McCombs or Goizueta

Question

Goals are consulting, indifferent for location other than Southeast generally.

ANALysis · Answer

your probability of getting to MBB through Owen is close to zero
personally, i would choose owen since MBB isn't a sure thing at NYU, and full scholarship is worth more than the shot

Regenerate · Answer

Agree. Besides, Vanderbilt is beautiful and there are tons of alumni who own great businesses of all types. If you want to get MBB, and you prove it to those you meet, you'll be able to network into those opportunities

Full ride = low risk

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Full ride = low risk

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applicant123456 · Answer

That’s a tough one.

If this were a conversation about investment banking, I would go NYU all the way. It’s location is right there and has a heavy finance focus.

Being that it’s consulting, I’m sure NYU places well but I don’t think it’s enough to throw away a full ride to a T-25.

The thing that you said that was more important though is that Owen fits you better. These forums are self selecting in that “you should go higher rank or bust” but if it’s a culture mismatch why put yourself in a less ideal situation?

There are other items that could be thrown into this argument but that’s my 2 cents.

Just be prepared to hustle if you want to come back to NY as Owen more than likely is a school that places regionally (ie. the South).

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FinanceMan · Answer

I edited your post to add a poll.

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bb · Answer

Congrats on your admits! I know nothing about you or your personality. I have no idea if you are rolling in cash or crippled in undergrad debt. So this answer is a bit blind.... keep that in mind. Stern is no golden automatic ticket (not any other school for that matter). You will be competing with all of your classmates for the top on campus positions. You will be competing with everyone else for the top off-campus positions and you will be working the alumni network just like everyone else. A lot of the success depends on your background and luck. With higher ranked schools, you get more chances and better probabilities, but as Bill Gates said, after moving to the girls dormitory at Harvard, higher probability is not a guarantee of success. I want to set your expectations correctly. If you search expectations correctly, things are a lot more enjoyable. With wrong expectations, people hate first class on emirates airlines but with proper expectations, they love Southwest economy

I think it makes sense for you to stay in New York and pay the full price and avoid every location mess and all of that craziness. You are investing into the best thing but things will still be frustrating and not perfect. You will do online school for the first semester or so. It will be a bumpy road for internship and job search. But that alone and $1500 a month payment will light a fire under your butt. You will have to go beyond the comfort zone to score that job. PS. At the same time, if you are a cheap guy like me, and occasionally you splurge, but often regret that splurging, then I think you’ll be a lot calmer and peaceful not having a big loan waiting for you after two years. You can set your expectations that things will be bumpy and employment rough but at least nothing for it so no skin off your nose type of thing. A lot of our decisions are made by who we are and our gut feel. Sometimes there are easy and sometimes the conflicting.... I bet the other 200 guys who got into oh and as the first choice, are very happy to pay full sticker price ? Posted from my mobile device

bigge2win · Answer

I’m gonna provide a very different opinion than the comments on here. I heavily disagree with those who pick Owens, who are looking at the short-term upside of no debt.

Since the economy is more pinched than ever before, there’s an even bigger focus from employers to tighten up their hires to true target schools. If you look at the employment reports of both schools, you’ll see that the proportion of students who get MBB at Stern (11%) is close to the proportion of students who get MBB and Big-4 Accounting firm consulting (15%). These consultants coming out of Owens are going to Nashville, Atlanta, or Dallas. If you try for NYC or any other big office, you’re going up against all the Top 10-12 schools. Your chances are pretty small to get what you want. And then another 15% at Stern gets Big-4 Accounting firm consulting, ATK, LEK, Strategy&. Your downside is significantly lower at Stern.

You’ll also get better shots at better tech roles or anything from NYC at Stern. Getting an MBA to maximize your income growth potential is your true objective, not minimizing your short-term downside. Brand really matters here unless you plan to stay in the same industry or want to go to a location that the school places people into.

The way I see it, you either end up at a company and role you want out of Stern with a lot of debt or you take a company, role, and location you do not want but with no debt. I’d say having no debt, but also a stifling future is a way harder pill to swallow than a good consulting/tech gig albeit $2K of loans a month for the next 10 years, because you have substantially better exit opps and connections to increase your income growth.

The only way you should take Owens is if you got a sure shot or a super tight connection somewhere for the job you want, otherwise you’re taking a huge gamble. Sure, it’s free education. But what’s it worth when you have an insane uphill battle and you’re at a disadvantage at every door of the top employers. You might as well just do part time at Stern while working.

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audentes · Answer

Disclaimer: I'm starting at Owen in the fall, so obvious bias.

One thing that hasn't been mentioned: with a full-tuition scholarship (especially if it's a named scholarship), your recruiting opportunities at Owen will be somewhat enhanced. In addition to the network/OCR, the value of a highly-ranked program is the screening value it offers potential employers. It's hard to quantify how employers perceive T15 vs T25 w/ full-tuition, but this does narrow the gap to some degree.

Additionally, I think the value of a program's brand is oversold. If you pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for something, for your own sanity you have to believe that you wouldn't have been able to achieve the same outcome from something that was free. Despite this, every year people get to the same companies from Owen that they do from Stern. Yes, Stern will likely give you a head start, but, the lion's share of your results will come from your own abilities and willingness to hustle, not from the prestige of your program. And those abilities will continue to eclipse the importance of brand more and more as you get deeper into your career.

In terms of MBB, bigge2win is correct that you'll be looking at the Atlanta and Dallas offices. However, that doesn't mean you can't transfer to another office eventually. And it also doesn't mean that you can't recruit for Big-4 consulting or internal strategy in New York. Owen sent students to internships at EY and PwC in their New York offices last year:  https://business.vanderbilt.edu/news/2019/07/23/mba-class-2020-summer-internships-map-2/ .

The risk of recession is indeed a consideration. However, I'd rather face that with the certainty of $200k in my pocket than with the hope that an MBA's ranking will shield me.

On the whole, it seems like this question boils down to whether you're willing to give up $200k (+ a potentially better fit) for and improved (but not guaranteed) shot at MBB and a higher chance of being placed in NY.

Regenerate · Answer

If I could have given more than one kudo to the post above, I would have.

The only additional observation is that the cost is more than 200k ... think interest costs ...

The opportunity costs are also enormous! With school debt, you've simply required to take the highest paying reasonable job you can get and keep it no matter how unreasonable your boss or crazy your coworkers ... until you can get another job. That kind of stress is real. It's palpable.

Doubt me?

Talk to anyone who's suffered under the burden of obscene debt burden with no out besides continuing to do what they've been doing ... but hate.

I hope you enjoy your time in Nashville ... AND ... you take your named scholarship to a sweet MBB gig.

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NickC137 · Answer

Disclaimer: I am a Stern alum who is in consulting, but I am going to try to be as objective and customized to your situation as possible. It seems as though you have two questions you are trying to answer: "what are my increased chances of getting to MBB from Stern or at least staying in NYC for consulting?" and "what does my expected career income look like?"

For chances of getting to MBB from Stern or staying in NYC for consulting:

If you are aiming for NYC recruiting, Stern has an advantage that should not be ignored, as these companies' NYC offices are within 20 minutes of campus and Stern has a much larger presence at MBB than Owen, as MBB is 3 of our top 6 employers based on our most recent employment report. About 35-40% of the people who recruited for consulting at Stern ended up at MBB (40 people went to MBB, with around 100 going into consulting total), with the rest mostly going to T2 (Kearney, Parthenon, LEK, Strategy&, etc.) and Deloitte, PwC (outside of S&), and EY. I don't have exact numbers, but almost all of my classmates who are in consulting (unless they are going to an international office) are staying in the NYC area (NYC or NJ offices, with some going to Chicago and LA). Our most recent employment report shows that 81.8% of graduates ended up in the Northeast.

For Owen, the most recent employment report shows that 12% of graduates ended up in the Northeast. The report does not have quite as detailed information to calculate MBB percentages, but no MBB is listed as a top employer. The top consulting employers are the Big 4 (Deloitte, EY, PwC, KPMG).

Based on this, Stern seems like the better fit for your consulting goals.

Owen employment report: https://issuu.com/vanderbiltowen/docs/2 ... OTM2NDkyNw
Stern employment report: https://www.stern.nyu.edu/sites/default ... 9-2020.pdf

For what does my expected career income look like:
For this, I built a model that you should be able to open from this post. My takeaway is that you would expect to earn about $330k more (NPV adjusted) from Stern over the course of your career, even with taking out 100% loans at the current federal interest rate.

Overall, it seems as though Stern is a better fit, but you can put different assumptions into the model if you want to do a sensitivity analysis. Hope this helps!

Edit: reuploaded the model and added links for easier quality checking
Edit: typos

Attachments

Stern vs Owen full ride.xlsx [52.5 KiB]
Downloaded 87 times

audentes · Answer

NickC137, thank you for your analysis.

I agree with the spirit of your model for the  average  Owen vs Stern student. Assuming you work for the 20 years needed for the NPV of Stern to pass that of Owen, Stern is the right choice. However, a full tuition scholarship means more than just less debt. It also indicates that OP's qualities make them somewhat   above average . Since employers look at many of the same factors for hiring that business schools look at for admission, OP will likely have above average recruiting options. Because of this, it becomes more difficult to compare employment reports - the main value of these reports becomes determining whether a preferred company recruits at both schools.

Take MBB, for example. Stern blows Owen out of the water in terms of placements. But how much of that is due to Stern itself (accepting that location is a huge bonus), and how much is due to the average GMAT at Owen being 680 and the average at Stern being 720? Many of Owen's students don't cross the 700/720 threshold needed to get in a room with an MBB recruiter. But for the Owen students who do cross that threshold and do get to the interview, are they at a disadvantage vs. someone from Stern?

Also, circling back to Regenerate's point, debt is more than a number in a spreadsheet. It does have some influence on your actions. Stern will likely create an easier path into MBB, but in the same way, $200k in debt could close off some less lucrative paths that OP might want to pursue if they decide consulting isn't where they want to end up.

Overall, the heart of my argument isn't that Stern has no value over Owen. And there's no question that Stern's location is advantageous to OP's goals. My argument is that a student's success or failure is due more to that student’s qualifications and determination than the MBA program they attend.

Unfortunately, I don't think this question has a definitive answer, since you'll never know whether someone would have been more/less successful going to any particular program. Maybe one day Poets & Quants will decide to do a school-blind study of career outcomes based on factors like GMAT score, work experience, etc. Probably wouldn't be a very good for their advertising income.

NickC137 · Answer

roundh0use, I like what you are saying and I wish we could include those in the model. What you are saying is full of "what if" scenarios that are hard to quantify but could have an impact, and I think those "what ifs" could be infinite. OP could have gotten lucky to get the Owen scholarship and is not above average. Maybe Owen gives out a ton of scholarships to a big portion of students (anecdotally, I know someone from an over-represented group who got a 680 GMAT and a half-ride at Owen). Maybe OP got unlucky to not get a Stern scholarship and is above average at Stern also. It's unfortunate that those aspects are much harder to quantify, as they could be important decision points. My model is by no means perfect but is rather meant to provide some quantitative direction to base the decision off. There are obviously exceptions, but if I am making a major life decision, I have more confidence in averages than betting on if I am an exception.

Edit: Just adding that if my model would have shown that Owen had a higher NPV, then I would have kept that. I truly was trying to be unbiased, as I want OP to make their decision based on what is best for them and with some comparable information, not based on what is best for Stern, Owen, or any of their constituents.

Edit: Just adding that if my model would have shown that Owen had a higher NPV, then I would have kept that. I truly was trying to be unbiased, as I want OP to make their decision based on what is best for them and with some comparable information, not based on what is best for Stern, Owen, or any of their constituents.

applicant123456 · Answer

Do you have some stats to give slightly more context to your scholarship?

Ie.
Gmat score 
Gpa & undergrad tier 
Work experience

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Regenerate · Answer

NickC137 ... cool model. Thanks. If I've got this right, there is a 6% spread in 20 year NPV?

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NickC137 · Answer

I believe there is a 0.6% difference for the 20 year NPV (years 2022-2041): Stern at $2,683,737 (including student loans) and Owen at $2,669,254.

Edit: there is a 6% difference for the NPV through year 2060 (39 years of income)

Regenerate · Answer

Sorry ... yes ... I meant 40 year NPV ...

So, a pretty tight spread over 20 and 40 years, with many great unknowns in between now and 2040 and 2060 ...

NickC137 · Answer

Yes, there are definitely unknowns. If OP is extremely debt adverse, then Owen seems more optimal. If OP has a longer-term view and is not as sensitive to shorter-term debt, then Stern seems more optimal. Given OP's stated preference for MBB and/or NYC consulting, Stern seems to provide about a 40% chance on average for MBB, and much higher than 40% for all NYC consulting positions. I cannot calculate those numbers for Owen because MBB is outside their "top employers" list on their employment report, so no numbers are provided (Owen seems to define a "top employer" as a company at least 4 people went to, making chances at MBB one of the great unknowns).

Edit: typos

Regenerate · Answer

Oh, I 100% agree with what you say. My observation of nearly 50 years of living life is this ... when making major personal financial decisions, it's absolutely critical to be sober minded and not get excessively focused on the best case scenario, but actively consider the possibility of the next 20 years of life looking MUCH different than expected (illness, injury, poorly timed career change a few years post MBA, etc).

For example ... understand the downside in addition to understanding the upside. Make a truly informed decision!

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For example ... understand the downside in addition to understanding the upside. Make a truly informed decision!

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NickC137 · Answer

Amen!

bb · Answer

I just had a chance to download the actual file and wow - awesome, awesome job on putting it together!!! Clearly demonstrates that Stern students are willing to put in the effort!

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