Hi everyone, I’m currently planning to attend one of the following schools: Berkeley for chemistry/chemical engineering, Vanderbilt, Johns Hopkins, or CMU. My goal has always been to go to Harvard Business School, so does anyone have any input as to where to go so I can maximize my opportunities? I was thinking Berkeley, due to Silicon Valley (ie. interning at Google) and its top chemical engineering program, but I’m uncertain due to the large class sizes, etc.
Any thoughts?
HBS is a fine goal. Being stuck with narrow thinking isn’t. To idealize one out of a large handful of top B Schools in the country is actually, counterproductive and won’t impress anyone in the admissions offices.
Alright, thanks for the tip. But still, if I want to eventually end up at a reputable B school, which college do you think I should choose?
Go where you will earn the best GPA, and prepare for a great career. HBS looks for at least 3-4 years of work experience where you demonstrate advancement, leadership, and earn excellent recommendations. So the undergrad college is not as important as what you do with it.
If you are interested in working in Silicon Valley with a Chem Eng degree, why not aim for Stanford business school?
I’m not sure; I’ve been pretty good with computer programming, but I only discovered that recently, so I have to go to Chem Engineering, which isn’t so bad (considering Berkeley is 2nd in the nation after MIT). As for Stanford, I don’t really know. I’ve just always set my sights on Harvard Business since I felt at home when I visited Harvard. And it’s less selective.
HBS’ admission rate for 2015 is 11%, Stanford GSB is 7.1%, so they are both super selective. For banking and consulting, HBS is probably the best.
Is it too late to point out that a high GPA in engineering is going to be a hell of a lot more difficult?
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