Turning down Columbia offer - international student

People's failures are the result and consequence of their own malpractice in preparing for the investment banking recruiting process. If you are unlikeable, unteachable, and do not "network" like a maniac, then all the finance clubs and convoluted STEM majors you boast on your resume alongside your grift Search fund / Hedge Fund internships in the world won't save you. Networking is in parenthesis because I do not mean having artificial and transactional pointless 30-minute conversations with bankers that yield nothing. Try to get to know the people you will be potentially spending 18 hours with a day on the most personal level possible. There is an endless trove of information online to help you prepare for your interviews. If you're serious about getting into this line of work, technicals should be table stakes.

The job will be taught to you largely once you arrive. It's hard to teach someone not to be an insufferable dweeb. 

Columbia has been striking out on recruiting because its students are largely unlikeable and come across terribly. Plenty of internationals cross the finish line. Your inability to do so reflects your own inability to convince someone beyond a reasonable doubt that you aren't a liability. Feel free to use liability as a holistic term.  

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I recruited as a non-diverse international undergraduate student at Columbia. I was fortunate to have received many first rounds, as well as high super day conversion. Generally, from someone who faired pretty well in recruiting, there were always some reasons why some kids, regardless of being international or not, struggled to get offers. 99% of the time I promise the problem was and is a mix of not enough networking, lack of social skills, stubbornness, unwillingness to take advice, and learn from mistakes. It was pretty obvious from my perspective, but no matter how much I tell them, they wouldn't listen, and after striking out, they would say that the they were simply unlucky. It is actually up to you to make the most of your MBA here. 

It is quite simple. CBS is an easily recognizable brand name that creates a sense of intelligence and togetherness. However, the second you open your mouth and begin talking is exactly when that preconceived sense of who you are is validated or thrown to the wayside. Going to CBS gives you the social clout to network with other CBS bankers, or other bankers in general, who are generally going to be more receptive. No school is a surefire guarantee of success in this business. However, some schools have a statistically higher presence and enable a broader channel of outreach than, say, Rutgers Business School might have. Nothing wrong with Rutgers, merely an example. 

The "and hope they like you over that pretty white woman (who, let's be honest, people will be far more receptive to over a brown Indian dude)." is a victim mentality that will assuredly get you canned from anywhere you try to recruit. Who do you think represents Wall Street more, white women or brown men? I'll give you a hint: it is the latter. 

The competetive advantage of an M7 comes in the form of Private Equity professionals peeling out of their careers to pivot in to different seats. Even then, its really Harvard / Stanford, maybe Wharton as a distant third. 

Show up prepared and serious, and make a concerted effort to know the people you intend to work with. Or, fall in line with the thousands of tombstones of egotistical goof balls trying to manipulate the world to conform to their bizzare interpretations of their surroundings. 

I think you should do the Columbia MBA.