Hi. I am a rising transfer sophomore student and I’ve been admitted to both Boston College and Babson College. At my current university I major in Business Administration with a concentration in finance. In my freshman year I didn’t have any finance-related classes though. I just had an intro to business and business communication courses. Therefore, I am not quite sure I really want to major in business. At Boston College I will major in Economics in A&S college and I will be allowed to take 6 classes from its business school (I will most probably take 6 finance courses). At Babson College I will major in Business with a concentration in finance. At Babson I will only have to take 5 finance courses to acquire that concentration. Besides that I will have to take accounting, marketing, IT etc courses that are part of the business core curriculum, and that’s a major difference between majoring in Economics at BC and majoring in Business at Babson College.
My credits transferred to both institutions in a way that I can still graduate in 4 years. At Boston College, however, I will have more flexibility of choosing classes I want to take, and I won’t have to take full load of courses each semester in order to graduate on time. Financial aid packages are almost the same so financial situation is not a factor in my decision.
Lastly, I am a US citizen that grew up in Europe and that would like to possibly relocate to Europe at some point of my life so the prestige of the school is somewhat a factor. I am also planning on having finance-related job after graduation. Which school would open more opportunities for me? Thank you.
If you want to broader name recognition/prestige, go with BC. I would heavily consider the carroll school of management at BC which is always ranked very high for undergraduate business school rankings.
Ultimately, you should visit each school. They are each different. BC is much closer to the city and you’ll be able to do internships in the city without having to move, which is a significant plus for business majors.
While Babson is arguably better for business, you say you’re unsure if you want to study business and you want to live outside the U.S. Boston College is better known and has a much wider array of classes you can take.
@Qwerty568 What makes you think that Babson is better for business? BC has a highly regarded business program and the entire school has a far better reputation than Babson. In fact, BC is even ranked #4 in the country according to Businessweek and is highly ranked elsewhere. I’m not saying that Babson is bad in any way. However, when discussing the strength of the business programs, Boston College should get the upper hand.
Reputation of a school is often based on publicly available ratings like US News & Forbes. Babson is not rated due to the fact it isn’t an academic institution in the traditional sense.
I would hate to want to explain this, especially to person outside the US.
Boston College is a top school and offers a much fuller experience and easy name recognition.
Thank you all for the useful suggestions. I’m leaning more towards the Boston College as of right now. First of all, housing at Babson is not guaranteed in my first year, and the public transportation in the area almost doesn’t exist. I don’t have a car in the US so that might be an issue if I end up living off campus. At Boston College, as I mentioned I won’t have to take full load of courses each semester in order to graduate on time. Even though the major is in A&S there are some courses I can take that relate to finance field: e.g Capital Markets, Financial Economics, International Finance, Quantitative methods. And I will take up to 6 finance courses from the business school to supplement my knowledge. That will be my unofficial finance minor (Officialy I won’t have that minor on my transcript, because BC doesn’t offer that). Because of that course selection flexibility, I will still be able to take advantage of study abroad opportunities. I also like an idea of being right outside the large student-oriented city.
I am actually still waiting for decisions from 4 schools:
Vanderbilt University: Economics (waitlisted)
Notre Dame: Economics
USC: Business
Northeastern: Business
I have to pay my enrollment deposit at BC before this upcoming friday. If any of these schools accepts me I will compare financial aid packages and make a decision again. Since I want to work either in New England or in Europe I think, however, that BC would be a good choice even though it is ranked slightly lower than these schools I listed (They are located in different parts of the US).
Based off of what you have just said, I would lean towards BC too. The housing situation plus the lack of transportation can pose an issue. Good luck, OP!
If you didn’t yet, just take a look at the core curriculum at BC (can be found online). Jesuit colleges traditionally have large liberal art core curriculums which can sometimes make it hard for a transfer students to complete and graduate on time.
@happy1 Yes, I already checked out the core curriculum. All of my 30 credits transferred to BC, and most of them satisfy core requirements. I still have a room for 8 electives I can take over 4 years, and I am planning on using 6 of them by taking courses from a business school (considering I will be taking 15 credits each semester) or maybe on math courses.
Although, Babson College focus is business we do offer 27 different concentrations for students to tailor their business degree the way they want. We also allow all of our students do up too two concentrations. This means that you could concentrate in Econ and Finance if you’d like to get the best of both or you could take some Econ course additional to the finance ones you would be taking. Additionally, we offer a course here called the Babson College Fund where are students work with a professor and invest over 1.5 million dollars in the stock market. Before you would have graduated college you would be managing different portfolios with about 20-25 other students. It is courses like this that shape your Babson experience and attest to our rankings.
So far as international opportunities go Babson is a Global institution that prides itself on establishing relationships with companies not just domestically, but internationally as well. Out of 2100 students over 25% of the population is international students. You’re looking at an average class size of 27 students. This means that your classrooms will be very diverse. Due to the structure of Babson we have established a name for the college across the global, especially in Europe.
Even though we are No.1 for Entrepreneurship we understand that not all students want to be entrepreneurs and that’s not what we are trying to accomplish. We strive to ensure that all students at Babson posse an entrepreneurial mindset, innovative and creative. By equipping our students with this mindset it is an attribute to the qualities that you will already posse making you as a student more marketable. I know your probably thinking what are some ways in which we do this? We don’t have lecture halls, because all of our classes are discussion based, we don’t have teacher assistants, because we want our students to have a relationship with their professors, and most importantly your classes will be case-based learning.
Neither is famous on its own in Europe the way Harvard is, but both are known within the international business community; you need to investigate with which universities they have semester exchanges and attend one, so that your resume can state you attended HEC (for Babson) or ESADE (for BC) (or whatever) in addition to either American institution - this will be a powerful signifier to future employers in Europe.
It’s very likely though that you’ll start your career in the US, as European employers like for students to have a Master’s for their entry-level positions.
sorry, late to the discussion. But BC all the way. I was a A&S economics major at BC. There is a quality of a well rounded liberal arts education that’s important in the business world. Babson is a great university, they have a great business program, look at Money mag for their ranking. another alternative if you just want business is Bentley U. also in MA. smaller campus but ranks higher in the Bloomberg Business week ranking than Babson. Good luck.