London exchange schools
Hi,
I have the possibility to go on exchange next year and really want to go to London. However, my school only has deals with Regent´s and Westminster. They also have deals with schools like SSE, HEC, Nova, St. Gallen, and Bocconi to name a few. I guess my question is how decent are the two London schools? I know that they aren´t LSE, LBS and Imperial quality. As it´s only 4 months exchange it might not matter at much as my MSc is from a good school. Anyone got any ideas or thoughts whether those schools are decent enough to choose or should I instead go to Bocconi even if i really want London. How do future employees look at exchange schools if I have good grades and several relevant internships?
Thanks
Regents and Westminster are unbelievably bad. I'd go with HEC
Agreed but the question might be more how important is the exchange school I attend for future employers. If I graduate from CBS with top grades, good internships and a kind of bad exchange school, how much will that affect my possibilities going forward?
Go to Bocconi
how negatively will it affect future job opportunities if I receive top grades from CBS and have had several good internships?
What's CBS sorry?
No would say either LBS or HEC.
I did lots of study abroad and used to screen CVs when I was still at my BB -
In my experience, study abroad utility for job hunting is maximised when you tick 1+ of these:
As you mentioned only European schools in your post I guess you made up your mind about going / staying there, and that's totally OK.
Regent's and Westminster aren't great, but they'd be an easy sell as people will quickly get it when you say that you had the option to pick a more fancy school, but really wanted to be in London.
Otherwise, of those you mentioned Bocconi and SSE would probably the best bets, as you get great schools in great cities.
St. Gallen and HEC are both quite rural and can therefore turn into a quite meh experience (HEC much more so) - I wouldn't want to spend four months there tbh, but up to you.
It’s not that they care about the pedigree of the school you studied abroad from. It’s just an experience. But those two you listed for london are like genuine shitholes. You don’t want to be spending time in those buildings
Thought I'd give my 2 cents since I graduated from a decent European BS, completed an exchange at Bocconi and worked both in the UK and continental Europe.
I have two questions for you:
In Europe, you have to understand that language requirements are paramount to work in regional offices especially in IB. There can be some exceptions if you are looking to break into Sales & trading, but still worth it to have a local language under your belt
If you already come from a target school in the US, then you could afford to go to a less prestigious school here in Europe, and enjoy yourself for 4 months in London and have that fulfilling experience abroad. It would matter even less if you're looking to go back to America to start your career - although I would always advise on maintaining the same level of "eliteness"/prestige across your profile when you can't add to it.
Having said that, I need to underscore how Regent and Westminster are really not that great (British euphemism for they really suck).
And that could be a prejudice if you are looking to work in London because you won't have banks come to your campus, interesting job opportunities won't be shared on your school job board because it's a non-target (we do that in my PE firm). And it could even go as far as not getting passed screenings in case your US school is not Harvard or Yale and is not as recognisable for European/UK recruiters.
So if you want to maximise your chances of getting a job in Europe, HEC/St. Gallen/Bocconi are your best friends. And believe me, you'd still get a nice semester abroad experience. Lived in Milan and really loved it.
Can't speak to St Gallen, but for HEC for example, it's a campus that's in the Paris region and not exactly in the city, but you could still easily take public transportation to get there, and for nights out you are almost never alone because you are an exchange student so it might actually be the occasion for some fun late night bus trips to Jouy-en-Josas with your group of friends - or so I've been told by friends/coworkers who studied there.
TLDR; choose depending on where you want to start your career and how good your home university is. And also don't discard schools because of city/campus locations until you actually get feedback from people who went there
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