Brown/UChicago/Duke/Penn(CAS) for I-Banking
Hey guys, I just got accepted to these four schools as a sophomore transfer. Planning to do IB after graduation, but don't know anything about the IB recruitment at these 4 colleges. Especially for Chicago. I personally love Chicago's quality of undergraduate education, but I've heard bad things about its job placement outside of Chicago. Is Chicago considered a target on the east coast, and how is its international prestige? I am planning to work on the east coast or in Hong Kong. So I'd love to hear any info about these 4 schools' prestige (for IB bankers) on the east coast / internationally. Which one is the best for IB? Thanks!
Non-Wharton makes Penn a bit less attractive, but I'd still put it at the top.
I'd rank them as:
1) Penn 2) UC 3) Duke 4) Brown
I think the top three will give you a shot, no matter which you chose. Chicago definitely places some into NYC, but I get the impression that for undergrad, it isn't as strong as Penn or even Duke (I could be wrong, so wait for others to chime in).
Brown is a step below IMO. I know one guy that went there and ended up in GS' Private Equity arm (not sure if its GS CP or PIA or what).
I second this rank. While Wharton is the best, it still adds to your brand if you make it into Penn. Chicago has been know for a quant school producing analyst class on Street for ages, so it will also be a good choice.
I can speak for Chicago on placement for ibanking. JPM and CS heavily recruit at Chicago, usually each banks' summer class has near the most amount of Chicago students (JPM really likes the quirky analytical type from Chicago and CS's CEO is a Chicago grad). GS, BAML, BX, Lazard do some recruiting on campus, but not as much as the aforementioned. All the Chicago MM banks do recruiting too here.
Honestly, I think the placement rate into NYC is fine, probably not as much as NYU or comparable ivies, but still extremely solid. It places extremely well into HK, with many of the similar banks doing heavy recruiting. A bunch of students go to HK/Singapore every summer. PM if you want more details on the banking or education aspect.
These schools are all good enough (with Brown slightly below the other three) that you should decide based on things other than career prospects (academics, location, student life, etc.).
My personal choice:
1) Duke
2) toss-up between UPenn and Brown
4) Chicago
My personal choice would be as follows:
1) Brown
2) UPenn CAS
3) Duke
4) Chicago
Point is, everyone's personal preference is different and the only thing that matters is what you think. Maybe it would be more proactive for you to create a post where you rank the schools, list the pros and cons of each school (according to you only) and then further discern from there. From there we can try and question what you want out of college, although, what you want right now as a supposed college senior is most likely going to differ drastically from what you want as a college junior or senior.
I picked Brown because I like how it de-emphasizes fraternity life and the liberal feel of the school is great. I feel like the fact you don't have any requirements truly differentiates it from other schools where half the time is spent taking classes you don't want to take. I don't think it's a very "finance" oriented school. I think the college itself has a propensity to attract students who have a strong desire to go into graduate school. Although, I do know some people from Brown who work on Wall Street. I think you should widen your criteria farther than just "which schools are gonna get me into banking."
I go to Penn (Wharton), and frankly, I would definitely not recommend going there if you want to do investment banking and are entering the college. From what I've seen, Duke and UChicago place very well. I actually havent seen a single Brown alumni at the banks my friends and I are interning at (I'm sure they exist, but I haven't met them). If I were you, I'd go Duke.
I'm a sophomore at a HYP Ivy. I'd rank them as follows:
Duke
UChicago
Penn
Brown
Speaking from personal experience at Penn. In terms of BB IB exposure, I'd rank them as:
Penn CAS
Duke
U-Chicago
Brown
Penn CAS, regardless of what prestige-whores will tell you about it not being Wharton and to "knock it down a tier ", I believe with harvard and princeton is possibly the best place to be for UG IB recruiting. Reason being, CAS students have access to all the things/perks that the Wharton students do (OCR, finance classes, finance clubs, info sessions, networking sessions, etc.), however apply from a distinctly separate application pool (liberal arts students).
Given that there are far less liberal arts students interested in IB than Wharton students, you are essentially a "big fish in a small pond" (liberal art student apps), and will get a lot of interviews (assuming your gpa, ec's, internships etc are in line). This gives you a distinct advantage over Wharton candidates, who have to compete with other Wharton students for interviews/jobs (many firms want to take a certain # of CAS students/ have some sort of a CAS quota/ have a rounded app pool). Granted, there are firms that recruit exclusively wharton students, but this is mainly only elite buyside funds.
I can personally verify all the information above. I can also say that Penn/philly is a blast and from a social standpoint, is great.
As far as the others go, I'd say duke and Uchicago are fairly close, with Brown definitely a cut below. I'd place duke a little higher as I know there are a ton of duke alums on the street.
Hope this helped and you really can't go wrong with any of them.
So much BS... I don't even know where to begin.
I'm a student in both Wharton and the College, so I have a decent number of friends in both. I don't really agree with this. Everybody goes through OCR the same and to the best of my knowledge, recruiters don't have a separate "pool" for CAS people. At the top banks, I know one person from engineering who is going and thats it. I am also fairly sure that GS and JPM did not take anyone from the college this year. I do know a few college people going to places like DB though. Bottom line is that I respect the college and think its great, plus the sciences classes I take are definitely waay harder than anything in Wharton. However, for banking, I think its tough for banks to justify not taking students who are going to be exposed to the industry as people in Wharton typically are .
I really think you're missing the self-selection aspect. I don't know anyone from the College who wanted to get into banking and didn't. Wharton is 500 students a year, almost all of whom want to go into banking. The College is 2,500 students a year, maybe only 5% of whom really want to go into banking.
^ No I would have to agree with nyrangers11. Penn just places more into the field (because of the wharton influence, i.e. it's seen as an accessible, prestigious thing to do), and yes, you slap on hard Wharton classes and clubs onto your resume, it ends up looking a lot better than someone at Duke etc.
And no one at BB from CAS? Have you seen the career reports from the last 10 years !? GS, JP consistently the top employers after TofA. The self-selection thing is key as well, there are 1500 graduating college seniors (less than when they started for sure, many transfer into Wharton, a few into Engineering) and 650 from Wharton, around 18% of Penn CAS go into finance or something related and about 60% of Whartonites go into finance (financial services listed on cas). Placement, when adjusted for interest, looks similar. 270 in CAS, 390 in Wharton interested, so we should see a 40:60 split if they have similar placement rates.
Wharton students (look at the career reports) make up 60% or so (less or more depending on the firm). From Career Reports in 2013 GS 22 from Wharton, 11 from CAS; for JP, 15 from Wharton, 14 from CAS, MS 18 from Wharton and 9 from CAS).
Some firms do better or worse however. Citi/CS/UBS/BAML even BlackRock often it's skewed towards CAS (i.e. at BAML, 11 from CAS, 7 from Wharton), whereas elite boutiques + PE, it's the other way around. Lazard didn't hire any CAS, but 2 from Wharton. Blackstone had 12 from Wharton and 2 from CAS.
Wharton's placement is very very good, the best in the country (over HYP, their numbers are just better). Penn CAS is not bad either, and when you do try to adjust for those interested, you see that Wharton does have an advantage (like maybe 66 vs 33 placement, when it should be 60 40), but it is exaggerated.
I would also say that if you're not in Econ/Math Econ in CAS, you will probably see that this advantage of Wharton completely disappears (i.e. out of the very few in these fields interested in banking, their placement at the top of BBs is very very good) because there are spots for liberal arts majors which Penn CAS probably disproportionately takes.
Hopefully this does make the comparisons between the Wharton and CAS make sense. Overall, the placement of both is exceptional. I doubt it would be as good at Brown/Duke/UChicago/Duke.
Penn Brown
Chicago
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Duke
Duke blows Brown out of the water for IBD.
I never met a Duke undergrad but have met plenty from Brown. But I think there's also an element of self-selection -- Brown is Ivy-League caliber students who prefer humanities/social sciences, while Duke is Ivy League rejects who still want banking/consulting.
Duke destroys Brown for IB and that is what this thread is asking..
Found the UNC grad.
Thanks really, for all of the comments. I am a Hong Kong native and spent the past 19 years of my life in the HK system. As my family moved to the east coast of the states this year, I applied for transfer from HKU to a bunch of US colleges. Though I know a lot about their educational programs etc, I pretty much have no idea about the job placement of these colleges, so I found this great forum and put this post.
@AQM. Thanks for your advice, and as I explained, I'm definitely NOT trying to decide my college based upon "which schools are gonna get me into banking." I'm just trying to learn about these schools' job placement and make a more informed college decision. To me, college > profit-producing diploma. :-)
Again, I truly appreciate the info you guys gave me, and I'd like to hear from more people!
Doesn't make a difference. All these schools are targets, so there will not be a significant difference in job placement coming out of these schools.
I think there are pro's and con's to each of those schools. For example, Penn has a large presence on the Street, but arguably it is easier to get into finance from Brown since fewer people are interested in the first place. So go wherever you would be happiest!!!
^^ I completely agree. I'm at JPM for the summer, I know know Wharton only sent 3 to JPM. Duke might actually have beaten us, I'm too lazy to look. It's a great school and definitely the easy choice here.
Every single bank does OCR at Duke besides Credit Suisse and all of MBB recuit (each of then take 5-10 kids each year).
According to the guy who went to Penn above, JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs didn't even take anyone from Penn CAS above. Penn CAS does very well in Consulting though. As far as UChicago, Bain and McKinsey don't recruit there and it looks like a lot of bulge brackets like Deutsche, BAML, UBS, etc. don't really have a presence there. Brown is strong for Management Consulting but not so much for IBD.
You Ivy Leaguers need a reality check. You have no idea how strong the OCR for IBD and MC at some of the non-Ivies like Duke, Northwestern, and Georgetown is.
I will agree with you on Georgetown.
Just wanted to correct a few things about UChicago, Bain and BAML do recruit at the U of C, Bain fairly heavily, BAML just OCR.
I would put it as very comparable to any non-Ivy in terms of OCR recruiting. The U of C also has programs to help students get into banking/consulting such as UCIB (UChicago in Business), as well as access to Booth.
Duke Chicago Penn Brown
Duke Brown Penn Chi
GS securities division summer analyst class for both summer 2010 and 2011 had more SAs from duke than any other school, just to throw it out there
It's nice to be part of the "Ivy league networking" linkedin network. Seriously, visit each of these schools and choose where you'll be the happiest. Happy people = successful people
ugh. is there really a wrong answer here. just pick one and roll with it. congrats for receiving a great set of options. good luck.
I'd say
1)Duke 2)UChicago 3)Penn CAS 4)Brown
in terms of how good OCR is at the undergrad level. I'm a bit biased UChicago sophomore, but I think that UChicago's ibanking recruitment isn't quite yet on par with its overall repuation because disproportionately students here are more interested in quant roles/trading/hedge funds.
i'd have to agree with this. but between Duke, Chicago, and Penn, you should base your decision on how much you would actually enjoy going there. sounds cheesy, but you're choosing your home for the next 4 years. .
Honestly, I really hope this isn't what is driving your college decision. These schools are all VERY different and there is more to college than getting into ibanking (why do I even have to say this?). Maybe for someone who hasn't been at one of them it's ZOMG APPEAL IBANKING but once you're in you really don't care.
People who want it will get where they want. Any one of these schools will probably get you where you want. The only one I personally would not consider going to for sure is UChicago since from what I understand it's a hellhole there (very harsh curve) and the questions on their application are what they are for a reason. I think my year it was something involving string theory and how to apply it to your life.
Floppity:
I think that perception is pretty outdated. UChicago used to have a harsh curve and was known for a pretty boring social life. That's changed a lot over the past 5-10 years - students seem to be a lot happier and the school has a much better vibe. Also, the average GPA is a lot higher now too. At least according to one aggregator (the Law School Admissions Council), UChicago's avg. GPA is noted as 3.44, Duke is 3.46, and UPenn is 3.45. I can't post links yet, but you can google the docs on this.
Nowadays, UChicago is pretty similar to any other top 10 or so school, like Duke, Brown, etc.
Yea I did graduate a while ago so my views are probably/could be a little dated.
UChicago's gpa, if I were to guess would be in the mid to high 3.40s. It might be up to 3.50 in the near future. Don't believe in the whole fun-comes-to-die myth. I've had lots of fun at this school. You obviously have to write papers, do your problem sets, study for and take exams and may have to pull an all-nighter every once in a while, but that's not really going to be change at any top 10 school.
Duke has the best combo of recruiting + social scene.
Yeah, I wouldn't even consider UPenn or Chicago if he got into Duke.
Brown I could see (if OP was a pot-smoking hippie, for instance, or someone who wanted to major in Egyptology).
some of the answers in this thread are hilarious.
Having done Econ at UC and having a brother who did undergrad at Wharton - i can answer some questions for you.
Regarding UC - job placement is fine outside of Chicago. Obviously the city of Chicago itself will be the largest congregation of grads - but the school is well represented in NYC as well (especially CS and JPM). As an econ major - you can take finance classes at Booth - if you want to do IB, this is especially attractive to recruiters. Target on the East Coast? It is the #4 ranked school in the country, you can answer this question yourself. International prestige, from my experience living in London when studying at LSE, international recognition was very pronounced (Most Nobel Prize winners by university other than Cambridge - that holds international weight).
Additionally, many get jobs in HK, but most of the kids from the Econ department that landed those jobs had intrinsic qualities that helped land a job in SE Asia (READ: They were Asian/From Asia/Spoke the Language).
Penn CAS -All I can say is it is not Wharton - you could go get an econ degree and leverage the Penn name/alumni network and still land an IB job.
Don't know shit about Brown and I would avoid entering the state of Rhode Island in general - just personal opinion.
The only Dukies I know in finance are the ones in Chicago and they are all traders - most with finance/engineering degrees. Very quant driven, very bright guys. Couldn't go wrong with Duke.
You have all great choices - you can enter IB with a degree from ANY of the schools if you play the game right.
PM with specific questions regarding UC if you want.
Oh my... I'm amazed by you guys' answers. I made the right choice to post my question here. I'd like to say 3 things.
2.Also let me share what I feel about these two schools, as I guess many of the alums can help me with it. Here are the main drawbacks of the two schools that make my decision exceedingly tough: 1. I'm worried about Chicago's workload, as I do hope to have substantial time to do something other than schoolwork. 2. I'm personally not into the idea of Greek life, and Duke is a school with an extremely strong presence (or even dominance) of it. I don't like the fact that 35% of the student body is generally beyond the reach of socializing. Correct me if my "HK conception" of Greek is wrong. :-)
Again, correct me if anything I've said is wrong (I know I might be wrong on many things. I'm a Hong Kong guy anyways. :)
They both have great international prestige, but I would UChicago definitely has a better known international prestige. Again they do plenty of recruiting for HK/Singapore, as well as a presence in Beijing and Paris for their study abroad.
Chicago has very little greek life compared to a school such as Duke. UChicago's workload is ridiculous to be honest, especially since it is on the quarter system. This sucks particularly for internships as usually you will have to take finals early to ensure you'll make it for your internship start date. I would say UChicago compared to Duke non-engineering, Duke probably has the easier workload. At the same time almost everyone does extracurriculars, whether it has to do with academics, finance, or social events, most people do a combination of them. We'll just complain about never having time for anything.
Both do a great job of it, UChicago is known for that "life of the mind" and critical thinking, and I'm sure Duke is the same.
Honestly, I think you sound like you want to go to UChicago. I think one of the big things to consider is that though Duke is probably a better experience socially and will be more fun, UChicago is probably more of a fit to a HK student. There are many HK students here, enough for a student organization. Also, you should consider that Chicago is in a city vs Duke in a suburban area. Best of luck with your choice! I'm sure you'll be very happy whenever you go.
Take what i have to say with a grain of salt cause I went to a far shittier school than what is being discussed but having grown up in the south with a lot of buddies at large energy PE shops/i banks I would like to add that Duke places extremely well in energy banking in Houston...
Pick Duke or brown. Very good social life and strong undergrad community bond. Besides OCR for banking&consulting at duke is superior to u Chicago.
For MBA though, u Chicago/ Penn wins by landslide. For undergrad totally different story.
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^ The fact that u Chicago booth MBA is stronger than that of duke's doesn't matter at all at college level. U Chicago at undergrad level has horrible OCR for consulting while duke is a major target for virtually all top consulting firms. Besides OCR for banking is probably better at duke as well. I work at a top 10 consulting firm in terms of size and revenue and I've never met a single u Chicago grad at analyst level... while I run into bunch of ivy + duke alums on daily basis.
Duke has a much better social life, better name recognition/ prestige (even people in Chicago dont even know what u Chicago is), better ocr into consulting / banking, and more grade inflation. Picking u Chicago over Duke would be a grave mistake.
Funny how IvyGrad is always quick to trash UChicago's reputation. He did the same thing on another forum regarding Ibanking recruitment specifically for UChicago.
^ No one's doubting that Duke has more people interested/involved in banking/consulting, which is basically why firms come to the school and spend resources on recruiting in such large numbers. You're mistaken that Booth's prestige doesn't hold any weight though, because undergrads in the UCIB program are required to take multiple Booth courses and are put through a preprofessional program that Duke can't rival. Social life, I'd agree, Duke has Chicago beat. But the difference in social life is at least equivalent to the difference in the potential quality of education. Chicago > Duke in the academic world, it blows it out of the water in all honesty. And you have to be joking about Duke being more prestigious. You might as well put Kentucky in the same light too then, given that all Duke really has on Chicago is its amazing basketball. Name recognition, yes, but prestige, no. I'm sure more people know of Ohio State than they do Duke, so I'm not sure OP should be concerned with that.
My advice to the OP would be to pick based on fit. The important employers all know and recognize UChicago's status. In fact, Credit Suisse went on record to say that there are two classes of kids that impress it most: Wharton students @ Penn and UCIB students @ UChicago. The CEO of Credit Suisse is also a UChicago college (not MBA) grad, and met with a group of kids personally during a visit this past month. JP Morgan also has an enormous presence on campus, and I'd be surprised if it picked a Duke student of similar caliber over a UChicago student, and it even has a specific case competition closed off to Harvard, Wharton, and Chicago kids. As a high school student, I was obsessed with Duke, I'll admit it. Why did I like it though? Because I'm a basketball fanatic. If you feel as though you're a good fit for Duke, go for it. And if you feel as though you'd be a better fit for Chicago, go for it. You really can't go wrong, and I'd disregard posts from any "IvyGrad" telling you that picking one over the other would be a grave mistake.
As an alum of neither Duke or Chicago, I offer an unbiased opinion. I sometimes feel that this board has too many school x,y,z alum fanboys pulling for their school in front of prospect students, despite when a clearly better school is in the available choice set.
I don't know how you define a school's 'prestige', but for me, I define it by the level of recruitment that elite/desirable firms deploy during OCR at each college campus. I don't care about what some random economics professor believes to be a more 'prestigious' academic institution between U Chicago or Duke. All I would care about, as a prospective student,is the level of job opportunities, grade inflation/deflation, and social life along with personal fit.
I will admit that I am no expert on banking OCR. However, I do know that for consulting (banking's rival industry in business) Duke is a huge target school, when U Chicago isn't even a semi target. Although U.S. News ranks U Chicago at similar level as Duke, that doesn't mean that the two schools have equal prestige or appeal in front of employers. Just like how Emory and Johns Hopkins are ranked higher than Georgetown and U of Michigan, but how Emory's OCR is a joke compared to U Michigan's for finance and consulting. Obviously, that tells us that rankings aren't everything.
Duke is a major target school for MBB, OW, Booz, Parthenon, Deloitte S&O, and many other boutique strategy consulting firms, along with all Ivies sans Cornell. Most of these firms, to my knowledge, don't even recruit at U of Chicago. Compare this to the fact that Duke is a much more well rounded school for college - more social activities, sports, better weather, better campus, more grade inflation, more fun student body, etc.
If someone was picking between U Chicago and Vanderbilt/ Emory, my support would go to U Chicago. When someone has acceptances to Ivies and Duke, picking U Chicago is just plain dumb. Worse OCR, tougher grading, much worse social scene, lesser school prestige/branding etc. That being said, I would definitely pick U Chicago MBA over Duke MBA.
I agree with you. I'd rather go to Duke over UChicago. And Duke probably does have better OCR than Chicago. And for the purposes of this metric, it makes good sense to pick Duke over Chicago. Which you state at the outset. Fair enough, it's a very practical decision parameter.
That said, you're waaaaaaaaayyyy underselling UChicago. I wouldn't say it's plain dumb to pick Chicago. It's academic "prestige" and reputation, particularly internationally is certainly comparable with Duke and lower Ivies. It's world class in many, many departments. UChicago is an excellent school. I don't want to talk about rankings here because I hate that shit.
And I know since this is a finance/consulting forum, Johns Hopkins gets shit on a lot (I'll concede your point on Emory), but IMHO, it's on par with Georgetown and perhaps Michigan as well. Again, I know nobody on a finance forum probably cares but Hopkins is world class in numerous medical, engineering, biomedical, and social sciences, not to mention IR/policy. Historically, Hopkins has set the bar for the modern research university model--a model now followed by many Ivies and other elite institutions.
Yes, I'll concede that Hopkins finance/consulting OCR blows compared to Ivies/Duke/Michigan/whatever/etc....But again...it's a really good school. I wouldn't consider it an enormous mistake to choose Hopkins over a Michigan or Georgetown.
I also think I'm unbiased as I did not attend Duke or Uchicago or Hopkins.
IvyGrad: "I will admit that I am no expert on banking OCR. However, I do know that for consulting (banking's rival industry in business) Duke is a huge target school, when U Chicago isn't even a semi target."
Didn't realize BCG, Bain, and McKinsey have been recruiting at a school that "isn't even a semi target". Thanks for informing us all. Can't believe they have been doing that this whole time? I'll have to inform my friends that work in MBB that they were very lucky to receive an offer coming out of UC.
^^^ I completely agree. When your at the level of Duke v. UC, the answer will not be which school recruits better for banking. Choose based upon the people/campus.
Think people are forgetting that this kid wants to recruit in HK. If it was for a position in the U.S., Duke would definitely be a better choice for recruiting purposes. Chicago and Duke are pretty much on par for international recruiting. If you are looking at it strictly from a recruiting standpoint, choice should be between Duke and Chicago.
Seriously, fit here should be the key deciding factor.
Also, I didn't go to Duke, but am I missing something? I've visited numerous times and I found the social scene to be insufferable - very frat heavy and not in a way that makes it as fun as nearby UNC, in a sleepy town, with too much emphasis on basketball. The social scene really depends on the individual. I'd personally much prefer being in a big city.
Duke is a great school, but people are overselling it on this board and underselling UChicago. Heck, if the OP really likes Brown (which has a very distinct vibe), he should go there. Options are great out of all these places, but the environments are very different. (I actually prefer UChicago or Brown - which are probably more similar to each other than they are to Duke or UPenn.)
IvyGrad,
You clearly have no idea what you're talking about, and using anecdotes from your consulting "experience" is funny. UChicago is a target for consulting, and as ucmaroon stated, all of the aforementioned firms have a large presence here (though I haven't seen much out of McKinsey), and I would add Accenture to the list as well.
My definition of prestige does indeed differ from yours. As we're talking about universities, I'd like to think that prestige stems from academics. There aren't many that would deny that UChicago is better regarded than Duke on that front, and the US News ranking (the most widely regarded of them all) now has Chicago several spots above Duke. Also, OCR does NOT equate to prestige. OCR reflects the leanings of the student body on campus, and if one school (such as Duke in this instance) harbors students with a greater interest in Banking/Consulting, then that school will inevitably have more OCR. It doesn't reflect on the institution itself, just the students that are there. That being said, more interest in the student body will lessen the impact of the increased OCR, so the net gain is nothing.
Social life is relative, and depends on what you want, so the OP should be looking for fit, not your conception of what's a better social life.
Again, saying that it's "dumb" to choose one school over another just shows how much your (questionable) education has gotten you. Here at UChicago, we're more than just pre-professional drones looking to get high GPAs and jobs. Nonetheless the high GPA and jobs will come to those that desire it, as the real grade deflation is only present in the hardest classes we offer, which students can easily avoid.
Quality of OCR is more reflective of the previous students that come out of a university and their performance. Harvard doesn't have great recruiting because they funnel their kids into Banking/Consulting, they have great recruiting because they churn out a bunch of high quality employees every year. Companies don't give a shit whether the school is more "intellectual" or ranked higher on US News. This kid is asking about prestige in the context of getting a job, so I'd say OCR is more important that academics. With that being said, in either the academic or OCR department, Duke and UChicago are too close for a dick measuring contest.
I never said that companies care about which school is more intellectual, and you're quite mistaken about how OCR works. The fact that Harvard "churns out a bunch of high quality employees" would be completely irrelevant if their students weren't interested in Banking/Consulting. Had they not been interested, why would companies spend their resources in recruiting efforts? Claiming that Duke produces "better employees" is pretty ignorant. If anyone knows the history of UChicago, they know that the interest per capita in Banking/Consulting here simply was not as high as it was in schools such as Harvard and Duke. It is higher now, and so more firms have turned to recruiting here.
Prestige in the context of getting a job: I'll concede this point. Duke, for decades, has produced investment bankers and consultants in high volume, whereas UChicago has sent more students into academia. A firm deciding whether to take a UChicago student vs. a Duke student of same caliber would likely go with Duke, solely because there's more of a history, lesser risk there. The aforementioned situation doesn't happen much, though, as firms tend to recruit by comparing students within the same school. The amount of OCR tends to be correlated to the amount of interest on campus, and so, there tends to be an equalizing effect. As more UChicago students become interested, OCR here will increase to match the demand, and in the end, UChicago may have the upper hand given its location.
I am beginning to think that you are a clueless college freshmen who's never been through an OCR interviewing process, much less obtaining any sort of job offer yet.
Much of 18 year old high school kids entering college don't even know what inv banking or mgmt consulting are. I know I didn't. AFTER they get to college, see recruiters on campus, hear about friends or classes above you who've got banking/ consulting offers and make 100k+ straight out of school, that's when kids do research on the said careers and decide they want to become bankers or consultants.
Also, most of banking or consulting firms don't need to worry about 'lack of interest' from OCR in case they go to x,y,z school to recruit and fail to recruit targeted amount of students from that said school. There is no industry besides banking or consulting that is as coveted and as competitive to get in out of college, just by looking at the sheer volume of applicants each year at firms such as Goldman, MS, or Mck. If you show up at x,y,z school and inform students that the starting comp at you company is likely to be 2-3 times more than any other job they would otherwise get, have faster career progression, strong exit ops, and all other perks, you can bet that there will be a shit load of applicants for the job. Yes, that includes students at the University of Chicago.
Getting into banking/consulting straight out of college is so damn competitive nowadays that you want to put yourself in the most favorable situation as you can towards the process: hence go with a school with stronger OCR and easier curves/ grading.
As for the consulting OCR, I know that my firm doesn't recruit at Chicago undergrad, but does at all Ivies + Duke. When I was still in college, I went to a shit load of info sessions across all consulting firms. Many recruiters said along the line: "we only recruit at the top schools, such as Ivies, Duke, Stanford, and strong publics such as Berkeley and Michigan. But that's it." I am too lazy to look up detailed info across all notable firms with stats, but here is an example.Parthenon, which is arguably the most prestigious boutique consulting firm there is, recruits only at a handful of schools - such as Harvard, Dartmouth, and Duke, but U of Chicago is not even on the radar:
http://www.parthenon.com/Undergraduate/InterviewSchedule
Lastly, I've heard that OCR for banking at Duke is sick. Almost at equal level as top Ivies. I seriously doubt that U Chicago OCR for banking would be as good. (Banking recruiting and Consulting recruiting tend to be similar at most colleges)
I'd go to Brown so I could grudge fuck a bunch of hippy chicks.
.
^ The issue at hand is that OCR between Duke and Chicago is not the same. It's pretty drastic difference. I had high school friends who went to U Chicago complaining about non-existent OCR for consulting and weak OCR for banking.
I still remember one kid from my high school who chose to go to Wash U at St Louis over Cornell and Dartmouth. His reasoning being that 'Wash U has better medical school and is ranked higher in sciences'. 3 years after that, he changed his mind and wanted to go into finance/ consulting. You can bet at that point, he was really pissed about crappy OCR at his school compared to Ivies and heavily regretted his choice back in high school. (Btw, Wash U is ranked HIGHER than Cornell and Brown according to US News. But if you want finance/ consulting, you would be a fool to choose formal over latter)
It is pretty interesting to note that from my high school class, there is a huge difference in career outcomes between kids who went to Ivies, Duke, or Stanford, and the kids who went to schools like Emory, Johns Hopkins, Vanderbilt, Wash U, Rice, Notre Dame, and U Chicago. All of these kids were smart and hard-working and all attended schools in top 20, as US News defines.
Many of the kids in the formal group are working in IBD, strategy consulting, S&T at large firms, making 100k+. Many in the latter group are working in big4 accounting, tech consulting (Accenture, Deloitte, etc), corp finance, f500 rotational programs, etc.
nah, no shit storm here. This is actually reasonably accurate overall. I only had issue when he said it was "plain dumb" or stupid to go to UChicago vs. Duke. People are wired differently...some might prefer UChicago over Duke based on fit. And frankly, if you're not happy/don't fit in at Duke, IMHO, that's more important than improved OCR.
I think very good schools like UChicago and Hopkins get absolutely hammered here unnecessarily--but I guess this is a finance/consulting forum. If you're looking to become a mathematician, physicist, chemist, engineer (for Hopkins), economist, biological scientist, psychologist, political scientist, physician, english professor, etc... you're no worse off going to UChicago/Hopkins than most target schools.
But for finance/consulting OCR? IvyGrad's fairly on point (EDIT: I will say I'm a little unsure of UChicago's OCR). And I really hate talking about rankings.
^inb4shitstorm
I'm not a direct student of UChicago or Duke, but I have several friends who attend those schools. Based on their comments:
Duke : ridiculous OCR, especially for finance/consulting. They have this "Duke in NYC" program where they spend a week or so in NYC and basically secure interviews way beforehand. And to be specific, my friend said they have a huge number of finance courses which can be taken (and are usually taken) by those pursuing a BS in Economics there.
UChicago : Not sure about consulting but contrary to this forum, they have very good recruiting for finance (both NYC and Chicago). However all three of them agreed that the academics are ridiculous - many of my friends who were some of the "smartest" ones in HS were barely getting a 3.5 GPA at UChicago while literally studying 3 hours every single day. One of the complaints was the Chicago operates in a trimester system so basically you're cramming all the material you need to learn in 2/3 of a semester.
Again this is just from word of mouth - so take it for what it's worth. Based on their reflections, I don't think you can really go wrong with either school. I feel like it's just a matter of where your personality would fit better at, which is something that only you - the OP - can rightfully decide.
Duke in NYC program is a whole semester, not one week. Definitely helpful for networking, but sometimes can hurt in the context of arranging interviews separate from the campus process (if HR rep from the bank sucks and forgets you, you are screwed).
I'd say in the context of international recruiting, Chicago and Duke aren't far off from one another. For NYC recruiting, Duke OCR is stronger.
//www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/thoughts-on-u-chicago-undergrad
A UChicago student gives a breakdown of IBD recruiting in the above topic.
They're all fine, go to the one you like best.
Don't be fucking retarded, you're only in college once. Don't choose a school based on what a bunch of clowns on the Internet tell you about their placement rates. All those schools send people to Wall Street, you should do yourself a favor and actually visit them/talk to professors/do what sane people would do when choosing a school rather than choose based on what WSO thinks is best.
Also these guys are wrong, Brown will be the easiest path to Wall Street. How analyst recruiting works is they take X amount from each school, Brown has a much higher percentage of graduates who aren't interested in working in finance than the other schools, so there will be less competition. When you interview for an analyst role, you're really competing against the other people from your school.
Doesn't matter, get decent grades and do finance shit at any of them and you'll get banking offers. Go to the one that is most appealing to you.
The Duke or UChicago debate, to me, seems very similar debating Williams or Swarthmore. I think ivygrad would agree (and the OCR numbers probably reveal this - as seen from the Parthenon consulting page and others) that Williams has a greater presence on Wall Street than Swarthmore, and that more firms recruit at Williams than Swarthmore. At the same time, both schools have comparably accomplished groups of students, and are similarly selective. Yet Williams holds an "edge" in IBD recruiting.
For a student choosing between these two schools, though, fit would absolutely be the deciding factor. I know people who spent 4 years at Williams and hated it, and same with Swarthmore. The schools have different student populations, but exit options are great coming out of both. I really haven't heard of Swarthmore kids struggling to get consulting/IBD jobs, but there tend to be a lot less interested in this field. The same may hold true for Brown as well.
(Also, again, the UChicago grade deflation thing is now a myth, with the avg. GPA around 3.44.)
College (and life, really) shouldn't just be about optimizing outcomes to the greatest extent possible. As long as schools pass a certain threshold (and UPenn CAS, Duke, UChicago, Brown certainly do), don't worry about it.
I don't think the question is: does a particular school send 100 students to GS every year? The better question is: does the school pass the threshold to be feasible for me? Unless you're looking to optimize outcomes completely, and focus more on the outcomes than the fit, all these schools pass that bar.
(Finally, UChicago seems to have some real positive buzz around it lately. Maybe there's a lag with employers, but remember, not too long ago, Duke was in the very same position. It didn't really become a "hot" school until the 90s - before that it was a regional, provincial southern school. As schools gain more and more talent and notoriety - and their cultures change [I suspect UChicago attracts less nerdy/loser types than it did a decade ago] - the outcomes for graduates change as well.)
I'd agree with Letter2's comments entirely. I honestly think that that's how to get the most out of your education: pick based on fit. One correction though: the average GPA definitely isn't 3.44, I believe that was cited in accordance with UChicago undergrads applying to law school. Given the extreme importance that GPA has on law school admissions, this group of students is not representative of the entire undergrad population. Nonetheless, a high GPA isn't tough to come by if one were to pick the right classes.
What's interesting is that as recently as five years ago, according to almost every thread on this forum, UChicago was viewed as a "shithole" with horrible recruiting, social life, weather, grade deflation, ect. and certainly not viewed as a peer to ANY of these schools being discussed. Obviously, today that's not the case, as shown by this thread. I'll chalk it up to a perception issue, with Chicago being significantly underrated in the past. You can look up old threads and see Chicago being bashed on by just about everyone. I've read just about every thread on UChicago on this forum.
According to my most up-to-date sources from current students, Chicago has significantly ramped up recruiting, with a selective careers in business program and the ability for ANY undergraduate (not just economics majors) to take classes at Booth. The administration has made a concerted effort to improve the undergraduate and pre-professional programs, as well as improve student life and accept more pre-professional students. Recruiting is better, social life is better (though not Greek-heavy), weather is still just as bad (hey, it's Chicago) and grade deflation has reversed into grade inflation. There are students who voluntarily take honors classes and complain about grade deflation (keep in mind these are probably some of the hardest classes in the world) and people have taken these statements out of context.
This "rise" coincides with the rise of the undergraduate program as a whole, and is due to the influx of normal kids who overwhelmingly dominate the new incoming classes and want IB over traditional academia. The "Where fun goes to die" slogan used to be true, but not anymore. I'm in the class of 201x group and I'm surprised at how many normal, well-adjusted kids there are. Granted, there are still some intense nerds/intellectuals but they are fewer in number than expected, and they will be present at any school. There are many cross-admits to top schools, including HYPSM, who chose Chicago (though they are not aiming for IB).
Chicago is the fastest rising school perhaps in the history of college admissions. In other words, the gap between perception and reality is shrinking. 2013 was a great year for the admissions cycle, with a new record for acceptance rate and yield, reflecting the growing popularity of the school and hence the ability to attract better students. If you think of college as an investment, Chicago looks like an attractive investment.
http://chicagomaroon.com/2013/05/14/class-of-17-yield-above-50-percent/
My point is -- and trust me on this -- don't underestimate Chicago. I mean, people could still continue to bash on the school and tell everyone to avoid it, but in ten years no one will be able to do that. I know it's hard to imagine a school changing so rapidly (I was skeptical at first too), which is why there's so much skepticism, but that is exactly what Chicago has done (you can read all of the articles on the student newspaper about the rapidly changing culture) because it has the administrative savvy and financial clout to make it happen.
For info on grade inflation at uchicago, go to gradeinflationDotcom. In 2006, the avg gpa was 3.35, up from 3.26 in 1999, so I imagine its between 3.4 - 3.5 now - especially given all the other changes on campus.
Also, I think the responses of Duke people re Uchicago is a little weird. Think about Duke in 1988 or 89 compared with Duke in say, 1998 or 99. The school was completely different - it went from being more or less a provincial school to having Great Wall st placement. I'm not sure why there's doubt that UChicago is on a similar trajectory.
This being said, I think the swarthmore Williams analogy works well. Williams like duke has great ibd placement, and swarthmores (like uchicago) pure numbers probably lag behind Williams'. Both school though, clearly pass a reasonable threshold, and students should just pick based on fit.
I truly appreciate all the comments. Just made the decision last night, and I decided to choose my college based on "which will make me the happiest". Chicago is the place to be.
[What's interesting is that as recently as five years ago, according to almost every thread on this forum, UChicago was viewed as a "shithole" with horrible recruiting, social life, weather, grade deflation, ect. and certainly not viewed as a peer to ANY of these schools being discussed.
The "Where fun goes to die" slogan used to be true, but not anymore.]
I was applying to college around 8 years ago and this was definitely the view back then lol.
Actually, floppity, it's still the same view now. Perception always takes a while to catch up to reality.
I personally don't mind because people respect you for having an average GPA (since people think it's super hard to get a 3.5, when in reality a 3.5 is not far from the average) and, being socially well-adjusted, people are also impressed that you aren't a stereotypical Chicago nerd. So think of it this way -- IT'S IN CHICAGO'S INTERESTS TO CONTINUE PROMOTING THIS STEREOTYPE. It's better to be underrated and perform above expectations than to be overrated and perform below expectations. Whenever people ask, I always make a point to exaggerate how difficult things are at Chicago, while in the back of my mind I chuckle a bit.
Further proof: the marketing department at Chicago uses "Where fun comes to die" as its official slogan on brochures and advertisements. Why in the world would they do that? Idiots, right? In my view, this is an attempt to cater to alumni (who may be against the recent changes) and, to a degree, continue advertising to traditional UChicago students (the nerds, intellectuals, and academics).
Sorry, I know this went off-topic by quite a bit. It's just that many have been fooled by Chicago's marketing department and hey, I thought this would be an interesting read for you guys.
@OP, congratulations on your choice. Personally it would have been a hard choice between Chicago and Duke. Hope to see you on campus in the fall.
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