Transfer Student Seeking Advice

Hi, all,

*Insert generic comment about having lurked on the forums and this being my first post.*

I'll try to keep the background stuff as concise as possible: I'm a rising junior who has just transferred to the Finance program at a state school (a large university in a major metro area, but deep in non-target territory). I graduated HS with a 4.0, around 30 credit hours from my local CC, and a fairly decent SAT score (just shy of 2200)... and then, due to financial reasons, I ended up right back at the very same CC for the next 2 years. Long story short, I finished my associate's while holding down a job in a small IT firm through a family connection. (It also came with a 90 minute commute, huge pain in the ass.)

Ideally, I'd like to try breaking into a boutique/MM IB in the area (or elsewhere), but would this even be possible? It seems as if my background might be a bit too "non-traditional", especially compared to the profiles of other applicants. I assumed that no one would be inclined to speak with a community college student, so I've pretty much neglected networking until now. Couple that with the fact that I'm a fresh transfer with no coursework completed at my current institution and a new 0.0 GPA, and I'm unsure how to proceed with networking. Will I be screwed once anyone at a bank looks over my transcript? It's worth noting that I'll need an extra semester to graduate, so I should have an additional summer to work with.

With that being said, I have a few specific questions for anyone with experience in these matters:

  • If you were in my situation, how would you go forward in regards to the whole IB networking/educational background issue?
  • What sort of backup plans would you recommend looking into? Given the circumstances, it seems pretty likely that I'll end up empty-handed as far as high finance is concerned.
  • Apart from my 40ish-hour work schedule, what would you recommend I do with the remainder of this summer? Buying BIWS seemed like a decent idea (at least it couldn't hurt), but other than that I'm at a loss.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

3 Comments
 

Never neglect networking. Try and find some people who went to a CC and then transferred and then broke into your field of interest. Definitely a tougher situation than most, but doable.

Alright, Alright, Alright...
 

Solid advice. Consensus on here seems to indicate that CC should be left off of the resume though... Would this apply on Linkedin as well? I'd imagine a lot of bankers who've been in that situation omit it from their profiles, though I have no way of confirming my suspicion. On the other hand, this approach would require me to mention CC somewhere in our early conversations, and then present a resume that omits it.

 

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