<p>I have all my extracurriculars set and I hold officer positions in them. My goal after graduation is to work in the Big Four.</p>
<p>As a 3RD YEAR (READ: Junior - 2nd semester), should I go out of my way to join Beta Alpha Psi? It will require me leaving some of my current extracurriculars and involve a tedious pledge process. I, however, always did want to get involved in some professional business fraternity throughout my lifetime.</p>
<p>So my question is: Is it beneficial to me (in my situation) to get involved in Beta Alpha Psi? Will it be worth what I would be sacrificing?</p>
<p>I not only was in Beta Alpha Psi,but was a Beta Alpha Psi tutor. However, no firm ever asked me about it or even cared about membership in the organization.</p>
<p>In the career fair at my school all the accounting recruiters said they look for Beta Alpha Psi on their resume, hence relationship building with the recruiters. I honestly dont think you’ll sacrifice much at all b/c the pledge process is extremely easy.</p>
<p>It takes very little effort to join. Hopefully most of your time spent with BAP will be in employer sponsored events anyway so you won’t lose very much(if you want to work for Company X, going to Company X’s BAP event is a good idea).</p>
<p>Ok, I’m an old CPA who graduated a long time ago (when it was the Big 8 and not the Big 4!) so things I’m sure have changed a lot but…it mattered a lot back then. In fact, I graduated during a recession and all the BAPs got jobs with the Big 8 while many other accounting grads did not. So, I would join- plus it was fun!</p>
<p>At my school, pledging BAP is just like pledging any business fraternity. We have to dedicate an entire semester to it, take minimum units, and potentially sacrifice our GPA. Although it is only for one semester, I have heard that it’ll be like a 30-40 hour/week commitment (at my school). </p>
<p>I actually don’t mind pledging, but the problem for me now is that I have officer positions in two other organizations. If I were to pledge my junior year second semester, I would essentially have to give the two other organizations up. </p>
<p>Do the benefits of a leadership position (say President) in a medium-sized professional organization outweigh the involvement in BAP? Are the benefits of BAP so great, when it comes to getting offers at the Big Four, that it’s worth starting over?</p>
<p>Dawgie, what if I go to a fairly respectable school?</p>
<p>^Dawgie, I have a question for you, and I’m not trying to argue btw, just curious. Whenever you give advice, it seems to be geared towards getting a high GPA and work experience. Do you think that ECs (as in clubs and all) are worthless to some extent?</p>
<p>Now in a way I agree with you since honestly, I don’t learn squat from my “clubs” no matter how much “real-life experience” they try to provide, and I do think work experience is king, but a lot of people seem hung up on clubs and getting leadership spots in them, so I wanted your opinion on that. I’m only a sophomore, but I have a pretty good GPA (3.7+ and it will go higher as I completely messed up my last term) I have worked during the summers (I might even work at Ernst and Young in an international office if everything works out), and I’m going to start an asset management fund with some friends, so do you think that even if I join a couple of clubs for the hell of it that this stuff alone will help make up a bit for the lack of ECs?</p>
<p>It’s pretty worthless. You think these people outside of college care about some joke lil clubs, which entail inexperienced college kids gathering up doing jackass worthless crap? I was lucky to have an internship after my sophomore year doing SOX work, and small CPA firm experiences throughout the semesters. That itself is worth way more than some jackass clubs. Even if the job isn’t related to the job you are applying to. GPA + WORK EXPERIENCE = BEST. Not Lower GPA + some clown clubs. Varsity Sports + GPA = Powerful too. Not some weak intramural though.</p>
<p>At the regional university where most of my students transfer, the BAP members usually have events with recruiters the evening before their on campus interviewers.</p>
<p>2VU OH REALLY? Because before my interview I had pre-interview sessions that weren’t exclusive to BAP members. That makes a lot of sense, let’s only give the BAP members a chance to gather information and network. LOL, BAP what a joke.</p>
<p>I think it depends on the region where you live… but at my location, BAP can and probably does make a difference-- but as long as you have a good GPA 3.7+ and some other things that are notable (e.g. part-time jobs, leadership positions, etc.) it won’t matter if you are in BAP or not. I am living proof!</p>
<p>However, do join the accounting club at your school. Go to the events. Get your face out there.</p>
<p>This is assuming you are going for Big 4. Mid tiers and boutique won’t give a rat’s a$$ if you are in BAP or not. However, it is to my knowledge that all the jr’s/sr’s at my school have landed offers with the big 4 or mid tier.</p>
<p>Take that as you will. My honest opinion, no you don’t need BAP if you have a good GPA-- as others have mentioned.</p>
<p>I received an interview from a BAP contact. It is nice to have, but nothing super special. Just another indication of competency and another potential network to reach out to people.</p>
<p>Having a network during college and after is important. I worked for controllers that didn’t have a lot of accounting experience and weren’t ever in BAP. I think that they could have used the BAP network to hire better candidates. </p>
<p>The GPA requirements help to encourage students to keep there grades up and give students a brief chance to interact with their peers. I always liked it. My University was very social (i.e. lots of clubs and fraternities) and being a “member” was of critical importance for social acceptance in the large university sphere, so being a member of anything really helped my self esteem. I believe it is good and helps to keep students from becoming too anti social. However, I guess if you live at home and are going to a University you probably don’t need the good influences. If for nothing else than meeting some friends it is a good idea. They could use some help in coming up with better real world training to supplement business studies, but they do provide a lot of chances for networking through the speakers and job fairs.</p>