How's Oxford College at Emory?

Hi all,

How’s Oxford College at Emory? Especially the Economics program? What’s the acceptance rate there like? Is there a separate application to this college or should we apply directly to Emory and then select Oxford on it? Also, is the transition to Emory direct or is it like a transfer admission, especially to the Business school? Will the Economics course taken at Oxford count towards the, say BBA Finance at GBS, Emory? How’s the reputation of this program in the bigger financial industry cities like Chicago and New York? Who would be a in a better position as a quant, a direct Emory finance graduate or Oxford Economics and transitioning to Emory Finance? Thanks in advance.

@GuessME5 : Please research how Oxford, ECAS, and GBS works (for example, Oxford, since it is two years and then you can automatically “continue”, not transfer to ECAS, GBS, or Nursing, does not have an “economics program”, but hosts all the major economics courses that one needs to apply to GBS or continue to pursue the econ. major in ECAS which has a recommended set of courses depending upon career track:http://economics.emory.edu/home/undergraduate/preparing-for-after-graduation.html ). Both sets of students get the same degree. In addition, ECAS nor Oxford has special coursework in the economics department that specifically prepares for a finance concentration. Everyone is responsible for the same pre-reqs, which are all offered at Oxford (and likely better because Oxford can do better renditions of introductory courses due to comparatively small section sizes) and then you apply to GBS (whether from Oxford or ECAS) which hosts the finance concentration and courses.

Like other great schools, plenty of people place in firms in those and other cities and of course placement is performance and experience dependent. It is up to you to prep. yourself for any firm or position you want and your effort plus the help of GBS, its courses, and the career center can certainly help. But it really is up to you, so don’t go anywhere with the attitude that somewhere is supposed “place you” wherever…they can only assist indirectly. Some elite schools naturally have more people placing at certain firms not only because network and historical pull but also for other huge reasons including: A) Many more pursue specific tracks (as in some schools have students with more diverse career track interests than others…Yale vs. Harvard is a case of this. If Harvard, Stanford, and MIT flood NYC and Chicago firms with more applications than elsewhere, and have lots of talented applicants, of course their students will place in high numbers proportional to the amount aiming for such jobs and the amount of talent in those applications. The schools didn’t make them talented. Instead the already talented constructed a pathway to train themselves specifically for those positions), B) Some schools have more well-off and connected students in the first place (life can be unfair), and of course those have easier access to internships that prepare the resume, C) Some schools straight up have students with talents more aligned with what firms are looking for (slightly mentioned already). All elite schools have varying degrees of all of this happening

Either way, only a portion (likely a small portion) of people’s success placing at these firms can be directly associated with the prestige (basically alumni network) of the school or even how good the economics program is. Most elite schools with with exceptionally strong (and there aren’t many) economics undergraduate programs are known for additional theoretical and mathematical rigor which means the students who end up doing well in them are likely very talented or experienced/ambitious in math preparation (and quantitative skills are attractive to many of these high paying careers) which makes sense because many of the most elite schools are notorious for recruiting those with a super strong inclination towards math (Harvard, MIT, Stanford are among stand outs). So think more about the skills you need to be attractive to such firms and try to build them with your coursework and internship experiences. No school or alumni network will pave the network with that. Be proactive.

*I say all of this because I am seeing too many of these threads asking: “How good is X at placing at Y and Z”…and have to remind people: “Well there is nowhere where X is even doing 1/4 of the work”. There are so many factors that explain variable access to them, and the only thing that is common (barring no connections) is that they performed well in a rigorous curriculum that helped gain exposure to the knowledge firms want and also got good experience (via internships or other opportunities from whom they can get good recommendations). Looking at numbers at various schools and determining who well “it places” is dubious because it assumes everyone majoring in business and economics is aiming for such firms which is untrue at most places so unless one has an attempt vs. offer rate (which I know no school to publish) for specific firms, it is hard to tell how well any of them place and what variances are attributed to. I would just not think about it. Think about YOU and how you will build your own qualifications so that you are competitive.

I also advise you keep an open mind towards college degree, career of interest, and certainly location of whatever opportunity. Do not get absorbed before even enrolling about “placing in Chicago or New York”…there are many other awesome firms, places, and high paying careers as well as multiple ways of accessing them. I would rather have a parent such as @ljberkow comment on something like this as well. Either way, it is simply not as simple as some program or school “successfully placing” (again how is this measured with so little information) when it comes to these career types.