HELP! Columbia or Fuqua (or maybe Booth)?

hydrocarbons · 2017-03-20T14:51:40-07:00

Hey everyone, I will try to keep this brief, however brevity has never been a strength of mine. Here's the basic outline of my problem: I am going to business school in the fall, I don't know where. By matriculation I will have spent the past two years at a commodity trader and the two years prior to that at an oil company. Applied to five schools, admitted to Columbia, Fuqua, Darden, and McCombs (with 1/3 tuition scholarship), and wait listed (two rounds in a row!) at Booth. I am experiencing significant difficulty deciding between these options, and the possible career paths that might follow at graduation. When I started this process, I wanted to go into MBB consulting. While that's still a definite interest, I've discovered other avenues that sound interesting and gratifying. For example, some of the finance/management development programs are appealing, and there's still a tiny, unrealistic, masochistic part of me that thinks I could break into a middle market oil and gas private equity fund out of Booth or Columbia. Essentially, at this point I am looking for any reason not succumb to the brand name of Columbia. The reputation and finance job availability is obviously tops of the schools that I've gotten into so far, but I have a strong aversion to living in NYC. Culturally, and going by gut-feel, Fuqua is far and away the best fit for me with Darden a close second. However, I assume that move would basically preclude my getting any non-banking finance job. I guess what I am trying to get here is a reality check on what exactly is possible out of Columbia that may not be from Fuqua/Darden, and feedback on the reputations of each school irrespective of the rankings. MBB is possible from Duke or Darden, but it's at least as (slightly more) possible from Columbia. While I am somewhat geographically agnostic (Houston/Dallas, North Carolina, LA/Bay, Seattle), I have no desire to work in the Northeast after school, so one of the main draws and advantages of Columbia is undercut. Am I fooling myself into thinking that these finance jobs for which Columbia is renowned will be accessible for someone with no finance experience? If that is a large part of why I would want to go to CBS, that may ultimately be ineffective if I wouldn't even be able to get those jobs regardless of which school I choose. If I am going to spend two years at a school and then end up in MBB or corporate strategy/development, I would much rather do it at Fuqua/Darden. What are your thoughts? What would you do in this position? How would you personally go about evaluating this? Any help is much appreciated.

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HELP! Columbia or Fuqua (or maybe Booth)?

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