UChicago is Paradise

Sure, the ED1 rejection from Wharton and the dream-crushing waitlist at Harvard stung, but UChicago — with its mysterious grade deflation myth and a Core Curriculum that’s basically just intellectual hazing — is prestigious enough.

You wasted no time updating your LinkedIn to: “Student at the University of Chicago | Economics Major.” It fools everyone. “This kid studies real economics,” they think, when deep down, you know you’re just doing Business Economics (bizcon). It’s “non-econ” econ, but you’re still saying you study at Booth (number one according to US News), and thankfully, you don’t have to deal with actual grade deflation. You're just hoping recruiters don’t catch on anytime soon. As for those poor non-bizcon majors? Well, you’ll leave them to their PSets while you and your bizcon boys hit the frats for another round of shots on Friday night.

You tell everyone UChicago was your top choice, but you know it was an ED2 consolation prize. Meanwhile, your parents are still telling their friends you study at “Chicago Booth,” because, honestly, what's the difference?

You thought about recruiting for Eckhart Consulting — it’s got a good enough reputation, but let’s be honest, The Blue Chips (TBC) just sounds cooler. “Investment management,” you tell yourself, “has a much more prestigious ring to it.” You join TBC, because nothing says “I’m a future banking god” like managing $100K that underperforms the S&P 500. But you don't mention that part to the analysts at the Goldman coffee chat. You’ve memorized some Milton Friedman quotes and can throw around the phrase “efficient markets hypothesis” like a pro. Still, they don’t seem impressed.

No worries, you tell yourself. You’re all about intellectual curiosity anyway. After all, you took Physics for Future Presidents, a class with absolutely no intention of producing physicists. Plus, you’ve been sneaking into frat parties on the weekends with your boys — a reminder that despite the “UChicago is where fun goes to die” reputation, you’re still managing to live a little. You just won’t tell the recruiters that part either. 

Sophomore year hits, and suddenly everyone’s on LinkedIn announcing their Goldman or JPMorgan diversity summits. You haven’t been invited to any, so you start revising your personal brand. After all, you’re more “diverse in thought” than half these people, right? You apply to every diversity program you can find. “UChicago teaches us to ask tough questions,” you think as you confidently hit “Decline to Answer” on the demographic questions. You’re not lying, just keeping your options open.

You’ve also started playing the "Core" card in your coffee chats with analysts. “The Core is the foundation of my curiosity,” you say, knowing full well that the only curiosity you’ve expressed lately was whether you could nap through your Self, Culture, and Society discussion without being called on. The analysts nod along, likely more impressed that you’ve survived two grueling years without fleeing to a more “traditional” econ program.

Eventually, you get into TBC’s executive board, or as you like to call it, “UChicago’s Goldman pipeline.” You spend your time talking about how managing the club’s money is “teaching you invaluable real-world skills,” but you’re mostly just biding your time until the next Tao outing (you’re not paying for the table this time).

By junior year, you’ve hit your stride. You've finessed your way into every diversity summit out there, thrown out a couple of buzzwords like "intersectionality" and "leveraging intellectual capital," and suddenly your inbox is full of fast-track interview offers. You ace the interview at Citi by smoothly dropping a line about how we can always trust the markets, except when we can't, and hit them with a hot take on UChicago's intellectual rigor. They're eating it up.

You update your LinkedIn again, this time with that coveted Citi internship. You glance over your shoulder at the guy still grinding in the Core — poor soul's still writing essays on Aristotle while you’re counting down the days to your Manhattan summer.

You won’t admit it to anyone, but every now and then, when you’re feeling reflective, you still wish you were at Harvard. That dream won’t ever quite fade.

But hey, UChicago is Paradise.