Undergrad Transfer Advise
Hi,
This is my first post in here. I have been searching on WSO about transfer questions but I think it might be better to just ask directly.
I currently attend a non-target school in California as an international student and would like to apply for junior transfer admission. I am looking for schools that can provide the best opportunity for me to get an offer after I graduate. However, I will not apply for those target schools both because I cannot get 2200+ SAT(I got 1820 during high school) and my 3.3 not so impressed GPA. Ideally I want to become CPA and work in big 4 accounting firms or even other medium or large size firms but I know due to working Visa issues it will be really hard to get an offer after graduate as an international student. Assumed that I will get 3.5+GPA and tons of extra curriculum, which school would be the best choice? Also, despite what school I go for undergrad, is it a good choice to just go straight to a decent MS accounting program?
List:
Only 2 target schools:
Cornell AEM
G-town (only consider reading+math so maybe give it a shot?)
others:
Fordham
George Washington
Pace
Boston University
Rutgers(admitted as freshmen but did not go)
Wisconsin
Maryland
Please provide your insightful and valuable opinion and I will be much appreciated.
I think any number of these schools would be great! You just need to make the best out of whatever situation you end up in. Also, if it's possible try to get residency here because employment can be tough to achieve with a Visa. Good luck!
Without a 3.8+ and over a 2200 or 1400, you have no chance at Cornell or Georgetown. The other schools are more realistic.
I went through the transfer process. If you apply after your freshman year to be a sophomore, your sat scores and highschool GPA will be extremely important. Thus, don't apply and wait for your sophomore year to apply for junior status. At your college, make sure you have a 3.8+ gpa. Do what you have to do to get it. If you pull it off, Cornell will be much more in reach. However, with those sat other ivy's wont be likely. I would also try for NYU stern. Most important however is still your gpa.
What do you think of University of southern California, UNC (will apply internally for kenan flagler, likely to get in), Vandy, Emory and NYU econ, and Rice for transferring. I'm in the same process and trying to figure things out.
To W.W., What school would you recommend?
To realestate101,
Unfortunately I will be applying as rising junior so I guess 3.8+ is just not gonna happen.
Thanks for advice guys!
USC- might be a target at west coast but I personally dont really like it. UNC- looks like a good choice but external transfer cannot get into Kenan Flagler directly. NYU- Yes I was thinking about this but was wondering how hard it is to compete with Stern students.. Emory- not directly in B school (spent at least one year in Emory before apply) so probably not. Rice-dunno.
If you want to do Big 4 Accounting, then the best bang for your buck are the CSU schools in California (which may already be where you're at). They send hoards of people to the Big 4 and you pay less to get your degree than you would pay for one year at a USC, for example.
Bump
Gtown has a pretty high transfer acceptance rate
Any large, top 100 ranked state university will have good Big 4 placement if you have good grades (3.5+) and are an accounting major. Rutgers, Maryland, Wisconsin would all place well. There are also other large accounting firms, such as Grant Thornton, that would hire up a lot of the quality accounting majors at the well regarded state universities.
Echo what DC said above. Any halfway decent state school will feed the Big 4 firms. Interestingly, with Big 4 Accounting, I am pretty sure they're looking for solid bang for their buck in recruiting, so it's actually better to go to a bigger, less prestigious school because they're more likely to recruit there.
That being said, it's simply not that hard to get a Big 4 accounting job. Assuming you have to get a MACC anyway, you probably don't even need to transfer if you don't want to. Just get into a solid masters program and you'll have every Big 4 firm recruiting there.
Thanks DC and BGP. Does private or public school matter? how about location? And just wondering, for ex, if I do Rutgers BS accounting and further do MACC at different school, can I fulfill 150 credit hours CPA requirement? Also, Is it better to go to some BS/MS 5 years program or go to MACC right after undergrad?
You basically have two options when it comes to the 150 credit req. for the CPA. You can either do a MAccy program like you said, or you can simply do the 150 in undergrad. While Rutgers allows this via a double major in the business school, I would imagine you could do something similar no matter the school. So you could do Acct+Fin, Acct+Journalism, Acct+Underwater Basket Weaving etc.
If you're totally focused on accounting the master's is a good option. Gives you a nice salary bump and possibly career progression. However if you're looking to explore other paths down the road, the second option is a cheaper way to get your CPA and still leave the option for a master's on the table.
Don't think public vs. private matters, but just make sure that the firms are recruiting a decent number of people from whatever school it is. Big 4 Accounting targets are very different from I-Banking of MBB targets, so just do some research.
Most recruiting is regional, I believe, so if you were to go to Rutgers, then you'd likely be recruited for the NYC office. Don't know if that's for sure, but I think that's how it is. I imagine if you're a good candidate you can probably control that a bit more.
I know you can get the 150 any way you want, so I don't think it matters if you do a 5 year BS/MS program or go to a different school for the MACC right after. If I recall correctly (this was awhile ago), most undergrad accouting majors will give you the accounting/business credits needed to be a CPA, you simply need the extra 30 hours, which most people do via the MACC. When I was thinking about it, I literally could have gotten a Masters of Journalism and that would have satisfied my 150, because I already had the necessary course requirements (e.g. Advanced Accounting, Tax...).
I can tell you that my start class was made up of predominately Va. Tech and Maryland kids. There were a decent number of JMU, UVa, and W&M people, and the rest were relatively random. Most of the randoms were from better schools, actually (Georgetown, Penn, Richmond). I know the Philly offices have huge numbers from Penn State, Delaware, etc, so you can figure out the trend: big schools send large numbers to these firms.
BGP is basically spot on.
Just out of curiosity, my school is in the top-100. From people who are in the industry what are job prospects like for graduation from those types of schools?
What type of jobs? What region? If you don't want to name your school, at least give us three (Harvard/Yale/Princeton).
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