Picking Undergraduate School
My son is picking a school before May 1. He is interested in Economics and Finance. Core SAT was 1580, 4.0 GPA in an International Baccalaureate High School and ranked third in his class. The schools he is choosing from are NYU Sloan, Notre Dame and Wisconsin Madison. We are visiting all three schools in the next 12 days. All are very different experiences. He intends to go on to get a MBA. He thinks he wants to work in the financial industry in Chicago or New York (IB etc.). He is interested in a double major or major/minor - maybe fiance and definitely economics.
Any suggestion or comments on these schools launching him would be helpful.
NYU by far.
Sorry, i meant to write NYU Stern.
Good luck
LOL. are you sure that's what he wants? or is it what you want?
If he really wanted to do what you said up top he should be the one on here posting questions. He is a high school student and should be more than capable enough to use the internet and forums.
NYU would be best for finance for sure
After the campus visits it will defintely be his decision. Frankly without insisting on that he sees the schools in person he would have already picked Stern. I want to make sure that he sees the difference between a Big 10 school, South Bend and NYC for somewhere to live for four years.
He attended a class last summer at Columbia on Economics that stirred a lot of interest. That is where all of this got started in his mind. I want to get him as much good information as possible to allow an educated decison to be made. No matter where he goes, it is a big investment of time and money.
If he likes NYC and wants finance then Stern is an easy choice.
Why not Columbia? Just curious
Notre Dame has the best program in the nation.
wot
He did not get in to Columbia.
NYU and Notre Dame are neck-and-neck overall, but if your son wants to work on Wall Street, NYU will give him more options there. The dynamic changes outside NYC, though, and Notre Dame is a much better school if your son wants to work as a derivatives trader in Chicago.
If you qualify for in-state tuition in Wisconsin (I believe Wisconsin also has deals going with Minnesota and Michigan), and you are not millionaires, I would seriously push UW Madison, though. It is a top 50 school with an excellent economics and finance program. Running the numbers here, if you can earn 10% returns on investments over the long run, your son would have to earn an extra $12,000/year out of NYU to justify the added cost. My parents were nice enough to give me in-state tuition, I turned down MIT for Illinois, and I don't regret it for a moment. If your son's smart (and the 1580 SAT indicates he probably is), he'll do just fine and have plenty of cash saved up to pay for an MBA when he gets into a top five business school.
PS: Finance is a fairly easy degree. Encourage him to think about pairing it with a science, engineering, or math major.
If your son wants to do finance in NYC, go with NYU, the others that he was accepted to just won't position him as well.
Having that $100K under the mattress- or at least not as student debt- is a really good feeling when times are tough in the financial sector.
dude has a 1580 on the SAT w. a 4.0 and NYU is the best he can do? ouch.
It doesn't really matter where smart people go to school. They tend to do well regardless. Send him to UW Madison, save $100K, give him the chance to learn how middle-class America really works, have him spend four years in industry with a mild state school chip on his shoulder, and let him become a knockout admit for HBS if that is what he wants to do.
Trust me, if he's as smart as I think he is, he'll do just fine in the long run if he goes to a Big Ten school. The more you make him feel like the odds are stacked against him, the better he'll do at kicking Ivy League butt when he graduates.
I agree, none of the other schools have the alumni firepower as Stern. Stern is great also as its more recognized ( at least in Canada) and opens the door a lot of career options.
I'm not saying he can't/won't be successful, all these schools are good, NYU is great, but damn dude I graduated yrs ago and I woulda thought those stats could get him somewhere in the ivies (or at least UMICH-Ross).As for what school he should go to, if he is serious about IB and knows that is what he wants, I think it is worth the extra $$$ for NYU. Although if, at some point, he decides he doesn't want IB/Consulting then NYU would be an awful investment.
The math gets tougher for out of state tuition. Out-of-state, I think NYU does make more sense.
I'm in IP's camp on this... I really can't back you kids saying NYU so heavily... it really isn't all that difficult to break into financial services from a Big 10 school if you are smart as shit, IP and myself have proven that. The kids from Kelley prove that every year. I don't see that value proposition paying off. You don't get anything additional out of it, and as he points out, you save a boatload of money. I made a very conservative decision with respect to where I went to school and I STILL owe a ton of money in loans and I can tell you that if I were in the same exact job with no debt today I would be so much more relieved... You really can't underestimate how good it feels to not need the job you are in, especially given how much of a grind finance is and how uncertain the job outlook will continue to be into the future. NYU is not worth the additional cost unless you know that you want to be in NYU and want to live in New York. The whole "NYU's finance education is so much better" mindset is just bullshit marketing from the university. Higher education is largely a scam anyway, I don't think many top universities can justify their value. Kids would make as much money coming from other schools so you are "overpaying" for the name, and the premium isn't justified.
Cmon IP some of the stuff you say is pretty far out there
I'm just running the cost numbers here. If you're conservative, it's hard to lose on in-state tuition at UW Madison. If you're a gambler, or if UW Madison is not in-state, NYU is the best choice. What I do know is that there's two guys who sit between me and a lady from Harvard who made it to the street just fine.
Pedigree never hurts, and for the same cost- or even up to a $100K difference- NYU is the clear choice, but UW Madison is good enough for a bright candidate. The past five years have been the most dangerous time in decades to be getting a finance degree with the expectation of working in markets or investment banking, and if things don't work out exactly as planned, it's always nice to not have to carry $250K in student loans at 8% interest.
come on dude you are about to drop a small fortune and 24 months of your life for a PRINCETON master's. if elite and non-elite schools are so much alike why not go to vandy MSF or something less exalted on "Top-X" lists?
Back to my PBR and my rusty honda. (don't worry, the passenger seat).
PS: my mistake was studying CS exclusively when I was more interested in business, not going to a state school.
deleted.
We live in Atlanta. Out of state tuition for Wisconsin.
To all of you surprised that the OP couldn't get into Ivies - some people just aren't interested in Ivies for whatever reason. Or some students apply to maybe one of their choice and that's it.
With regard to ND vs. NYU, ND is ahead overall but I'd assume that NYU would give you more career opportunities overall in NYC, if that's what he's aiming for. However, as a student at ND I can say that the BB do recruit heavily at ND now - we have around 50 out of 150 finance majors going to Bulge Brackets, most of whom are going to NYC. All of the banks recruit for NYC, some have additional Chicago positions as well, and lots of smaller funds have positions in NYC and Chicago. So I can say that the people who state that ND won't position you well for finance in NYC don't really know what they're talking about. ND will position you very well for positions within finance in NYC. I can't speak to NYU since I don't go there but I can give info about ND if you'd like any.
As a side note, I've noticed a shift at ND within the past few years (my brother graduated recently as well). A few years ago, most finance majors weren't interested as much in banking or high finance and it wasn't well represented through courses or on campus. Now, everyone gets involved with the Student International Business Council from freshman year in which people pick modeling/PE projects with real firms in all sorts of divisions, etc, and then travel to NYC or Chicago to present to them, people join the Wall Street clubs from freshman year, and they all try to get internships as early as possible. More and more students are becoming cut-throat about finance, so this may be why so many don't yet know that Bulge Brackets recruit at ND.
it is possible to go NYU and major in business with finance conc, and get a major from cas is you manage your credits correctly (you could do comp sci, math, w.e.).
NYU > ND for anything finance (anything business really) no matter what "shift" is occuring. The debate isn't really ND vs NYU though (since it would be an absurd one to have finance-wise) but UW (in-state) vs NYU, which is a more viable discussion after consideration of cost. With all that said, they don't live in Wisconsin, go to NYU.
I only spoke about ND's recent atmosphere to give the OP some info, I wasn't comparing it to NYU in terms of finance opps because I know nothing about NYU recruiting. Please don't criticize my posts when I'm only speaking factually about ND.
Go to Stern then try to transfer to an Ivy/better school. That's what my little bro is doing next year. I wish he would have picked somewhere like UVA or Cal over NYU but he's a little douche bag.
I started out biomed engineering and dueced it for econ/acct for obvious social reasons then, like a hypocrite, strongly urged my lil bro (class of '12) to major in electrical engineering lol
I have close friends at NYU Stern, and they were MISERABLE all 4 years. Students are viciously competitive, to the point of neuroses. There's no actual campus, which means you don't even feel like you're at college. EVERYONE wants to do banking, so recruiting, while strong, by no means guarantees you a job. And to top it off, the girls are busted.
Imagine going to school with everyone on WSO. It would suck. That's what Stern is.
Sounds like a fun way to spend some of the last carefree years of your youth when you should be making mistakes and having fun while learning who you want to be and where you want to go... too much prestige whoring goes on...
hahahaha that'd be awful. Rufiolove, I disagree with you about the value of the ugrad degree but agree with you in that in general there is too much prestige whoring going on here. I just think there's a difference between Wisconsin and NYU/ND, whereas I hate it when people say "if you went to Dartmouth/Cornell/lesser Ivy, you're not prestigious."
The only real difference would be pretentiousness and the amount you paid to attend the school, which is what keeps tuition rates high. You aren't going to learn anything better at ND or NYU than you would at Wisconsin. And if you want to keep making the argument about ND's alumni network, Wisconsin, Michigan and PSU's alumni networks are larger and more well connected. Wisconsin has had more Nobel Laureates than Notre Dame has, including one in economics. The fact that you went to a school that YOU think is more prestigious than others doesn't mean that it's going to get you any further than a kid who decided to go to Wisconsin or another Big 10 school... the only thing you guys really can brag about is rankings (which are meaningless once you get into the real world) and perceived prestige in order to justify the fact that you overpaid for your degree. It's fine, it just means that Notre Dame is doing a bomb ass job of selling you on their product and getting YOU to pay more for it (unless you got a free ride, but all else equal, it just costs more) when it doesn't really get you anywhere better. I can tell you for certain that the ROI on my degree is likely much higher than a degree from ND, and if you are a motivated intelligent student, like the son of the OP, then his would be higher attending Wisconsin than ND. Your argument about having a better 20 year earnings outlook is a correlation, not a causation of attending ND.
Nope. I go to NYU, and about 10% of my classes are female (CS major), and in general NYU girls are fucking fine.
Dead on accurate...go with Notre Dame. NYU is just a bunch of random buildings in NYC. And I know for a fact that ND is one of the few non-ivies that places well into Stanford's MBA program.
Sounds terrible!
NYU chicks are busted?
is this real
Tell your son to pick a school because he likes the school, but since you are paying for it, don't ever forget that the degree is going to be what he makes it, and to be quite honest, you don't have to overpay for a "name" to get a good education or to secure a job on Wall Street. Your son will be smart enough to get a job on here if he wants it, regardless of where he goes to school. People who tell you otherwise are merely trying to justify why they paid what they paid for their degree, but you can't make the argument that it couldn't be done from a Big 10 school. I am partially biased, since I funded my own education, but you get a great, well rounded college experience from attending a big state school, and you'll learn a lot of life lessons that will help you out further down the road in life than just what you were taught in a classroom. He would get a good education at ND and NYU as well, but ultimately it comes down to does he want to go there, and do you want to pay for it. It's really just a question of what experience he wants to have in college, not the quality of the school. All those schools are good schools but your son's motivation and drive are what are going to get him his first job.
^^ Couldn't have put it better, Illini about the culture differences, but I'd like to point out that all BB recruit heavily at.ND for NYC positions - we've got 50-60 going BB FT out of 150 finance majors. BB opps are plentiful at ND, as are other firms like Baird. NYU may be better for NY, but I don't know if you can say that going to ND would "hurt you" career-wise.
Since we are talking culture, go with what feels like a better fit. This will contribute to a more positive experience and better results overall. Ultimately, this is a bright kid and they will do well if past performance is any indicator, now help them choose the environment that best suits them where they really grow
In 50 years, that's going to count more than anything else
OUCH. Back when I was going to school, in-state costs were $17K/year, out-of-state was $25K, Catholic was ~ $33K, and secular private was ~ $43K. Oh how things have changed.
I know right? I was mortified about how much I paid for my degree given that tuition increased ~50% from when I started to when I matriculated. I just can't wrap my head around the justification for some of the prices of these degrees now, even with all the "prestige" or whatever you want to call it.
Just to clear the air here.
ND is a good ACCOUNTING school.
NYU STERN is a top two FINANCE school.
Can't really comment on Wisconsin here, but know many people in s&t that went there.
Wow, a lot of bad advice in this thread.
IP, you turned down MIT for Illinois because of $100k? Now you're wasting time in the prime of your career going back to school to get the Princeton stamp of approval via a dinky Master's degree? Your "money saving" advice is a little myopic...
Both ND and NYU are perfectly reasonable places to go to school. Both are decent Top 25ish schools, so they won't set him up or hold him back. Their vibes are different; visit both and see which he prefers. It's not any more complicated than that. Good luck to OP and his son.
Huh? MFin and MBA are completely different career choices, completely different reasons to go to school. The whole point of MFin is the knowledge; the whole point of an MBA is the network. You get a piece of paper with either.
There's nothing in an MFin program you can't learn on your own. You're paying the money for the piece of paper.
NYU and ND > the other options for finance in NYC, it's just not close. Out of NYU/ND, NYU is going to give an advantage that can only be measured by how the kid fits in: if he HATES NYU then he'll choke, if he HATES football then he really shouldn't be at ND. SCHOOL + FIT + EFFORT = results. Cost is a secondary consideration, as in "I like this, but can I afford to go and if...and only if...not, then what are the alternatives.
OP can simply write out a chart of costs/benefits of each school after the visits and take it from there. He's asking a simple question and math degrees -> ???? at other schools, etc... aren't really the focus here. They need some basic information as opposed to a highly theoretical overview of higher education LOL
Agree with the logical fallacy
Illini, with all due respect, your advice is tinged with selection bias. We all agree that you have done very well for yourself and, at the same time, finding yourself in a debt-free situation.
But, I recognize that the general sample of state school kids who are gunning for finance-related front office positions may not have fared as well when compared to the general sample of finance kids at ND/NYU.
In the current market, I would suggest the OP sends his son to a school that will maximize his chances of going where he wants to go rather than going to a state school and hoping he is smart/lucky enough to hack it.
As mentioned earlier, it is also important to consider the culture of the school as well. I know that I wouldn't be where I am today without having competitive and driven people around me - driving me to constantly set my own bar higher. Of course people like that can be found everywhere, but they are most heavily concentrated at ND/NYU as opposed to Wisconsin.
Yes, the average kid at Wisconsin isn't quite as smart as the average kid at NYU. The average kid at Wisconsin did not get into NYU. The top 10% did, but couldn't afford it.
Sure, and I think NYU is worth an $80-100K premium to UW Madison because of that. But I would also say that Illinois gave me a lot of opportunities to stand out and get leadership experiences I couldn't have gotten at a smaller private school filled with future masters of the universe. And the intellectual and research gap between UW Madison and NYU is much narrower than the gap between NYU and most northeastern state schools.
Relinquis would probably echo much of this.
To be honest, if I were a Georgia resident, my choice probably would have been Georgia Tech if I had gotten in.
I just want to return to the point regarding going to school with future masters of the universe. Where is your competitiveness? Generally, one of the most essential aspects of the learning process is to compete with the best and see where you measure up. You have to deal with these sorts of people in IB/Finance anyways - why not start early in figuring out how to deal with them and work with them
Further, on the other side of the coin, I would find becoming complacent a threat in going to a school that is not as competitive (i.e. full of driven kids who want to be BSDs/POTUS whatever).
Remember that our OP's son went through an IB program and placed 3rd in his class. If I were to guess, he would prefer to surround himself with people who are generally more worldly and intelligent. At Wisconsin, there isn't a critical mass of those types of people around to make him feel welcome.
Analytics is simply not front office. Nor is it better than the MIT median that goes into finance.
Given you got into an MIT-caliber school, it's not surprising you can compete with their graduates, is it? Nonetheless, it is ridiculous that you think the opportunity set you would have had coming out of a school like MIT is about the same as Illinois.
Re: your hair comment, I don't even know where to start... but clearly you know about the MFin program. Good luck.
Look, the MIT grads I worked with were thrilled to be there; the Princeton grads I worked with were thrilled to be there; the Stanford kids I worked with were all thrilled to be there. And I was especially thrilled to be there because I didn't have any debt. We always assumed it was front office, but if it wasn't, I'm not sure it really mattered to us.
As for whether the opportunities are similar out of Illinois, I'm pretty darned sure they're close. We place about the same proportion of our graduates as MIT into Google, IBM, Microsoft, and Amazon. We're also home to the NCSA, invented the internet (literally; see Mosaic), created PayPal, Netscape, Youtube, and a host of other successful startups since I left, and place extremely well into the other top five PhD CS programs. Maybe you can say it's not on par with MIT, but I don't think you'll find too many alumns who lose sleep over that.
Wisconsin has a very close track record on engineering. It's not quite top five, but I believe it's top ten or fifteen and ranks better than about half the ivies. I don't think too many of their alumns lose too much sleep over rankings either.
To anyone wondering how the kid didn't get into any Ivy League schools, Ivy league admission this year was brutal.
It has gotten significantly more difficult in the past 10 years. Harvard's overall acceptance rate was 5.9% this year and the Regular Decision acceptance rate was around 3.8% Cornell had the highest acceptance rate with around 16% (For Cornell!!!)
I had slightly lesser stats than this guy and got dinged at 6 ivies and 2 other tier 1's. Best school I got into was Umich Ross.
To anyone reading who will be resume reading in the next 3-5 years, the ivy league is becoming such a luck or legacy based shit show that State Schools are going to have some really amazing talent.
Look, at every flagship state school, you will meet significant numbers of kids who can compete well with the best and brightest from Harvard or Stanford, and you'll probably find several dozen who had no choice but to turn down various ivies and top five private engineering schools because they didn't have the money. Florida is clearly one of those state schools.
I'm still going to gloat about Illinois being ranked higher, especially in business and engineering, but don't knock a kid from Florida until you know he's not one of those two or three dozen kids on campus who got into- or could have gotten into- a better ivy than you did.
IP - I think the big thing that you miss out on and is absolute worth the extra $100K in the long-run is the network you get at a school like MIT or HYPSW. We all know the old adage of "it's not what you know but who you know," I've come to realize that success in the business world really just comes down to this. As long as you meet a minimum bar of intelligence the more well connected person will always win out. Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, etc. are all great schools but going to a place with "future masters of the universe" is invaluable. Just the people I met at Harvard was worth the $100K of debt in the long run over full rides I had at Michigan, UVA, etc. I'm still pretty young in my career (graduated in 2008) but it has already paid dividends. A recent examples for you, we were in an extremely heated war to buy a company against another major tech player. The reason we ended up winning the bid...my roommate at Harvard's father (international billionaire) was the main investors in the company. I called him up, set up time, I fly to meet him, and the next day we secured the deal despite coming in at a lower bid than our competitor. Just this one connection basically landed us the deal, I came off as a hero, and got immediately promoted. If I ever want to start a fund or build a startup I can pretty much pick up the phone, call 3-4 of my college buddies who are hundred millionaires / billionaires and pretty easily raise a few million without really doing much. Then when I decide to sell it I'll call up whichever one of my buddies is an MD somewhere and throw business his way. Basically network trumps anything in this world. I don't care if you are the smartest motherfucker in the world...if you don't know people you'll find it hard to succeed (obviously there are exceptions). $100K to booze and makes friends with lifelong connections that will help you succeed down the line is absolutely worth it.
I agree with you about the value of the network, your point is exactly the point I was making. I personally think that any top 20 or 25 school will give you a very valuable one with relatively minute differences (and Lord knows how diehard ND alumni can be) but your point is spot on - a person can succeed at a state school but going to a solid private one will impact you in the future in ways you may not know now based on the power of the network you build.
At the same time, there are very bright people who attend state schools - it's just that success comes easier at good private ones (read my earlier post on this in this thread) because you're interacting with a generally better-educated and successful group of people, exactly your point Harvardgrad08.
In my opinion, people don't look at colleges the right way when they say "Well factoring in the cost, is it worth it to go to the more expensive one or the cheaper one?" because the reality is that worth is very hard to measure immediately. A better approach would be to say "Which school out of all those I got into is the best for me, my future, and where will I thrive, feel at home, and fit in?" THEN, the question should be "Can I afford this school?" If the answer is no, then move down the ladder.
this.
I hope you're not insinuating that Notre Dame is better than top private schools
Better than top private schools as in Harvard? No, I never said that. But Notre Dame IS a top private school as in top 20 - as are schools like Georgetown, Emory, Vandy, etc. Top 20-25 or so was what I meant when I said "top private school."
shit, I meant top public schools
When did I ever say that? I was comparing top 25 or so private schools to large average state schools like UF, Wisconsin, etc. Obviously schools like Berkeley are in the top 25 to begin with so that's not what I was speaking of. And better in what way? In national rankings? ND is ahead of any public school. A significant component of U.S. News rankings is also "peer ranking" - being a Catholic school in South Bend has held and will continue to hold us back even if we advance academically. In terms of wall street recruiting? I couldn't tell you since I am clueless about any of their recruiting, but I can tell you all BBs recruit at ND and we have 50-60 seniors going to FO FT positions out of 150 finance majors. In terms of average mid-career salaries? ND is also ahead of any top public school, so yes, it's not like it's that absurd of a proposition. In terms of ROI? Probably not, as schools like Berkeley also rank very highly and cost far less. Depends what you mean when you ask if I'm insinuating that ND is "better" than top public schools.
http://www.forbes.com/2008/07/30/college-salary-graduates-lead-cz_kb_07…
Way too many people have answered this, it can't be true. If a kid with a 1580 wanted to go business he would have applied to stern not sloan. If you want an MBA eventually, good for you, but you would apply to the undergrad business school. dumb and waste of everyones time
You mean sloan and not stern?
Wait, I'm Canadian so don't hate, but isn't the SAT out of 2400? Isn't the average score 1500?
the afffirmative action + instate combo fucked me over in my chemistry lab earlier this year -_-
also, there are no laws that require that you go to HYP if you're a genius, so I think there's more weight to the on average argument between HYP and state schools, but it doesn't seem like it would be too hard to have a couple uber geniuses decided to go somewhere besides for HYP. Remember, not everybody is as obsessed with prestige as most people on this site. In the midwest, the general trend seems to be: go to your flagship state school, it's da best! Including in my state (got lucky with that one). Contrary to popular belief, geniuses ARE born in the midwest also. Cray, I know.
I just don't see how being one of the smartest college students in the country means that you have to go to HYP
j
Absolutely. I know personally friends who were accepted to Wharton but didn't attend because they thought the atmosphere was terrible. I also have very bright friends who attend UF because it's free. A lot of it comes down to culture and fit - HYP have very distinct cultures that not everyone will thrive being immersed in. Some top students will just do better and feel more comfortable by attending a different school, be it Dartmouth, Georgetown, Michigan, etc. Now I do think that going to a good private school does give you an advantage in the network over a non-top public school, but I do think that too many people stress the importance of "HYP or bust." Many other private schools and top public ones will give you almost as valuable if not just as valuable a network depending on what you're studying.
Also, I'd like to know how common harvardgrad08's experience is.... ya know, the whole "call up my college buddy, get connected with his billionaire dad, become instant hero in office and promoted, then celebrate with my millionaire/billionaire friends" thing and if that exclusivity diminishes once you get a job in the real world
My experience to a certain extent was driven by the fact that I am a foreigner. I basically only hung out with international students and generally at schools like HYP the international students that are there are usually extremely wealthy which in turn usually leads them to also hand out with the wealthy, well connected American student. I noticed this same phenomenon at various universities. My friends and I would go for weekends to visit friends at other schools and found this to be true at basically every top school and a few other no so prestigious schools where certain internationals would send their kids that had no chance of getting into HYP (places likes Babson). Still even not being an international you still get to know these guys, become friends with them, etc. Zuckerberg is a good example of this...he became friends with Saverin, a wealthy Brazilian international, who basically was the first guy to fund FB.
I have to say though that you basically only have a small subset of schools where you will find this type of experience as there is a natural bias for certain school due to legacy / family ties, etc. It's rather funny just by meeting someone and learning their last name many times will instantly know what school they went to because their family has been sending people to that school for generations. I've noted this type of experience to be quite prevalent at Harvard, Penn, Princeton, Yale, Stanford, Babson, UVA, Columbia, NYU, and ND (which yes NDHome1 I visited and met a ton of great international wealthy guys including a bunch that are still current students).
You'll probably hear many people come on here and say that they didn't experience this during their days at Wharton or Harvard or wherever but the reality is that these wealthy subcultures are very real and very present and it's all about being able to find a way to tap into these networks.
Oh and yes after the deal signed we took the jet to vegas and celebrated.
oh and I didn't answer the second part of your question...if it diminishes once you get out in the real world.
I've actually found the opposite to happen. This aspect of my life has only increase now that I am in the real world. My buddies will call me up wanting to introduce me to people, I'll call them up asking for intros, etc. to the point that the network just keeps growing.
http://www.payscale.com/college-education-value
Don't be an idiot and choose a no-name public school like Wisconsin over Notre Dame. Girls are just as impressed when you say you graduated from ND as if you were from Harvard (actually more so).
Game, set, match.
fuck I should've went to harvard. too bad I didn't win any international science olympiad contests, publish a novel, start a non-profit charity, intern at the White House, or cure cancer when I was 16. Also I wasn't a URM, legacy, or star athlete. Wait come to think of it, I didn't even have straight A's or 2300 SAT scores. fail (/sarcasm)
From what I've heard UW is an awesome school, the kids have a great time and the academics are great. I don't know much about ND except that it's in the middle of nowhere. As for NYU stern, sure its great you can't deny that, but how can your son be sure at 18 that he wants to go into finance. I'm in college now, a pretty good one too, and I'm pretty sure 1 out of 2 people graduate with a different degree than they originally anticipated. Personally when I was 18 I was convinced I was going to be a veterinarian, and now I'm doing econ and bus. Make sure he goes to a place where he feels is a good fit personality wise, I'd urge him to go to a place where he can explore his interests. Being able to take an english or science class wouldn't hurt...Also if you can save money that's a huge factor, school costs much more than tuition and student loans suck
on the topic of the benefits of the network I came across this NYT article today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/14/technology/instagram-founders-were-he…
there's no comparison with Stanford and MIT. When I studied in college, there were literally startups coming out of the dorms weekly. A lot failed, but there were also a lot of instant millionaires and even some likely eventual billionaires (DropBox for example). The potential return on investment (even if it is $150k) is insane.
I'm going to have to disagree with you on the first point. I deferred my admission to a Stanford MS / Ph.D. track engineering program to take a break. The actual Ph.D. and funded master's programs at Stanford and MIT are pretty hard to get into (not the unfunded master's programs). At Stanford Electrical Engineering, for instance, you have to meet a GPA threshold and pass the quals (and score in the top 20%) to get a Ph.D. admission - while competing with top international students that have a better math background. Stanford accepts no one into its Ph.D. programs right after undergrad.
Notre Dame by far!
One thing I would consider is that if what some have suggested about NYU is true, NYU may be the best choice in terms of Wall St. proximity and placement. However, competing that harshly against other undergrads will NOT be fun in college. I can see being that cutthroat in business school or law school, but you want to enjoy college as well. As someone who went to law school can tell you, I can relate to how NYU is described as very competitive in terms of fighting over Finance jobs. I wouldn't wish my law school cutthroatness on anyone, much less an 18-22 year old. I can tell you from experience that consider greatly the ramifications of going to NYU in Finance and competing heavily with other students to get a job on a trading desk. The pressure sounds like law school and this is NOT healthy for an undergrad who should be concerned about grades and getting a job but also meeting girls, making friends, going to parties, pizza consumption and more girls etc.
Digressing a little here, but 1580 out of what? I thought SATs were out of 2400 (math, reading competency, writing)? But my advice is NYU or the like (Fordham) for NYC. Even if everyone at NYU wants to do IB and is very competitive, at least that will prepare you for actual banking and put you a step ahead of other competing schools.
I'd go to Notre Dame for reasons above.
And if it is out of 2400, sorry, but 1580 is not that great.
IP fails to realize he's an extreme outlier in many ways.
I think he'll be bored doing just finance/econ. But I don't think he'll be bored at UW Madison or ND. I wasn't bored at Illinois, and I certainly wasn't the only "outlyer" there. Things might have been different if I had studied econ, but you always find a couple dozen brilliant and engaging students in a top 20 engineering or math program, like what UW Madison and Notre Dame have.
I'm almost finishing up undergrad and am bored with my vanilla finance major poli sci minor. Want to do MS in econ or quant finance (not really for a job, just for shits someday hopefully). I think taking on some Math at least is a great idea, regardless of the school.
relative to what... the WSO forum population? I would peg that collective view as the outlier. If you're talking macro level risk / reward analysis, it should always be considered a viable option to attend a top state school (Berkeley, Michigan, etc.) if in-state tuition is in the picture. My Michigan degree opened all of the same doors that the ivies I passed up would have, and for a fraction of the cost. I progressed further and faster in my career than most people I know - including my friends that chose ivies. That's because I'm smarter, more well rounded, more social, and more ambitious than most of them - the factors that actually matter. I wouldn't be any better off had I gone to Harvard. I still managed to land at an M7 this fall.
That aside, in this case, NYU probably makes the most sense. UW is out of state tuition, so no real benefit to be had there. ND is a great school but doesn't have the ties to NY that NYU has.
its outta 1600 buddy, which is pretty good lol
^^ Well that's what I thought haha.
NYU.
Does this kid want to do trading or banking?
Which area in finance does your son looking to break into?
If he is trying to break into investment banking, I would recommend Wisconsin Madison over Notre Dame and NYU Stern, even if you have to pay out-of-state tuition. Wisconsin is renowned for placing its students at BB IBD in NYC and Chicago. The out-of-state tuition + housing costs are significantly lower in Wisconsin whereas both NYU and Notre Dame have extremely expensive tuition + housing costs, all for no difference after graduation *assuming the your son studied and worked just as hard in all three circumstances. So I don't see any reason why you should pay more to go to a private school that is not an Ivy (or other schools in par with Ivy).
If he is trying to break into sales & trading, I would recommend NYU Stern over Wisconsin and Notre Dame. After all, the school's in the middle of NYC, and breaking into s&t from any of the schools above will need some serious networking.
This is a very ignorant post. I highly doubt Wisconsin has better connections to BB than Stern or ND. All BB S&T also recruit heavily at ND - as I've stated before, we have 50-60 seniors going BB FT out of 150 Finance majors. It won't require "serious networking" at all - just an on campus interview followed by a super day.
^^ Exactly right. NYU has the advantage of being right there in NYC, the bottom line is that going to ND or NYU will easily set you up for a BB position in NYC if you're bright and focused. Wisconsin, not so much.
Sure UFO, but OP does not need connections. He needs an undergraduate degree from a flagship state school, he needs competence, and he needs hustle. CC: your story and mine. I think my tune would be different if he got a 1400 on the SATs, but a 1580 SAT is going to have to try if he wants to have a bad career.
My biggest concern will be that OP gets bored if he majors strictly in finance or econ at Wisconsin, ND, or NYU. Frankly, it's an easy degree and OP is going to be running circles around kids in all three programs. He needs to tack on a STEM major.
OP's son needs to find the best fit for HIM in terms of culture and finances. NYU vs. UW Madison isn't exactly Harvard vs. SUNY Buffalo. (Sorry to any Buffalo alumns; it is a quality school, but it's not quite at the public ivy level like UW Madison) There also needs to be some acknowledgement that a midwestern school like ND or UW Madison means it's more likely he'll wind up in Chicago or Minneapolis than NYC.
Agree with the fit part 100%
Flash forward four years and there's a dearth of programmers since nobody decided to study CS anymore. Starting salaries at Google are $90K/year for undergrads; Microsoft, IBM, and Amazon are all north of $80K, too.
OP's son isn't crazy for going into finance right now; he's brilliant. He's 18 years old, and he's already a contrarian.
NYU is not Harvard or MIT. My opinion is that the cost difference between UW Madison out of state and NYU is exactly worth it, and a double-major in electrical engineering and finance out of UW Madison with a 3.6 GPA will still get a lot of interviews on the street.
Therefore, my recommendation to OP is pick the school that's the best cultural fit. There is no clear, obvious choice here like there is for SUNY Buffalo vs. Harvard for someone where cost is no object.
C
I agree on the difficulty of a finance major. I got a 35 ACT and an 800 on the math level 2 SAT 2 and the finance major is too easy at Notre Dame. Kids groan if the professors ever use a first derivative, which is outrageous considering everyone there at a MINIMUM is required to take Calc 1 and 2. That being said,it does wonders for interview preparation, general knowledge, networking, etc. I'd double major though
How often do you need to take a first derivative in corporate finance? Never going to happen in IB or Corporate Finance... Those skills might be used in a quant role / trading... but there's a reason the kids are groaning and it's because that shit isn't relevant at all to what they are going to use in the real world.
Take the school with the best finance recognition, NYU. Might sound arrogant, but they are the best recruited and are recognized in finance for a reason. NY is also a great place to network. Idk about what the numbers are, but I'm pretty sure there are more networking/info sessions/on campus interviews/dropboxes @ NYU than the others.
Should go to GTech. In-state tuition there is a better option than any of the three, especially if you add a STEM major.
I understand, I was just giving my two cents. I think OP's son should go to ND if it is financially feasible.
I think you're missing the point...sure no one "needs" connections but having them can only increase your likelihood of success. If you had gone to HYPSW, etc. for undergrad you'd realize this. Just go back to my original post on 4/13. Success, especially on Wall Street, is not what you know or who is the smartest...it's all about who you know. As long as you meet a minimum bar of intelligence the more well connected person will always win out. Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, etc. are all great schools but going to a place with "future masters of the universe" is invaluable and definitely worth the $100K of debt in the long run. Visiting a few friends at ND I met multiple guys that come from billionaire / multi hundred millionaire families (similar to what I experienced at Harvard and at visits to other schools like Wharton, Princeton, etc.). Recently, I got a approached by one of these ND guys I met to be an advisor for a company he is starting because of my tech background...going to a school with, as was put above, "future masters of the universe" only increases your chance go success.
Just as a point of correction since I work in tech and know these numbers intimately...Google actually pays worse than pretty much all of the companies you listed (excl. IBM). MSFT and AMZN, at the moment, are probably the two companies that pay best in the industry. Facebook, Google, and Twitter all can pay less b/c they are "hot" resume brands that people are willing to take a pay hit to work there. Plus, MSFT and AMZN not only have higher salaries than Google but they are based in Seattle where you have no state income tax. Those guys kill it up there :)
^^^ These are NPVs. Going off of IRRs is the more conservative approach and tends to give you flagship state schools.
Yes but using an IRR is flawed in this case since college isn't a traditional investment. You can only "buy" one undergrad degree. You can't "buy" 1000 shares of college degrees. Since in our lifetimes we can only "invest" in one undergrad degree, NPV is a much better approach than IRR. If we had unlimited funds and could buy as many degrees as we wanted, then yes, flagship state schools would be better investments.
It seems like you're almost making his point for him. I understand your point I think but the facts show that on average you will have a better NPV, so it's not as risky as you make it out to be. I think it's a simple matter of risk-aversion. But I agree withe NDhome1 in that NPV and not IRR is a better indicator for college. So if you're really risk-averse, then you're right, a good state school is a better option. If not, then it's not.
^ I'm pretty sure Rufiolove got owned on this one.
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