Starting from ground zero - what to do?
I’m currently a freshman at Northern Virginia Community College with plans to transfer to UVA’s McIntire School of Commerce for finance (grad HS this past summer). Since I’m not yet at UVA, I’ve missed out on a lot of the early recruiting opportunities and exposure that McIntire students typically get.
I've taken microeconomics, macroeconomics, calculus, and statistics, and I’ll be taking accounting later this semester. Outside of school, I’ve started teaching myself financial modeling in Excel, learning how to build DCF models, tracking a small stock portfolio, and reading The Wall Street Journal daily to strengthen my understanding of markets.
My main concern is that I don’t know what’s realistically expected at this stage. Should I be focusing more on developing technical skills (like Excel, accounting, and valuation) before applying for internships and cold calling firms? Or do most students learn those skills after landing their first opportunity?
For context, I happen to know the COO of Deloitte, who mentioned he could potentially offer internships to third-year students, so while it’s not exactly IB or PE, I see it as a possible starting point to gain exposure.
I’d really appreciate any advice on how someone in my position with no prior finance experience can start building a legitimate foundation for a future in high finance.
The NOVA to UVA guaranteed transfer admission is great value, and you are absolutely right to pursue that path. The first step is undeniably making sure that you actually qualify for the transfer. I was a freshman in college too once and I know how eager you are to break into IB and get the prestige, but let me make this clear:
NOVA is not just a non-target, it's below that. Your chances of breaking into IB out of NOVA are genuinely non-existent, and so if you somehow fuck up the transfer opportunity, you're out of the race. The absolute first step you need to do is focus on maintaining a good GPA and whatever other requirements UVA has to transfer. Don't worry about anything recruiting wise, get networking out of your mind, get technicals out of your mind- no one will look your way, even small shops, unless you get out of NOVA first. Bottom line, once again, DO NOT FUCK UP THE GUARANTEED TRANSFER.
IB recruiting starts sophomore year second semester, so you won't be able to recruit for that unless you somehow already get UVA on your name and can apply out of there. I don't know how the transfer process works precisely, and so if you are granted admission to UVA before spring semester of sophomore year then maybe you could take that angle, but it will be difficult because a vast majority of recruiting is done through campus visits from these banks. For your purposes, i would say landing an internship your second year is going to be very difficult.
After you get to UVA your Junior year, it gets a lot easier. On-cycle IB recruiting will be finished for your year or mostly finished, but there are always banks that recruit super late or smaller shops that recruit into junior year. You'll be competitive for these with the UVA name behind you especially if you network with UVA alum. It will still be difficult given your delayed start, but doable now. I'd say start preparing for technicals and start reaching out to people the second you get your UVA acceptance - update your resume and everything to say UVA.
This will be an extremely up-hill battle, chances of an IB internship are low enough, your path makes it even harder. However, work hard, be diligent, talk well, and you'll get something. My realistic advice would be to open your mind up to other areas in Finance, such as consulting or back office. Shoot for the stars, but if you land on the moon don't be dejected.
You need to do 5 years in undergrad - 3 years at uva
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