<p>I'm currently in my second semester at a community college, and was formerly on the path to becoming a lawyer, but I'm getting a bit rebelious and looking towards Investment Banking.</p>
<p>Could someone please tell me what to major in or what courses to take that can help me become very good in this field?</p>
<p>I am very aware of the long hours and such, but would much rather have a job out of college and start being independent rather than relying on my parents for another 3 years after college. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>Just to toss it in: I will be applying to transfer to Brown and NYU in 2012. Hopefully I get in :)</p>
<p>they are going to re-teach you everything anyways, and they like clean slates more than people that has the previous financial knowledge. Be smart…good school. they will throw security analysis at you when you walk in the door (how to walk in is the tough question)</p>
<p>Yeah, seriously. IBanking rebellious? Study music, writing or film making if you want to be rebellious…Those who shoot for IBanking, then realize what it actually entails, end up in cubicles as another financial analyst. </p>
<p>But to not burst your bubble, its about the school. I’ve seen many articles and documentaries regarding Liberal Art majors at the Top schools becoming IBankers.</p>
<p>It’s not about your major. Even when you’re at an elite school, it’s the kids whose fathers are vice presidents/partners/some connected individual who get investment banking jobs. It’s largely not a meritocracy by any means.</p>
<p>Don’t be rebellious kid, rebellious people work at starbuck’s making coffee. Considering I work in PE and have friends in banking and I was also once a community college student, I will be nice and lay out what you have to do. </p>
<p>1) Get as high a GPA at CC as possible. I graduated with a 3.8. Get into extra curricular activities also. I worked full time while getting my AS. Volunteered also. </p>
<p>2) try and get into an Ivy. Study econ if possible, but really being in an Ivy is all that matters.</p>
<p>3)If this doesn’t happen a lot will depending on which state you are in, things might be easier or harder. If you are in Michigan, transfer to Ann Arbor and get into Ross. If in Virginia, go to UVA, etc. </p>
<p>4) If those fail, go to the best well known school possible. You want a private school and one with a lot of NYC alumni. I went to Syracuse and Villanova. Both have a ton of finance related alumni. Look at top LAC’s, schools with good sports teams, etc. Think networking and people on finance. NYU is great. Anything near a major city is good also. You want to be able to intern at a boutique shop while going to school. No jerking around and getting wasted. This is game face time. </p>
<p>5) As soon as you get into these schools you need to do the following:</p>
<pre><code> A) Intern - Start at a local PWM office. In fact, do this right now while in CC. Once you get an internship you start building on this.
B) Network - Being close to NYC is a huge advantage here. You can go into the city and meet people for coffee. Make sure your class schedule is set up so you have as many mornings and days free. These will be your interning and networking days.
C) Finance major and juice your GPA. 3.5 and above is a must. Don’t take anymore math than you have to.
</code></pre>
<p>That is basically it. Know your fundamental questions and know capital markets. Pretty simple.</p>
<p>OP-- You say you are looking towards investment banking. What do you mean? Front office or back? Either acceptable?</p>
<p>If you want front–school and gpa matter a lot. It is very difficult to get front office, but not impossible, unless coming from a highly selective,and honestly, small group of schools.</p>
<p>Back office jobs are also very difficult to get, but probably accepting of more schools.</p>
<p>The school I teach at just placed 3 students in back office internships in operations at a BB in NYC this summer. The recruiters were looking for students w/ 3.5 gpa or higher. The pay is great and they got a relocation bonus. They are all business/economics majors.</p>
<p>My D1 got a job front office at a BB in derivative trading. Her gpa was 3.99 and she graduated from a target school. She was not a business major but did take a financial accounting and corporate finance course. She was also an IT minor and took several computer science programming classes. Both her apartment mates are IB front office at different BBs. Both graduated from the same school as my D1, but were business majors.</p>
<p>So there several paths you can take. Most importantly is your gpa. Then your school-depending on front/back office jobs desires. And finally, network, network…,network.</p>
<p>Total respect to the poster above, but I worked BO for about 5 months. I wanted to quit after 3 weeks and I was going to quit with no job to fall back on after 2 months (but my GF at the time literally begged me not to do it). </p>
<p>If you want to know what BO is like, go watch office space. It about sums it up.</p>
<p>listen to this guy, it’s obvious he knows what he’s talking about. I’m trying to get into banking as well and I’m working my way through this list. I’m transferring for fall 2011, already accepted at Georgetown, still waiting to hear from Stern. I’ve done an accounting internship and I’m looking to start a PWM internship after finals.</p>
<p>It’s going to be alot of work and it sucks, but so does working a 9-5 making $50K a year for the rest of my life.</p>
<p>Listen guys, there are days where I want to throw up I am so miserable, but those days pass and I live a comfortable life with options to do other work which is engaging and at a higher level than I could otherwise get because of my experience. </p>
<p>Sometimes sucking it up and dealing with the misery for 2-3 years is worth it to know the options that are opened up. </p>
<p>Getting into a top MBA program from banking is much easier. So is working corp strat/development, PE, HF’s, top consulting, etc. If you want to start your own gig, the network you will make during your time in banking is great. On and on. </p>
<p>Nothing wrong with making 50K a year and working 9-5, but I think it will be frustrating when your income grows at CPI or slightly better each year. Plus, YOU might like your job, but when a wife and kids come you can’t think just about yourself. </p>
<p>Being a lifeguard sounds like the best job in the world until you have to pay for a kids college education.</p>
<p>Let me just say something for all the young people out there reading this. If you are ever in a situation that is making you so miserable that you want to throw up…LEAVE that situation immediately and never look back. People need to learn to think in terms of opportunity costs. Every minute you spend at that miserable job could be spent doing something much more useful, enjoyable, and healthy for you. </p>
<p>Also, don’t fall for false dichotomies. Life is not a choice between a miserable corporate job and poverty. There are an almost infinite number of paths you can take in life. If you see everyone gravitating towards a certain path, then take a different route- people are sheep and sheep get slaughtered. A man/woman never accomplished much of anything in life by following the status quo.</p>
<p>The thing about banking though (from what I’ve gathered from talking to people in the industry) is that even if you do choose to leave after your analyst stint, you have so many options available to you. Even if you find the job so tedious you want to pull your hair out, having GS or MS on your resume goes a long way towards finding another gig.</p>
<p>At the end of the day though, it’s about deferring your gratification. The longer you can wait, the better position you are (likely) going to be in. The people who can’t possibly wait to get out of school end up dropping out of HS and usually live in or near poverty the rest of lives. But soldiering on through tough situations will afford you job opportunities that just aren’t available to most people.</p>
<p>She has to work long hard hours, keep up constantly with current/market events (she has a job issued blackberry to be constantly aware of what is going on) and deal w/ a lot of stress. </p>