Cornell State School

Cornell as a whole is Ivy League, so that answers about 3/4s of your question - as for "special" programs none of them are on the same level of separation as the examples you mentioned from other colleges. None are designed for community college transfers - that sounds like a fantastic waste of money. The most niche program is the Hotel school. As far as recruitment attention, generally AEM and Econ do the best, ILR next, Hotel and PAM are basically a long shot. They vary by academic rigor but that is not correlated with their recruitment success: AEM for example may well be the least rigorous. Why are you interested in Cornell if you're already at Hopkins? Source: Econ major (private college)

They aren't state colleges - they just receive a tiny bit of public funding, but are still 100% private under the leadership of the university.

SUNY Cornell is ok, bro.

Cornell's hotel school is not one of the SUNY programs.

The four state programs are: ALS, ILR, ecology, and vet. science.

Cornell and MBB alum here. I've been on both sides of the interview table, and I can tell you from first hand experience that neither the students nor recruiters at Cornell differentiate between the endowed and statutory colleges (what you're calling the state schools). The statutory colleges are not state schools, they are what are called land grant colleges. Cornell is New York's land grant college. MIT is Massachusetts' land grant college. Cornell just negotiated a better deal with NY than MIT did with MA, and therefore is able to offer NY state residents a tuition discount.

It's true that each of the seven colleges at Cornell has it's own admission process. While admissions standards vary significantly across colleges they are all at least respectably competitive. The more popular, generic majors like economics tend to look more competitive on paper because the get more applicants, but student quality isn't as variable across the colleges as the admissions rates would suggest. For instance, the engineering school has the highest acceptance rate, but also the highest entering HS GPAs and SAT scores. Similarly, while the average English major may look better on paper than the average Hotelie, chances are good that the English major was rejected from most of the other Ivies. The Hotelie on the other hand is more likely than not at his or her first choice school. Sometimes the things that make an applicant desirable to a school or employer don't always fit neatly into US News' selectivity boxes.

Of course, if a hotel career is your first choice, you might inherently be retarded to begin with.

Listen to gammaovertheta, he knows what he's talking about.

Ok, I go to Cornell and am an ILR/PAM major (statutory college) and I'll be working in IB at a bulge bracket/top elite boutique next year. I had multiple offers to choose from and received interviews from many firms.

For Investment Banking, AEM and Econ are both good bets. Actually, most of my friends at Cornell that got banking jobs/internships are Econ majors, NOT AEM majors. I know AEM majors that interned/will be working at Goldman, JPM, BAML, etc. I know Econ majors that will be doing IB at Goldman, JPM, BAML, Citi, etc.

I know ILR kids that have interned/received full time offers in IB from Lazard, Blackstone R&R, JPM, Goldman (with an alum in TMT), Citi, etc. The CFO of JPM is an ILR alum.

I know PAM majors that have interned and/or received full time offers in IB from JPM, BAML, Citi, etc and received IB interviews from Evercore, DB, Credit Suisse, Goldman, Lazard, Moelis, etc. There are alums at Evercore, BAML, TPG, etc. There are a number of PAM people at JPM Investment Management too.

I know ILR majors and PAM majors that have interviewed at almost every single BB investment bank and elite boutique.

I don't know that many Hotel kids but I know alums/current students that received offers/work at Citi, Goldman, JPM, etc. They seem to do pretty well.

The easiest path to IB (by a long shot) is definitely through Econ or AEM and, in my experience, Econ is probably a little better. It's significantly harder from ILR and PAM. ILR and PAM majors need to network more, get better grades, and hustle more than AEM or Econ but, if they do that, they have great opportunities at top firms as well. You also need a good story for why you chose your major in the interview but that's not too difficult to do.

Edit:

Another issue is that there are fewer ILR and PAM majors trying to get into IB, whereas there are a ton of Econ and AEM majors gunning for those slots. The Econ and AEM majors also seem more prepared in terms of interview prep, networking, etc. That said, all else equal, Econ and AEM on your resume does give you somewhat of a boost.

I am less familiar with Hotel recruiting but I get the impression that it is stronger than ILR and PAM.

If you're at Cornell and you want to increase your chances of getting an IB job, here are the best things you can do to up your chances:

Join a Business Frat (not necessary but it does significantly increase your chances) Get a position in an investment club Network a ton with alumni Get as high of a GPA as you possibly can Be involved on campus Practice interviewing with the M&I guide Have a well formatted resume Take Financial Accounting and Finance Go to information sessions and keep in touch with the people you meet there Be a normal human being socially Go to Cornell Days during winter break of your junior year and make a good impression Or be a douchey trust fund baby and get your job through nepotism and do none of the above