Advice for a Veteran at a CC for Internships and Transfer Schools
I am currently at a community college in California and will be looking to transfer to a 4 year university in the fall of 2021. I am looking for any advice on internships while I am at a CC, as I know I will need some experience to get into a good internship before I graduate. Also would like to get some advice on universities that are more Veteran friendly for transfer, looking to study Applied Math and Economics. Wanting to work in IB.
I'll chime in as another vet who's made the jump. You're unlikely to get a good internship while at a community college, my advice would be to instead focus on maxing your GPA to transfer to a target school. Maybe you can find something with an accounting firm or something on campus that will help improve your general accounting knowledge. Also read a well known investment banking guide with a purple cover until you know it inside and out (if you find this exercise unpleasant given the nature of the content you probably won't like banking).
If you're in the 3.8-4.0 GPA range, I would suggest applying to Stanford. I knew a recon guy who went there and did really well, ended up at Goldman. Their vet program is smaller, but this comes with some perks since he landed Condoleezza Rice as some sort of alumni / student adviser. I would also avoid Applied Math unless you're sure you can do well, it's a pretty demanding major and as long as you're coming from a target school GPA ALWAYS trumps major for investment banking recruiting. If your GPA isn't perfect just apply to Columbia's School of General Studies - it's really just a cash source for the university. You'll be the redheaded stepchild on campus, especially compared to Columbia College students, but it'll get your foot in the door for banking. Good luck.
Edit: I forgot to mention you should still try to get an internship, but do it from a real four year school. Ideally you'll want at least 2 years of school left once you transfer to be able to land a summer internship.
For the book, you mean Rosenbaum and Pearl?
Yep, I think they just released an updated version.
To add to this, plenty of schools that have intimidating transfer rates accept a huge amount of veterans. If I were you I would also look in applying to transfer to Brown, Dartmouth, Princeton, and Yale. Brown and Yale also have specific programs for non-traditional students.
Most important thing for you is to apply and get accepted into a good 4 year school.
One last piece of advice, do not say in your transfer essays that the reason you want to go to these schools is to get into finance. Talk about your non-traditional path, your growth as a lifelong learner, and the benefits you think you will gain from a lib arts education, etc.
SB for this. Totally agree and sorry I didn't toss out a few more school names. Dartmouth could be a lot of fun too. I've thought about going to Tuck for my MBA over other top 10 programs given how tight the alumni community is there.
I will say outside of Columbia you have to be very careful with non-traditional programs. I can't speak to Brown and Yale, but at Columbia you are pursuing the exact same bachelor of arts degree as everyone else - it's conferred by the university to you exactly as it would be to a traditional student. The fine print is important here, make sure you're not signing up for some weird extension program. The litmus test is that you should be able to take any and all of the same classes as traditional students and also have the same curriculum and requirements for graduation.
Edit: the comment about Tuck was specific to the veterans at the MBA program. Have heard great things, but this doesn't necessarily translate to undergrad programs. Just something to be aware of.
Dartmouth has a great veterans transfer program! That being said, their transfer acceptance rate is something like 0.1%.
Thanks for the help guys. Is there anything else that I should start to learn now that could help me in the future? Possibly something that would help cut down the learning curve after graduation.
Reread my first comment. Get the Rosenbaum book. Trust me, if you learn everything in there you'll be in good shape to jump into recruiting. After you've got that down, probably worth checking out a WSO recruiting guide to go through technicals and fit questions, but that's more down the road.
Anybody telling you to apply to the ivies as a transfer is probably a boomer or gen x-er that hasn't been in school in 20+ years. Each ivy except for Cornell takes like 5 people a year. I know 3 people that were able to transfer into Yale, Harvard, and MIT. The guy that got into MIT was an olympian, the guy that got into Yale grew up around the campus, had perfect scores on all their tests, was a non-trad homeschooled 17yr old kid that finished sophomore year college courses and then decided it was time to transfer in as a junior, and the one that got into Harvard was a black LGBT girl who had perfect scores and had legacy.
Unless you are some exceptional human being or you have close ties with the school you are not likely to get into the ivies. Look up common data sets for each school you apply to and see how many people they accept. The transfer friendly t20 schools are USC, Vandy, and some people say Cornell although they have a really high transfer rate because of their guaranteed transfer program. They ended it a year or two ago i think though so maybe by the time you're applying you can see what the real numbers are. You're in california so it'd be dumb to not apply to the UCs. Also apply to UNC, people say that they prefer in-state over oos but that's not true, the transfer rates for oos are like 3% lower than in state, it's negligible. They only prefer it if you're applying as a freshman.
Good luck.
lol you have no idea of what you are talking about. veteran programs are different.
I get why you think this is the case, but it's just not true - at least not anymore. I did it and it was shockingly easy as a veteran. I did well at the school I transferred from, but I didn't come from Phillips Exeter or win a gold medal in the Olympics that's for sure.
I'll second the other comment. For better or worse, veterans are a very unique category at top schools right now. The downside is I think this has actually gone too far in the other direction, the bar is a little too low for veterans because it's become popular to recruit them even with average or only slightly above average academic performance. They also have guaranteed tuition from the GI Bill which schools love. Obviously you should apply to non-Ivy schools, but since OP has his heart set on investment banking, and it's well established there's a strong appetite for veterans at target schools right now, there's no need for him to cast a massive net and fill out 10 applications. Like I said in my original comment, Columbia GS should be his safety school. Stanford, Dartmouth, Yale, etc. great reach options. Princeton is out of the mix since I'm pretty sure they don't accept any transfers at all.
Dartmouth has a great veterans transfer program, but their acceptance rate is the lowest in the Ivy League at like under a percent.
100% correct. The guy you responded to has no clue what he's talking about. Ivies and similar caliber schools love veterans. They have active recruiting teams or working groups for veterans.
I've spoken to quite a few. There is no better time than now to be a veteran for both getting into an elite university and getting into IB.
Thanks for your input, just for your knowledge, Princeton has brought back their transfer program and I got in touch with one of the Veterans with them and Princeton took care of every expense for him and his family. Which I am sure was hard for him to get but it is out there.
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