Incoming freshman seeking advice

I'm an international student here; I will be starting at Emory University this fall and am on track to do my finance degree. My goal is to break into IB.

I have a few months before my classes start and was wondering what you'd recommend for me to study so that I can hit the ground running at college. I'm already pretty good with Excel but wanted to know what to prepare for content-wise. Will I be seeing a lot of calculus or statistics? Should I prepare more DCFs and other types of Excel models, or is the accounting side the toughest?

What kind of material would be best to go into? (balance sheets if accounting, or what type of model/task if excel, or what kind of math if the hardest part would be the math).

Thanks in advance.

2 Comments
 
Most Helpful

the hardest math is never hard (no calc no stats) the guides are actually really simple if you understand the underlying concept

i would 100% take an accounting and corporate finance class and start the guides early (say freshmen spring)

unless you’re targeting bx tac opps or pjt restructuring that’s more than enough for BB/MM interviews even EBs would grill only on the niche concepts in the guide rather than make the math any harder than addition/subtraction/multiplication

however, i do know that centerview and other buyside MF firm do at least a round of brain teaser (similar to consulting “how many tennis ball fit in a plane” or other math horientated ones) for those i would take stats to have a foundational understanding

 

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