Hello Wall Street oasis,
I have a question that is what are the best schools for Chicago I-banking BESIDES northwestern and u Chicago. I will be honest my grades aren’t the greatest and I won’t be able to get into either of those but what other schools could make it happen that aren’t super prestigious schools and help me achieve my dream of Chicago I banking?
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Undergrad? Illinois / Indiana both have excellent I-banking programs. Michigan. Wisconsin. They all place well into Chicago banks.
For MBA - its a mixed bag of top-10ish schools. Certainly doesn't need to be H/S/W.
ND too if you can swing it. If youre not at the IBW or IBA its a lot tougher from uiuc/IU
What if I couldn’t be a direct admit to uiuc or Indiana? Would that hurt also is there anymore?
Regarding schools in the midwest, U Chicago, Northwestern, and Notre Dame will have a heavy presence feeding into the IB jobs. I have also seen a good amount of people who have gotten there from state schools with strong business programs like Illinois, Wisconson, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio State, Miami OH, Michigan State. I think it would be helpful to look at clubs/business organizations at the schools that actively network with the industry and have successfully helped students obtain IB jobs. Leveraging a network of alumni, and a schools' relationships with the firms will certainly be important to help break in.
Ohio state? Miami Ohio?
At my Chicago bank, I'd say the breakdown of degrees looks like this.
35% Booth 25% Kellogg 20% Ivy (Mainly Harvard, Cornell, Dartmouth) 10% Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Miami (Ohio) 10% Other, including Notre Dame, Duke, Georgetown, & Darden.
There's one UIUC guy, and he's an experienced hire who came over from a Big 4 firm.
This is for MBA, not undergrad.
Thanks for the info :) Would you say at your firm there is some representation at the undergrad level from other east coast targets (HYP, Dartmouth, etc.?) I'm curious to know how many at east coast targets end up in Chicago, SF, Houston, etc. instead of NY.
Didn't you say you graduated already in another post?
I would say Indiana is your best bet. Not that competitive to get into, yet they have a great I-Banking club and place pretty well in Chicago and around the country.
I think the above replies will give you an idea of feeder schools for Chicago IB. After that do the next level research - have a look at the background of the bankers at your target firms. Where did they do their undergrad / MBA? The more numbers you see from a certain school, more likely it is that the school is core to that firm's Chicago office. For e.g. only IU and Wisconsin are core for our Chicago office (not even U. of Chicago or NW). Also, when you end up in any program, definitely join the relevant clubs/workshops and opt for finance heavy courses. IU's IB workshop is worth mentioning here.
Indiana and Illinois are well represented at middle market ibanks, i would look at specific programs, i recently learned that university of Iowa has a small 20 student program they place into middle market and BB ibanks. Each of the big ten schools probably have some connections, i would assume at iowa, wisconsin, etc, its probably a lot of smart kids with full academic rides placing into those programs, not average students.
have see a couple talented kids from indiana with undergrad/mba's in five years that were good, suggest looking into that
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