<p>mattistotle, first of all i would like to thank you greatly for starting this thread... it gave me sooo much info.</p>
<p>Here are some questions. I dont know much about finance or economy, although i am doing fine in AP econ right now. Should I subscribe to the wall street journal so that i have a base knowledge of what i am gonna do in stern? or do you just learn pretty much everything needed there?</p>
<p>What are the books used as textbooks? cuz i hope i can study them before september.</p>
<p>I really want to do the Princeton MFin program. I figure if I do what I need to for undergrad, then I'll be ready for the program. I'm going to try my best to get the job to put me in that position, but if I need further knowledge to launch my career, then that's where I will turn.</p>
<p>Uh... well, I'll jump in and and offer my advice, goodynotion.</p>
<p>My Business and Its Publics professor recommends reading the WSJ; however, it's not required, since we are here to learn business. I don't know... I've not tried reading the WSJ yet, but chances are I'll get tangled up in the terminology. There are some pretentious people who like to flaunt their knowledge of business, but my response to them is usually that if they already know so much business, why are they here? So WSJ is a useful thing to read, but don't worry too much about it. Four years of business school should teach you what you need to know, and you should probably not be learning concepts from the WSJ (keeping up with current events later on is a different story).</p>
<p>Er... don't worry about studying textbooks. Enjoy your summer, instead, and hang out with friends. That's what the school year is for. They often change, anyway, and usually, the books are so expensive, it's almost not worth it to buy it even if you KNOW you need it. :S Most people don't have any business courses first semester of freshman year, in any case. If you really want to do this... the calc book for Calc I and II has remained the same over semesters: Essential Calculus: Early Transcendentals by James Stewart, first few chapters for Calc I and Calc II picking up where I leaves off. Writing the Essay will probably use the same anthology -- Essentials for Writing by Robert Diyanni and Pat C. Hoy, but there's nothing to study there. Er... stats probably stays the same, but you'll probably be taking the calc requirement first semester. That one is Statistics for Business and Economics by McClave.</p>
<p>I'm going to have the opposite opinion of ijailin. I kinda screwed around my first 2 years...maintained a 3.5, didn't study career options too much, didn't go out of my way to try to find internships, etc... It's really coming to bite me in the @$$. People in stern are sick and study business on their own hours each week, there are many that don't even attempt to have the simpliest social life - obtaining a BB i-banking job is their one and only ambition in college. Competiting against them is a b*tch. Start reading WSO now if you can, especially when classes are easier. Leverage the knowledge you obtain to get a freshman year internship, leverage that to get a sophomore internship, etc. You won't realize it is this competitive freshmen year because you will be taking a lot of CAS classes/ the smart kids are usually quiet and go unnoticed like a stealth assassin. The only reason I'm not screwed is that my friend gave me a back office stint at a top asset manager last summer and I impressed my bosses enough that I'll be able to work front office this summer. But seriously, if I did not know the one kid who gave me this internship, I'd be dead in the water. Also, the fact that I have a decent internship sophomore summer and am currently going 1 for 15 in obtaining FIRST ROUND interviews (got ibd at tdsecurities) should tell you how ridiculous this is. I have a 3.5, 1520 SAT, leadership positions and I'm still basically striking out...</p>
<p>Hi am interested in transferring this fall 2008 to NYU stern and i would like some insight as to if i am on the right track or not i posted in the transfer forum but i have yet to receive some help. I would really appreciate help because i know that it is going to be very tough for me to get in..</p>
<p>Hey, reading the WSJ can be fun! At least, if you stick to Marketplace & Personal Journal (my dad's an econ prof, so we always had a subscription and I always skipped most of the first section - ie, all the actual wall street stuff). They actually have pretty good 'general interest' stories... but yeah, it's a pretty low-key way of familiarizing yourself with current events, but it's not a textbook. Don't worry, you'll get textbooks and you'll be taught the basics of business. In a few years, you will groan at every professor that starts the semester with 'now, this is how you calculate NPV...' </p>
<p>I actually think it's pretty common to have free time and go to Stern at the same time... I mean, the schedule's definitely easy (two classes a day, four days a week). Obviously, you have to do the work - get your homework done, put some effort into doing group projects, study for tests, etc, but that kind of goes along with the whole going to college bit. Trust me, Stern is not the business version of Caltech or anything even close.</p>
<p>The only exception here is if you decide to work while going to school. Depending on your hours, you might end up with very little free time. But hey, you're getting compensated at least, right?</p>
<p>"Stern is not the business version of Caltech or anything even close"</p>
<p>The way Mattistotle talks, you'd think it is, but that's good to hear. I think I'd want to work just to get some extra experience to beef up my resume. What's your experience been Youk?</p>
<p>Well, sometimes you end up with four classes a day, like my Mondays... <em>groans</em></p>
<p>Stern students do work a lot, although I think it's possible (at least, freshman year) to get good grades and have a social life at the same time... a lot of the freshmen I know got on Dean's List, and a few of my friends and I pulled straight As/A-s this past semester, and we still had time to do stuff outside of homework. This semester's a little harder workload-wise, but it's still manageable. I dunno... maybe it'll get much harder next year?</p>
<p>Competing for jobs, I heard, is bad, but I know that a lot of the people who have them early on get them through connections. Not much the individual student can do, besides comb through their contact lists.</p>
<p>Don't get me wrong, you'll probably have moments where you're working on a presentation at 3am the morning it's due, you can't find one of your group members, you've got a midterm in the afternoon you haven't studied for yet, and you basically just want to die. But like I said, I'm pretty sure that just comes with the whole 'being a college student' thing - it's not something that seems especially different from my friends' experiences in other schools & majors. </p>
<p>The thing that mattistotle is referring to is that it CAN be easy at Stern to look at other people around you who seem way more on the ball than you in terms of getting a job and panic. This is probably atypical of most schools, since I think most people are just kind of like 'lalala' until senior year, but Stern kids are thinking about it pretty early. However, to keep it in perspective, Stern has like a 95%+ placement rate, so unless you're basically unemployable or really unlucky, you'll definitely get something. At least, that's what I told myself when I got caught up in the rat race, and it ended up working out pretty well for me.</p>
<p>What did I do? I was kind of lazy all through college about clubs - I went to more freshman year, pledged for BAP, and then it tailed off to only lunch meetings (free food!) I'm not really a party person, so my social life was more like hanging out in friends' rooms + eating out, and I always had plenty of time for that. I studied a normal amount and got pretty good grades. My first job was basically an office assistant type thing summer after sophomore year (blind applications through careernet); did that through junior year; interned at an ibank during the summer; interned for a teeny tiny hedge fund & got my fulltime job 1st semester senior year; spent 2nd semester senior year playing piano and baking desserts. </p>
<p>You can probably find something more detailed somewhere else, but that is my short & sweet version. I'm definitely not one of the hardcore types that can't stop talking about cash flows and whatever whenever they get together with other Stern kids, so don't think you have to be that way to succeed!</p>
<p>Thanks Youk. How much is it about being aggressive and landing a good job as opposed to getting good grades and letting your record speak for yourself as you are average in pushing for a job?</p>
<p>Goody, I'm gonna back up Mattistotle here and say that you should start reading the WSJ ASAP, and at least mark major market news every day. You never know when it might come in handy. If you show up at an alumni/career fair and the topic turns to the power outages in South Africa and what it means to the gold market, you don't want to be one of the people who stare dumbly at him/her while he rapidly strikes up a relationship with whoever brought it up.</p>
<p>But on the other hand, you shouldn't be one of those people who has no life - remember, the best way to get jobs is through contacts. Make those, and you're set. Also, the most common criticism of Sternies is that their shmoozing is subpar (this is from the recruiters at BB firms). Technical skill-wise, we're far ahead of the pack along with Wharton. But get better at communicating effectively, and my advice is to start early. If you wait until junior year, you're going to be competing against people with 2-3 prior internships. That's extremely tough to beat.</p>
<p>just to specify...the school work/ social life balance really doesnt apply too much freshmen year (mostly CAS classes) and also applies much less if you aren't working (most are working/interning by sophomore year..I've been doing 20 hours a week since then).</p>
<p>You guys who are freshmen and sophomores should be focusing on getting good grades and making connections to land you jobs during the summer. While working during the semester and doing well shows you can handle school work while maintaining a high GPA, you don't want the job to have a big effect on your grades.</p>
<p>you need to have a job or internship and keep high grades. a 3.9 but no work experience/ EC's won't land you any interviews...but a 3.3 and tons of great working experience will make things difficult (but not impossible). Overall I guess work experience would be slightly more important than GPA? This is just my own subjective opinion.</p>