Bentley University?

Pick BC over Bentley if goal is IB

Easy. Boston College.

Bentley is not well suited, as many go into corp fin and accounting roles. BC has better connections to top banks.

But your choice depends. How much are you paying for each school?

Bentley Junior here, going into IB summer internship (WB, HW, RJ type MM bank). Bentley as a school boasts about job placement but vast majority of that is into accounting and corp fin roles. The value in Bentley lies in the student-run investment group and Investment Banking Club. The IBC has had kids go to top MM, BB and a few EB (FT, Evercore, Lazard, Jefferies). If accepted into the IBC mentorship program, you get paired up with kids that have offers. Their role is to guide you through recruiting and be a resource for anything you may need. As well Bentley is smaller and still considered a non-target (although HW now does on campus recruiting), this could help you out as it’s a tight-knit pool that is willing to go the extra mile to help you get into banks they’ve placed at. As well, no cap on number of students from your school (as some banks have for targets).

I do want to say however BC does have better prestige, and my opinion is obviously biased, but if there is a compelling reason for you to consider Bentley (perhaps fin-aid) I wouldn’t write it off.

BC CSOM grad here (so my bias is clear) working in NYC IB, my advice would be to take BC if you can make the money work, and even if not, I would take full-price BC over full-ride Bentley if I was dead-set on working in IB. From what I've seen, median outcome from Bentley is accounting and corpfin as the Bentley junior mentioned; whoever posted the other comment is clearly a standout so props to them since Bentley sends very few to IB. Median outcome from CSOM is quite similar (eg. lots of working at TJX, Big 4, FP&A), but the ceiling is much higher meaning it is much easier to land in IB. BC has reliable pipelines to certain BBs (Citi, Barclays, UBS, DB, if you're diversity GS), RBC and TD in the MM balance sheet type category, and MMs (HW and Blair take 1-2 per year for their BOS offices). For boutiques, BC is far weaker and sends 1 kid every year to each of Moelis BOS, Centerview, and potentially PWP (remains to be seen if that is consistent, but for the past couple years 1 kid/year has gotten PWP). On the other hand, Bentley has a potential pipeline of sending 1 kid/year to HW BOS (know there was a 2022 intern and there will be a 2023 intern, will there be a 2024 one?). Also, it's much easier to grind your way to a spot at BC, as there should be decent representation across the street (eg. at least 1 alum in banking at a given firm who you can talk to), while I doubt that Bentley has that representation across the street.

Similar to Bentley, BC also has has an Investment Banking Academy similar to Bentley that places ~85.0% of its classes every year (many to the aforementioned banks), and also has an extremely supportive alumni base especially senior bankers, who pull very hard for BC kids in the recruiting process (I have seen this first-hand). If you're MCAS econ, I would say that many of the same opportunities are available to you, you just have to work harder to find them as they're just more widely advertised to CSOM kids.

So sure BC has better "prestige", but it just has better placement as a whole. If you are dead-set on IB, I would disregard cost difference as there is a big gap between BC and Bentley in terms of having an easier time getting into a "better" bank by having more people to network with and getting more chances (interviews) to get a SA spot. Personally I'd be okay levering the hell up with student loans if you are dead-set on BC, as you could quite feasibly pay back even ~$300k+ of loans within 5 years of grad, assuming that you stick to high-paying finance roles, are disciplined about it, and want to pay down loans versus investing. However, if there is a hint of hesitation in your mind, I would definitely bring cost into consideration as you could be shouldering up to $90k+/year and that debt burden would be unsustainable if you took any other job besides IB (regarding high-paying alternatives, BC struggles with tech PM, SWE, SDE and the only remotely good positions I saw were 2 kids (both extremely smart) who are MSFT SWEs, and Stone Point recruits on-campus but has only taken one person at the analyst level as far as I know so extremely limited buy-side roles)

Thanks for posting. I hadn’t heard about Bentley until now. 

I'd say BC has a bigger name and better alumni on the street but both are non-target. Both are good business schools but you need to put the work in on the networking front. I would focus more on if you like the big/ small school feel or would you rather be in Boston or in a suburb.

Hey borg8am - first of all, congratulations on being accepted to two great schools. No matter which you choose, I’m sure you’ll find success being so proactive about your career opportunities at a young age.

FWIW, I am a Bentley alum whose now in PE. Bentley’s done a great job in recent years putting themselves on the map with regards to Investment Banking recruitment. With that, I would still choose BC > Bentley. I really enjoyed my time there and would choose to attend again in a heartbeat, but it’s unarguable that BC will likely provide you with the path of least resistance when it comes to breaking in. They have access to more direct recruitment tactics and, as a result, place better into these programs.

Happy to further elaborate on my experience, thoughts, etc.

Best of luck!