Transfer From Stern to McCombs?

I'm currently a freshman at NYU Stern and have just started thinking about the idea of transferring to UT McCombs. I'm from florida so I love warm weather and the southern atmosphere. Eventually even if I graduate Stern and start working in NY I want to make way down south with better weather and closer to family. Would it be a good idea to go ahead and try and transfer there to get into maybe energy investment banking. My two main concerns are that Stern has a really good history of placement into investment banking in NYC (with OCR, training, and networking) is McCombs comparable for investment banking in Houston, and would it be hard to make a community as a transfer both with clubs that require acceptance and with friends and party scene?

 
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I know both schools pretty well. I wouldn't worry about the concerns you stated. If you transferred after one year you'd have plenty of time to make the connections necessary and McCombs isn't some sort of place with a secret social code that you're alluding to. That would go fine and you'd be well positioned for Houston IB jobs.

Two concerns you should have:

  1. Texas isn't the South. Texas is Texas, it's its own thing. If you like warm weather, it certainly has that. But to the extent you like some other things (you mentioned a "southern atmosphere") you may want to get specific on what those things are. I've always liked the South . . Carolinas, Georgia, Florida,Louisiana . . but Texas feels very different from those places so it depends on what exactly you're looking for.

  2. You may want Energy IB in Houston now, but if you change your mind (or if problems in that sector change your mind for you) I think you should decide what your backup plan would be and whether UT will be as good as Stern for that plan. For example if you want to do something in tech, McCombs can probably keep up with Stern because of the strong tech scene in Austin. But if your Plan B is something else, McCombs may not be up to snuff. Depends on the situation.

 

I go to McCombs currently and can tell you that if you want energy investment banking, McCombs is the #1 school it's not even close.

Every bank in Houston comes down to McCombs for info session and interviews (except GS and a few tiny banks), and every bank reserves spots for McCombs kids even if other school kicks off their process earlier like this year.

Even at NYC, top boutiques like Evercore and Moelis flies multiple bankers from partner to analyst down to Austin for info sessions, and about a dozen kids goes to the top 5 investment banks in NYC. Granted, no one has ever gotten in PJT or Centerview from McCombs but literally everywhere else there's always someone placed into it every year.

Overall, there's two prestigious banking exclusive orgs at McCombs with 56 spots total, 90% kids in there score an offer and about a dozen students in neither gets it on their own.

About your second concern, there's nothing easier than finding a party group down in Texas, don't even worry about it.

 

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