MIT MFin vs. LBS MFA vs. LSE MSc Finance
Hello,
I just received my offers from these three programs. To give a little background about myself. I am graduating this year with the highest GPA from the most reputable school in my country, which is located in the Middle East. I majored in Management and have a lot of extracurriculars, leadership in student clubs, exchange and international summer school experience. I interned at two startups, a bank, a financial consultancy, and a trading firm.
My aim is to get a job in private equity in the end. But because of the experience requirements in these PE companies, I will be looking for an opportunity in IB first. I do not have a preference of one city over the other.
My biggest concern is MIT's tuition of $85k+living costs in Boston.
Also, I have a merit scholarship of 10k pounds from LBS and waiting for LSE to announce the awards. Both schools are 36k pounds + living costs in London.
All three programs offer working visas after finishing the studies, so it does not look like a concern for now for an international student.
I would be glad if you could help, I have about 10 days to make a decision.
If you purely look at quality/reputation of the programme, I would go with MIT.
However, the biggest factor I would consider is whether you have a visa for either the US or UK?
Second, only you can judge if you find the extra cost worth it (and how much of a financial strain it would be - can you borrow the money at a reasonable interest rate?).
Third, the argument against MIT is it's a lot more quantitative, so you need to be confident that you can keep up to speed with a Management degree (whereas LBS shouldn't be challenging academically for you).
Thank you for your reply. I will consider all your arguments. I have been checking the course content and curriculum for a while and hope to keep up with it until the beginning of the program. Also, I do not hold visa for neither us nor uk. But both degrees supply post study visas for 18 and 24 months. However, I have been told that it is much harder to find a job in the US as an international student and that really confused me and made me feel like LBS would be a safer bet, although declining an MIT offer would hurt. I do not know what I would do if I cannot find a job at all after paying that bulk of money. Do you have any idea what are the chances at IBs for an international masters student?
It all comes down to whether you'd prefer living in the UK or the US. IB and PE pay a lot better in the US, so you'll make the extra costs back in no time. Personally I'd take the MIT offer without hesitation if I were you.
All 3 are great but, masters are really less recognized in the US, and MIT’s one is a one year program if I am not mistaken, thus you’ll be expected to recruit for FT directly as summers are usually recruited in April-Early fall in the US - basically the timeline isn’t great for you to recruit for the US. Then you coukd recruit for London from MIT, but idk better be in London to recruit for London. Thus I would advise for LSE/LBS and not MIT.
Both LSE/LBS are well known programs that place very well. I think that LSE is more academic and the LBS is more career focused, so I’d pick based on that as the people will be quite different (got friends at both programs so feel free to PM me).
I am surprised MIT will admit at such a late stage. But summer internship pitot to the program is very important, do you have plans on it?
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