so I’m wondering which path would be the better choice. What would you do in my situation? Any insights are appreciated! I obv want to get on with my life and go to uni, but I also want to make the smartest decision possible. 


 

WWYD?

UW
77% (10 votes)
Gap yr
23% (3 votes)
Total votes: 13
4 Comments
 

Consulting internship recruiting is during the summer after your second year. If you come in as a junior transfer, you will have had no chance to stand out by securing meaningful internships for your 1st/2nd year summers, joining competitive clubs, participate in case competitions, and network before recruiting season.

 

Ok fair point. I was making this out to be an apples to apples to comparison and this makes it clear I was wrong abt that. UW seemingly does have some placement into MBB Seattle offices. My question would be do you still think 2 yrs of CC+UC Berkeley would still hold a competitive edge relative to UW which I would personally label as a semi target for Seattle offices? 

 
Most Helpful

Fairly certain UW is categorized as a target for BB Seattle and M is doable, just harder. You need to make sure you get into the clubs and make friends with the upperclassmen going to MBB.

There are good internship opportunities in Seattle and while classes can be hard, you should be able to maintain 3.7+.

Personally am not a fan of the CC to Berkeley route. Club recruiting will be hard (and will be entirely missed for junior summer recruiting) and soph/fresh internships will be harder from CC.

 

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