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Where should ryguy go to school?

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GoBruin
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 15:42
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Praetorian
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isa


My one cent :)


are you that cheap?

are you this stupid?
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Sorry Praet, it's an on going joke I have with Isa, i.e. girl who managed to only spend 5 bucks on her tour of wharton including airfare, cab fare, and lunch.

Did not mean it to get out of proportion.
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isa
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 16:05
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GoBruins

Sorry Praet, it's an on going joke I have with Isa, i.e. girl who managed to only spend 5 bucks on her tour of wharton including airfare, cab fare, and lunch.

Did not mean it to get out of proportion.
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No worries all! Let's get back to helping ryguy pick a school. :)
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dghazer
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 16:37
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I voted for Michigan so you can help me with my finance homework.
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 16:56
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Go Blue!
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 20:06
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If you plan on coming back to the west coast, I vote either Cornell or Michigan. Being a California native I grew up hearing about Cornell (probably more a result of its "ivy league" status). I've never heard about Virginia until much later (first looking at the top public school rankings in us news); I feel Virginia is more of an east coast biased school, similar to USC in so cal. A very good school, but it seems like it'd be better to attend if you know you want to stay on the east coast.

I'll probably be attending Michigan next year, and I am 100% sure I will be coming back to the west coast. So heres crossing fingers they place well out here :).
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 21:13
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Go to UVA. Let's face it - all those "brand names" are substantially equal. But...

Have you ever been to Ithaca, for god's sake? I'd rather spend two years in New Haven than that place. And that's saying something.

Michigan is nicer, but it's still a little like living above the Arctic Circle for nine months out of the year.

Charlottesville rules. You'll love it. WAHOO WA!
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 23:03
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You already seem to know each school inside out, whether it's Ross, Darden or Cornell.

It's a good idea to ask the others for opinions and any other information that you haven't considered yet. However, you must realize that the final decision lies with you.

Regardless of what we say and what we want you to do, this is your life we are talking about. You must make a decision for yourself, unbiased from our opinions.

After all, this is a huge investment in terms of money, time and effort. You get to go to business school only once.

If driving a Hyundai makes you happy because you will be worry-free from high insurance premiums and etc, then ignore the Ferraris and drive the Hyundai. If you think Ferrari is a once in a life time opportunity kind of vehicle, then forget everything else and go for the Ferrari.

Regardless of where you choose to go, our role is to come here and congratulate you. (and support you all the way) In the end, go with your gut feeling and decide for yourself and ONLY yourself.

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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 04 Mar 2009, 23:54
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so..nink,
what if hyundai give u $60k cash back...what do you do?

:P
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maverick2011
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 07:17
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Personally, I'm with bostonsparky on the fit thing; that is, I think I could adjust to any of the top schools' cultures/locations and have a blast. If you really feel uncomfortable at one school, then definitely rule it out. I think Cornell’s admit weekend will clear that up for you though. For me, the decision is mostly about career opportunities.

A quick example that seems relevant to your situation: I tentatively plan to target IB. Kellogg and Booth are at the top of my list (behind HBS and Wharton). Just looking at those two programs, there are two schools of thought with respect to IB recruiting:

1) Chicago is a core finance school, so you will have more opportunities to break into IB there, especially during down economic times.
2) Kellogg is not a core finance school; but since it is still a top program, banks will not drop it from their recruiting list. They will probably take less people compared to the core school, but there will be less people going for those spots.

Cornell is the Chicago in my example. Darden and Ross are the Kellogg in my example. Since I haven’t made the choice yet (mostly because I haven’t been admitted to Chicago yet), it’s hard for me to say what I’d do in your situation. I think I would probably choose Cornell unless you hate it during the admit weekend though. It seems to have the best name in the IM industry. It also seems to have the best curriculum and programs (Cayuga fund, Immersion, etc) for your interests. I wouldn’t worry too much about the lack of west coast presence right now. I think you should focus on the short term goal when picking a school.

All that being said, I’ll tell you what people keep telling me: “you can’t make a wrong decision, so just go where you would have the most fun.”
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 08:18
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How can you agree with bostonsparky, discount "fit," and yet still believe in just going to the place where you would have the most fun? Inherent contradiction there, no? :) "Fit" is, after all, all about comfort and consequently also (subjective) happiness.

maverick2011
All that being said, I’ll tell you what people keep telling me: “you can’t make a wrong decision, so just go where you would have the most fun.”
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maverick2011
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 08:47
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solaris1
How can you agree with bostonsparky, discount "fit," and yet still believe in just going to the place where you would have the most fun? Inherent contradiction there, no? :) "Fit" is, after all, all about comfort and consequently also (subjective) happiness.

maverick2011
All that being said, I’ll tell you what people keep telling me: “you can’t make a wrong decision, so just go where you would have the most fun.”
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I said that's "what people keep telling me," not that I will make my decision that way.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not discounting fit. In fact, I also said "If you really feel uncomfortable at one school, then definitely rule it out." Everybody is going to have a different opinion on "fit." I'm pretty adaptable to different environments, so it is less important to me than it is to some other people. So to answer your question, I don't believe I was being contradictory.
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 10:24
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maverick2011


Don't get me wrong, I'm not discounting fit. In fact, I also said "If you really feel uncomfortable at one school, then definitely rule it out." Everybody is going to have a different opinion on "fit." I'm pretty adaptable to different environments, so it is less important to me than it is to some other people. So to answer your question, I don't believe I was being contradictory.
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Yeah I think it's a case where most of the top-15 schools are very flexible in terms of what you want to get out of them. The student bodies are so diverse and options so abundant that you are really going to struggle to try to find something that's not available. Perhaps if you've lived your whole life in cities and hate cold weather, maybe Tuck's not a good idea, but I am starting to roll my eyes when I see people say stuff like 'well I talked to this one person from NYU, and he/she seemed really weird, but I talked to someone from Columbia, and he/she was so cool! I fit so much better there!'
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 15:09
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Congrats ryguy - excellent results - and a nice choice to have to make!

When it comes to rankings, I think these schools are about as equal as it gets - generally top 15, sometimes top 10.

I voted Cornell! The reason being Cornell's national and international brand recognition which may not be something you are concerned about now. However, we are probably going to change careers/ job functions several times over the next 30 years of our working lives - maybe for you - from working for a mutual fund to starting your own business to .. whatever. In my opinion Cornell has the strongest brand which makes a difference 10 years later(however this need not be of concern to you if you attended a "brand" undergrad).

Under Cornell "weakness" what struct me most was your dislike of the class you attended - there are good and bad Profs at every school - the class I attended at Cornell was really interesting - really depends on the Prof., so don't base your decision on this.

You know the schools well and it's good you're attending DJ. While at DJ try staying a day longer to speak to Profs / attend a few classes that are in your field of interest. Just might change your mind about the school particularly "fit". I'd attend all the admit weekends if possible before deciding.

Good luck!! You can't go wrong with any of these great schools.
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 15:21
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also, are you sure you would enjoy Darden's reliance on the case method considering you are going into finance?
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glettian
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 15:39
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I was actually really impressed by the Strategy professor whose class I sat in on. She was very engaging, humorous, asked questions that made students think, very good-natured. The class itself had a lot of laughter, discussion, many people engaged/asking questions...it was a positive experience I felt.
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 16:22
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bostonsparky
I am starting to roll my eyes when I see people say stuff like 'well I talked to this one person from NYU, and he/she seemed really weird, but I talked to someone from Columbia, and he/she was so cool! I fit so much better there!'
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My thoughts exactly! Sure you want to see if you fit, but how much can you really know before you attend?

After talking to 4 or so alumni from both Duke and Tuck (and plenty of current students) I've gotten a lot of different opinions on each school's culture. There has been some overlap between answers, but my sample size is obviously very limited.

RF
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 16:24
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wonderhaven
also, are you sure you would enjoy Darden's reliance on the case method considering you are going into finance?
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wonderhaven- I appreciated your comments in the previous post. +1

As far as the case method goes, I'm honestly not sure how I feel about it (in fact I said this in my interview). I may love it, I may hate it. At the end of the day, what I do know though is that I will be better prepared to express my opinions in a clear and concise manner in front of highly educated people, many of whom will have their own differing and conflicting opinions. Furthermore, my background is in finance and I have the CFA charter, so I don't think I'm personally going to learn much groundbreaking new finance material in an of these MBA programs. Sure I want to take some cool finance electives, but what I am looking to do is stretch myself in areas outside of my comfort zone (e.g., strategy, marketing).

In regards to finance specific courses/cases, they are pretty comprehensive. For instance, in valuations courses, the cases walk through financial statements and have students try to decipher company value based on an actual case (for instance amazon or apple). They walk through the same LBO models that the banks use for M&A and IPO deals (e.g., VISA IPO, or Time Warner AOL merger). So it's not as if Darden students are at a huge disadvantage (in fact I'm sure Darden students say that they have an advantage as compared to other non-cased based schools) for finance courses.
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 18:05
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Is the Cornell brand really better than Michigan, especially with anyone who even knows a spit about business schools? Maybe in a pub (even that is debatable), but not in a job search.

I voted Michigan.

I could not survive 2 years in Ithaca. No way...
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 05 Mar 2009, 18:32
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Cornell is an Ivy League school and will always have the best "brand name", IMO.... :?

And no, I am not torqued from the BW forums :lol:
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oziozzie
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Battle Royale – Johnson vs. Ross vs. Darden 06 Mar 2009, 00:17
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Just my 2 cents..

I'm an international and noone has ever heard about u of michigan in my country, whereas cornell is highly regarded due to its ivy league position.
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