28, Columbia GS, Private Banking Background — Can I Skip IB and Break Straight Into PE?

I’m looking for some realistic advice on whether I can position myself for a direct move into private equity after graduation, rather than going through the traditional 2-year investment banking analyst route.

A little background:

I’m 28 and currently work as a Senior Client Associate at a private bank in Greenwich, CT. I work with roughly 80 UHNW relationships representing approximately $900MM in deposits, with clients whose investment assets are managed by partner RIAs totaling several billion dollars.

My current role is not an investment banking or underwriting role, but I do have exposure to the credit process, lending transactions, treasury/liquidity needs, entity structures, KYC, and broader family-office/private-banking relationships. I also participate in client meetings and business development. Before this, I spent several years at JPMorgan in private banking/client-facing roles.

Academically, I recently completed/ am completing my associate’s degree with approximately a 3.95 GPA and was admitted to Columbia University School of General Studies. I plan to attend Columbia while continuing to work full-time and expect to graduate around late 2028/early 2029.

Long term, I want to work in traditional buyout private equity, ideally middle market. I understand that my current experience is very different from the typical IB → PE background, and I’m not assuming that simply having Columbia on my résumé changes that.

My question is whether there is a realistic path to going directly from Columbia into a PE analyst/associate role without doing full-time investment banking first.

My current thought process is to spend the next two years building the technical side of my profile aggressively: accounting, three-statement modeling, DCF, LBO modeling, transaction analysis, investment memos, etc. I would also like to pursue a relevant internship during Summer 2028, ideally at a smaller/middle-market PE firm, independent sponsor, search fund, family office, or potentially investment banking if PE isn’t realistic.

A few questions for people who actually work in the industry:

1. Given my background, how realistic is direct PE recruiting if I perform well at Columbia?
2. Would my age and several years of professional experience help me, hurt me, or mostly be irrelevant when competing against traditional undergraduate candidates?
3. What type of PE firms should I realistically target? Lower middle market funds? Independent sponsors? Search funds? Family offices? Small sector-focused funds?
4. Is getting an actual PE internship before graduation effectively mandatory if I want to bypass banking?
5. Would a boutique/MM investment banking internship during school materially change my chances even if I never work as a full-time IB analyst?
6. What technical skills would you expect someone in my position to have mastered before interviewing?
7. Is there anything I can do with my current private banking/UHNW experience to make the story more compelling to PE firms, or will firms basically treat it as unrelated experience?
8. If direct buyout PE is unlikely, what would be the shortest credible bridge? IB, transaction advisory, valuation, private credit, search fund, corporate development, etc.?

I’m willing to put a serious amount of work into this over the next two years. I’m not trying to find a shortcut around learning the technical skills or doing the work. I’m mainly trying to determine whether I can build a credible direct-to-PE profile by graduation or whether I should accept that IB is essentially unavoidable.

Would appreciate candid feedback, especially from anyone who has seen nontraditional Columbia/GS students, older undergrads, or people coming from private banking successfully make the transition.