Can someone compare pros and cons for UMD Business School, honors vs IU Kelley direct admit, honors? I want to do finance with some exposure to technology or computational finance for undergrad with the intention to go into investment banking. Cost for UMD about 22 K vs 38K IU
Maryland is not a target or even a semi-target school for IB recruiting to the best of my knowledge.
Are your stats 1570 SAT & 4.75 / 5.00 GPA ?
If so, have you appled to other business schools ?
Applied to other schools RD but kind of losing hope to get in anywhere else just based on some analysis of acceptances. It looks like schools are not that interested in stats and accept based on other criteria. Stats are SAT 1570 GPA 3.9/4.8.
Based on COA, UMD is about $64,000 less expensive over 4 years. But Indiana-Kelley places better in IB. This results in one vote for UMD based on COA, and one vote for IU-Kelley based on IB placement.
Why IB ?
To which schools have you applied RD ?
P.S. I like your intention of combining a finance major with a tech minor.
Will you borrow funds to attend either school ? If so, you need to find a financially feasible alternative.
Have you researched UMD’s IB placement history ?
Investment banking tends to place a high value on elite undergrauate schools such as Ivy League, Chicago, Northwestern, Stanford, Berkeley, NYU-finance, MIT, Michigan-Ross, Virginia-Darden. Georgetown as well. Also, the elite LACs do well (Williams College, for example).
Would you consider management consulting ?
Also, the Univ. of Texas at Austin places well in IB.
I do not know enough about Univ. of Maryland Honors to know if honors students / scholarship recipients are given special mentoring & guidance. If so, then UMD may be a great choice.
Have you considered a double major in finance & data analytics ?
I ask because you may be able to get a full tuition & fees scholarship based on your stats at some public universities.
Frankly, I think IU Kelley is worth the $16k per year over UMD for several reasons.
a) future employment and pay
b) elite MBA applications after working several years
c) better prospects should you decide to transfer
IU Kelley undergrad is really known by employers as a standout in practical preparation. I think it will payoff over time and will look better on your MBA application further down the road. Hutton Honors College is an added bonus and work hard for a great GPA to land the Kelley Business Honors program too.
If you knock it out of the park your freshman year, you have the added bonus of the option to be a great transfer candidate next winter, if you should decide you want something else at an elite college.
Yes, I am looking at the possibility of doing business analytics or data science second major. Denied at UT Austin
Was invited to apply to Kelley honors already based on stats
If that is the case, the Luddy Informatics School at IU is also getting more and more well-known. IU is pouring money into Luddy.
Can your family afford the difference in price between UMD and IU without financial hardship, loans etc.?
Yes we can afford the difference in cost
My son has gotten accepted to both as well. He loved the Smith building and the UMD campus, partly because of its proximity to Washington D.C. He likes major metros and so the rural setting in Bloomington did not appeal to him. The placement at Kelley is great, considering that it is a large school (2000 students). I think UMD is more of a regional school and most of their placement is in the DMV area with 15% in NYC. They do have a Wall Street Fellows program which is similar to Kelley’s IB workshop, although I am not sure what the outcomes are for WS Fellows. UMD has the better Engineering and CS dept. My son is also interested in Finance (Major) and CS (minor)
The difficulty in making this decision is that neither Kelley nor UMD- Smith are target schools for IB recruiting.
IU-Kelley places a lot of recent grads with the top 5 accounting firms in accounting or consulting positions. For IB, JPMorgan Chase & Bank of America each hired about 14 or 15 students out of over 1,000 finance majors at IU-Kelley.
UMD-Smith doesn’t share much of the placement information.
Have you applied to the University of Michigan-Ross School of Business ? If so, and if accepted, Ross will better serve your career goals.