You mean Pennsylvania, where the Penn State branch campuses mostly function like CCs do in some other states (frosh/soph course work for local commuters hoping to transfer to Penn State University Park), except at much higher cost to the students?
yup.
Lucky for us, we have a good community college nearby. It has articulation agreements with the state schools and most of the nearby private 4 year colleges (and some that arenât so nearby), and advising is available early and often if a student takes advantage of it. That combination enables kids to finish in 2+2. My oldest, who attended an OOS flagship, took courses at our CC for 3 summers starting after her junior year of HS and had no problem transferring those courses. She thought the teaching was as good or better than the teaching at her 4 year college, although the classes were smaller. I will send my youngest there with no hesitation.
I suspect Waterloo would be tougher. With American elite colleges, you can always transfer out of a tough major into something easier and still have an elite degree. Once you are out of Waterloo engineering, math, or computer science, you have a rather ordinary degree, imho.
That of course, brings back professor Kenneth Andersenâs suggestion: Do STEM if you have world class ability in STEM. If not, take the easy As and aim for law/MBA
I think there is a third option. If you have students who are good at STEM but not great, who can write well but not necessarily superbly, business is not a bad option. Get into a strong program and see how well they can compete. If they are Deanâs List material, focus on finance and aim for IB and consulting. If they belong in the next tier, accounting would be a good bet. Finally, for those in the bottom half of the class, just take whatever that would get them the business degree. Employers still prefer them over arts and science students anyway.
I think this option gives students a head start into the job world, and they can avoid the game of grade arbitrage and doubling down, which saves many thousands of dollars in the process. Whatâs not to like?
I think Wharton is unique in that it part of an ivy, with strong departments across the board, also also the curriculum forces you to take about 40% of your classes outside Wharton in other departments at Penn.
@Prof2dad rvate equity straight out of college is mainly reserved for very very few tippy top Wharton and Harvard kids. Usually Yale, Princeton, Stanford students do not have that opportunity unless they are super well-connected through family.
Bain Capital, TPG, KKR etc. all recruit at Yale, Princeton and Stanford for new BAâs. Penn95- no family connections are required. Just a very strong resume and exceptional quant skills. You are describing a world a generation ago where family connections meant something at these places.
Some hard data to back up blossomâs post #205. According to Yaleâs Office of Career Strategy, roughly 30% of Yale Collegeâs Class of 2016 were employed in finance (16%) or consulting (13%). Morgan Stanley. Goldman Sachs, Bain, McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group, and Deloitte were all among the employers hiring the largest numbers of Yale grads (along with Yale itself, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, National Institute for Health, and Teach for America). Impressive showing for a school that doesnât offer an undergraduate business degree. Blossom is right: the investment banks and consulting firms are looking for smart kids with outstanding quant skills, which makes the most selective colleges fertile recruiting ground regardless of undergraduate major.
Not so unique. Michiganâs Ross Schools of Business requires 120 credits for the undergraduate BBA degree, of which at least 54 (45%) must be in liberal arts. And because only 58 business credits are required, a student who is so inclined could easily earn more than half the required credits in liberal arts fields. Michigan isnât an Ivy, of course, but by any measure the school has âstrong departments across the board.â
" Blossom is right: the investment banks and consulting firms are looking for smart kids with outstanding quant skills, which makes the most selective colleges fertile recruiting ground regardless of undergraduate major. "
They also hire students from elite colleges who majored in social sciences and humanities and do not have outstanding quantative skills.
Social Sciences teach outstanding quant skills. Political science majors manipulate large data-sets (census numbers for example). Psychology majors learn to analyze trials/studies and meta-trials. Economics is all about numbers and analysis.
It is hard to get hired at most of these companies without evidence of strong quantitative skills but you do not need to major in math in order to develop those skills in college.
And for the other 2 million college grads per year. Nobody ever said a liberal arts major from an Ivy cant get an elite jobâalthough many still dont make the cut. That has been discussed for years here (Target schools ad nauseum) Question is the best path for most other students. Just go to an Ivy is NOT a useful answer.
Do history majors from Hobart or BU get those Yale jobs?? Not very many at all.
It is not unique to Penn that business majors have to take substantial amounts of course work outside of business.
For example, at Berkeley, the business degree requirements are http://www.haas.berkeley.edu/Undergrad/pdf/requirements_for_degree.pdf with prerequisites of http://haas.berkeley.edu/Undergrad/ucb_prereq.html . It may be hard to tell at first glance (due to the overlapping nature of some requirements) but the non-business requirements include:
7 non-business breadth courses (most are 4 credit units each, so about 28 credit units)
6 non-business prerequisites (22-24 credit units)
So a minimum of about 50 credit units (out of a total of 120 credit units) have to be in non-business courses.
Since the minimum number of business credit units is 38 upper division and 4 in a lower division prerequisite for a total of 42 credit units, a student completing 120 credit units to graduate with a business degree could take up to 78 credit units of non-business courses.
Another example using the less selective San Jose State University at http://info.sjsu.edu/web-dbgen/catalog/departments/BUS-section-7.html shows 52 credit units of non-business general education and prerequisites out of 120 credit units. The business major does require 61 credit units of business courses, so that the maximum number of credit units of non-business courses is 59 for a student completing the business major in 120 credit units.
âIt is hard to get hired at most of these companies without evidence of strong quantitative skillsâ
You would be surprised. However, they compensate for the average quantitative skills with being personable, having strong writing and speaking skills, knowing foreign languages, exhibiting leadership qualities, being able to overcome adversity or plain being cute.
My daughter is strong in math (Thank you Art of Problem solving), and will only be going to Big Merit schools, most likely UT Dallas. She wants to get an Applied Math degree for the purpose of working in business, what would you recommend?
Would this be better than say finance since she will not be going to a top school.
We are talking about your typical high stats, NMF type kid but not outstanding.
Iâve hired for one of these companies for more than a decade.
Being cute doesnât get you over the bar. But leadership and strong communication skills helps- assuming youâve got the quant skills to get you past the first round.
@Tanbiko Here is a piece by a former recruiter for Bain/BCG. IBs are similiar.
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/285160/how-elite-business-recruiting-really-works-jim-manzi
Here is a quote:
There may be a back door to an elite school, but there does not seem to have one to these elite firms.
FYI: Bain recruits at my kidsâ business school. One was competing for an interview but was unsuccessful. No shame no blame.
I guess I am in the Rivera camp.
âIf your GPA is below about 3.5, youâre outâ seems to be true so all budding investment bankers are very worried about their GPAs.
All AACSB business programs require a broad education.
http://www.aacsb.edu/-/media/aacsb/docs/accreditation/standards/businessstds_2013_update-03oct_final_tracked_changes.ashx?la=en
@Tanbiko Riveraâs study is based on qualitative analysis. It is discredited right here on CC by folks who worked in IB. If what she says is true, then it is imperative to graduate from HYPS and Wharton. IBs and consulting firms, on the contrary, are famous for asking for SAT scores long after graduation. From what Manzi said in the article, they understand grade arbitrage all too well.
http://www.businessinsider.com/goldman-sachs-bain-mckinsey-job-candidates-sat-scores-2014-3
@BingeWatcher Not sure if it helps, but I have a close relative who earned her B Sc, with distinction, in psychology with a minor in physics. Yes, a science degree in psychology. If you were to look through her transcript, it is really a degree in applied math.
She has done extremely well for herself working in finance, retiring even younger than I did. To her amazement, her former employer (and friend) still wants her back even after decades out of the job market. Her ability to do mathematical modelling on one hand, and explain it to lay people on the other is extremely valuable; so is her ability to anticipate what an end user wants (sometimes they could not even describe it effectively to her), figure out where to get that information, and put the stuff together in a way that is easy to access. She has an MBA though, double majoring in finance and management science.
Thank You @Canuckguy