Tuck First-Year: Ask Me Anything

No problem, thanks for being the first question! I will try to answer both together.

Before I start let me say, I liked Duke Fuqua's fun loving culture and Durham is underrated. As for Yale SOM, I really enjoyed / appreciated the school's mission and ambitions. With all that said there were some key differences that won me over to Tuck.

First, the people. I cannot emphasize this enough, Tuckies are utterly amazing. I think people are so use to hearing "oh Tuckies are so responsive" or "Tuck is the only top MBA program with over 50% of alumni donating (nearly 71% this year)" that they can become a little skeptical of these kind of claims. I was surprised during the application process how responsive Tuckies really were; however, since matriculating, this has been dwarfed by the sheer lengths Tuck alumni go for current students. I have met with a Fortune 500 CEO face-to-face on his own time, had MBB partners drop everything to chat about their work and reminisce about Tuck, and just so much more.

Second, was the career outcomes. I came into the program interested in consulting and general management to a lesser extent and as good as Fuqua was it just didn't match up well in either category to Tuck. For reference sake Tuck sent over 21% of the class of 2013 to MBB consulting. That is simply insane. Yale SOM on the other-hand I think is great for finance placement, but it is still distinctly lagging in consulting and traditional general management placement. This is not to say SOM and Fuqua aren't great schools, it is just that they aren't on the same level placement level as Tuck for my own goals. It is also worth saying, from what I've heard everyone who wanted an IBD job, including internationals, got one last year.

Third, the residential nature of Tuck. Everyone lives together in the dorms and even those who are married live off-campus in a community called Sachem Village which is a lovely white picket-fenced neighborhood a mile or so from campus. You get to know people so well it is crazy. We have only been together a month, but I can honestly say I really value all of my classmates. This community shows through in your study groups, everyone is willing to spend an extra hour on a project to make sure everyone is on the same page and so those who may not be as dialed in on say statistics understands everything being discussed.

In sum, I was surprised by how much Tuck not only lived up to, but surpassed the 'hype.' The community here is really that amazing and the collection of people is extremely impressive.

Hope that answered everything, please ask any follow-ups you have!