jlgdr wrote:
KaptainK wrote:
Visited Wharton today. Here is my brief description of the visit:
1. class: It was boring. Most people are on their phones or laptop doing random things. One of the students said they do have 50% classes that are case based. Darden class was relatively very interesting due to lively case discussion. That said, I am not applying to b-school for a class.
2. Campus & Location: Campus is beautiful! Looks like students (especially aiming at IB/wall street) do make frequent trips to NYC - 2 hr ride. All students live in 2x2 block area in rittenhouse square area. This area is expensive (my opinion) but all of them live there. 25 min walk or quick cab ride. One tour guide quipped that most students take cab. I also learned that Wharton bought space on 2401 walnut for students (kind of lounge w/ vending machines). Its mid way between campus and rittenhouse area. Thats good because one of the students said they only come to campus may be 4-5 times a week. Definitely not on weekends. Most of the recruiting (PE/VC/Fin/consulting/IB) happens in downtown four seasons. So from rittenhouse downtown is quick cab ride.
3. Recruiting: Every student I met was confident that they can get the job they want. Mature recruiting (consulting/IB) happens in Oct to Jan. Apparently no company is allowed on campus before term 1 which is ending this week. Lot of people seems to have utilized alumni in their job search with positive results.
Shoot if you have any questions and I will try to answer.
How did you find the brains of the students you met? Especially international ones? Smart?
What was your class about? Maybe a boring topic
What were some of the firms students were recruiting for? Any interesting conversations with people you met
Thanks man
Cheers
J
They are smart. You can certainly have an intelligent discussion on any topic. I met a doctor from India and an army officer from Israel (among few others from traditional background). Doctor is aiming for consulting and Israeli is working on his start up. Both were down to earth and were honest in their responses. But the few from banking were not so friendly and arrogant. I think in general TBD is weeding out smart a**holes so we may see a shift in overall attitude of school in the coming years.
I sat in two classes: Services Operations (topic was Harrah's revenue model) and Financing early stage healthcare companies. My comment about class is relative to Darden class. There was tons of finance and banking guys in each class. Especially in healthcare class only finance/VC guys were talking while others were disengaged (one girl was sleeping too). Class environment is the last criteria for me to choose a school to apply to.
Coming to recruiting, all firms you can think of for consulting and IB. No interesting conversations about the what they are going to do except that Israeli guy working on his start up. I chatted with him a little bit to understand what kind of resources and support he is getting from school and alumni. He is certainly meeting few VCs from bay area who were alumni. So thats a huge plus to have that kind of access to VCs.