<p>Swiss Finance Academy, a summer wall street training program:</p>
<p>look at the faculty (elite MBAs), curriculum, etc.</p>
<p>Do you think it's a credible program and acknowledged by recruiters?</p>
<p>How competitive do you think it is to get in?</p>
<p>Though I know nothing of the program, what often happens with things of this nature is this:
The program is elite. Ergo, the students therein are bright and will land banking jobs at a good clip. The program will then tout itself as the cause of this success. But, the students are mostly to blame, not the program, for their success. To put a politically abominable spin on it, companies can, per Griggs v. Duke Power ( <a href="http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0401_0424_ZS.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0401_0424_ZS.html</a> ) only with difficulty screen their applicants for such smarts. Instead, university brands serve as the new screen (an MIT man is probably smarter than a UMissouri man). That and interviews.</p>
<p>Bump. Can Alexandre and Ivy_Grad and Barrons give some opinions?</p>
<p>My initial thoughts (having briefly - and I mean very briefly skimmed through the website)?</p>
<p>1) Never heard of 'em (and the website looks kind of slapped together)</p>
<p>2) Safe bet? Most Wall St. Firms will not have heard of 'em either.</p>
<p>3) It's no wonder either - they're a whopping 1 year young!!!</p>
<p>4) Initial thoughts? Smacks of one of those late night info-mmercial "vocational" ITT Tech ads you see on access cable TV</p>
<p>5) Check out the bio of the "CEO" (CEO? Sounds a little cheesy - I mean are they trying to be a semi-serious academic institution?)</p>
<p>6) The "CEO" has Wall St. experience no question - but he was only a VP? Jeez, I was higher than that before I left Wall St. does that mean I could be a CEO too??? I knew VPs that were as young as 28 (graduate from undergrad at 22, 3 yrs as an analyst making you 25, skip b-school promote as Associate for 4 years - BAM you're a VP. This guy couldn't be older than early 30s (IMO). Oh, and no MBA.</p>
<p>6) Also, check out his "almuni" connections. He's a Dartmouth grad. Which is normally a good sign, until you take a quick gander at all the other "faculty" members - they're all Dartmouth grads (well, almost) - at any rate a whole lot of them seem to have gone to Dartmouth! Were they all fraternity brothers? Actually, given the timing - maybe Slipper knows this guy!!!</p>
<p>7) My take? A guy got sick of the rat race, left as a VP, got together with some other Wall St. buddies, got some funding and started a "high end" vocational school.</p>
<p>8) There's nothing in this program that you won't learn as an analyst - and it should prepare you to enter as an Associate if you have no finance experience - so from that "end" it seems pretty legit if that's what you are looking to get out of it.</p>
<p>9) But as a potential "feeder" to Wall St. firms? I say "nay". Wall St. firms will continue to recruit from the very fertile ground of top undergrad institutions for analysts and top MBA programs for associates. </p>
<p>10) Here's the thing: anyone who "needs" to go to this program never made it through the formal process (or a large majority of them IMO) - so, in effect, it is a "self-selected" applicant pool of "passed over" candidates that didn't make it in the formal interview process - that would be my gut reaction if I interviewed someone who came out of this program.</p>
<p>I would tend to agree with Ivy_Grad in this case. As the French (or some Swiss) would say; "quel horreur"! hehe Seriously, I tend to be too much of a traditionalist when it comes to things like education, cuisine and of course, my willy (Shakespeare that is). That's why I usually recommend Economics as a major rather than Business. But I digress. In short, I do not think this summer internship program will carry much weight among the Wall Street heavy hitters. That's just a first impression though. Certainly investigate the matter further rather than just rely on our collective $0.08!</p>
<p>$9000 for 4 weeks? are they kidding?</p>
<p>How many "students" are in the program?</p>
<p>$9,000 per pop FOR ONE MONTH? Sounds pretty lucrative to me (that is for the Academy)</p>