EMEA 2023 SA

I'm from the EU and just finished my first year (out of 4) undergraduate. It seems EMEA 2023 SA positions open the 1st of July in my current city and in London, should I apply for IBs for next summer (second-year summer) or wait till next July and apply for 2024 SA? What do people in 4 year degrees usually do? Apply to both just in case? Or is imperative to wait for your third year? I don't want to burn my bullet.

The other way is, apply for the 2023 Spring Week and hopefully secure a position for 2024 SA.

9 Comments
 

Thanks for your answer. I understand, and it makes sense. I think springs open in december, so I will be attentive for all of them. Then, I will seek internships in my home country, anything in finance at small investment funds (PE, VC, Accounting), IB is harder to land, but I will network my ass off anyways. My dream is London

 

I personally never applied to springs because I found out about IB too late, but I think it's good to note that selection for the spring insight weeks is largely based on a number of criteria:

  • Grades: for UK students this will often be A-level grades, but for you it would include your 1st year uni grades. See if you can make this the equivalent of a UK 1st class honours.
  • Extracurriculars: finance/IB clubs or participation in workshopsis lookee favorably upon
  • Assessment results: in the UK, online assessments are a standard part of the application process and for a lot of spring weeks, there aren't even any interviews. So it would definitely be useful to make sure you can get high scores on these assessments.

If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to ask. Good luck!

 
Most Helpful

Man, Thank you for being so insightful, this forum has lost people like you that take the time.

About grades, Im confused what exactly means "First Class" in the UK. Is it 70% or above? Like, do you need to be the top 30% of you class to be first class?

Then, about activities/experiences evaluated for the Spring program. I know degrees in the UK normally last 3 years, so I understand that 4 year degree students can be more competitive for Spring Internships. I don't want to be annoying describing my activities, but I seriously would like to know if the following activities I have done already (apart from the grades matter) would hone my application for the spring program:

  • I had 2 work internships a small SaaS tech company in my country leader in its niche sector prior to Starting Uni.
  • I'm a manager of my Uni's Finance Society
  • I did a Real Este Finance remote insight program with an American Real Estate bank
  • I'm in the process of founding a student-run investment managment fund by September 2022

And latsly about the assesments, what kind of assesments are those? Like mind-games? (Which I dont like at all) or Hireview?

Thanks again.

 

Man, Thank you for being so insightful, this forum has lost people like you that take the time.

About grades, Im confused what exactly means "First Class" in the UK. Is it 70% or above? Like, do you need to be the top 30% of you class to be first class?

Then, about activities/experiences evaluated for the Spring program. I know degrees in the UK normally last 3 years, so I understand that 4 year degree students can be more competitive for Spring Internships. I don't want to be annoying describing my activities, but I seriously would like to know if the following activities I have done already (apart from the grades matter) would hone my application for the spring program:

  • I had 2 work internships a small SaaS tech company in my country leader in its niche sector prior to Starting Uni.
  • I'm a manager of my Uni's Finance Society
  • I was selected for the 2022 Goldman Sachs Virtual Insight Series
  • I did a 1 month finance apprenticeship at a german management consulting company (remote)
  • I did a Real Este Finance remote insight program with an American Real Estate bank
  • I'm in the process of founding a student-run investment managment fund by September 2022

And latsly about the assesments, what kind of assesments are those? Like mind-games? (Which I dont like at all) or Hireview?

Thanks again.

 

To (try to) answer your questions:

  • You should be able to find grade conversion scales online. In the UK 70%+ is a First, but getting 70/100 grades in another country might not translate to that. - - > definitely Google the conversion scale for your country's grades
  • Your extracurriculars seem quite impressive for a 1st year uni student, these definitely will not set you back.
  • The assessments used are usually from a number of test providers (not sure if all of them offer free practice tests, but the most common providers are Korn Ferry, Cut-e, and SHL). Sites like Jobtestprep are useful to get an idea of their contents too.
 

Thanks once again. I will definetly check out those assesment providers to give me an idea. Finally, about first grade distinction, do people in the UK put their exact grade on thier CVs or just put "Grade: First Class" ?

 

I’m in a similar position to OP but technically eligible to apply for spring weeks and SA 23. Would it be better to just apply for spring seeing as I’ve been able to build my CV to be better than most that would be applying for spring or go straight for SA.

Just some info:

Going into 3rd year of 4 year course but have option to do masters afterwards which would technically also make me a 2nd year in a 4 year course, already completed a spring week in Citi in middle office role last year and a couple other things here and there and high positions in economics society and sports clubs in my uni.

 

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