How important is summer after freshman year?

I go to a target university and I am currently a freshman. Want to get any finance experience this summer so I can learn more and have somewhere to start before recruiting next year. Is it bad if I end up working a normal summer job? I've gotten conflicting answers on this and want to know where to start and if it's worth cold calling and reaching out to local firms just to have a starting point. Thanks!

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Most Helpful

GIven how early recruiting is, it's helpful to have one real internship on your resume to have something to talk about. If that's an offcycle internship in the fall that is fine, but recommend having something. This has changed in the last few years as freshman/offcycle internships become more common, so if your advice is coming from older alums I'd take it with a grain of salt.

I would reach out to local firms and try to get something like 8 weeks, doesn't need to eat up your whole summer. Can be wealth management, corporate finance at a small firm, really anything. Does not need to be IB/PE by any means.

 

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