Tuck ($40k total) vs. Kellogg (full price)

Question

Hi I'm  really really really  struggling between these two options:

1) Kellogg at full price
2) Tuck with $20k / year ($40k total in scholarships)

Short Term Goal: MBB or something more entrepreneurial (think VC, leadership role at a startup in strategy & ops)
Long Term Goal: COO, launch my own startup

Tuck Pros: 
- small, close knit community
- outdoors activities 
- scholarship money and lower cost of living in Hanover
- great with MBB

Tuck Cons: 
-small class size
-poor access to a major city
-smaller network than Kellogg
-lower in rankings than Kellogg
-career outcomes outside of consulting

Kellogg Pros: 
-Higher ranked
-larger alumni network
-more varied career outcomes
-strong consulting powerhouse
-beautiful building! 
-access to Chicago should I want to pursue working at a startup during the school year / VC

Kellogg Cons: 
-more expensive ($50k total over 2 years most likely)
-Not as much access to nature
-Potentially less close knit than Tuck

Deposit is due tomorrow so could REALLY use some sound advice as I weigh these options. I have about $70k in liquid savings I can use to pay for school. Thank you in advance.

bb · Answer

Congratulations on your admits and sorry to hear about the dilemma. These are hard and I can tell you that for the last few years people have been putting deposits at multiple places which had been driving MBA admissions teams batty. You’re definitely not alone in the decision hell 😂

Most people who go to Tuck, are looking for that close knit community and are looking to be away from distractions and to be more focused. And Kellogg and Tuck are almost opposite in there concepts. You could not have tack in place of Kellogg or vice versa. Their strengths are also their weaknesses. For example, you cannot have a broad alumni net work well also having a tightknit alumni net work. It’s either big or it’s tight But not both. Same way, you can have them small school community or you can have a large class and a big city nearby.

There are a few ways to look at it, and then sometimes it helps to illuminate some of the distractors and noise to make the more important elements stand out a bit more. The challenge of course is that there’s a lot of luck and chance involved in the outcomes. The predictable part only counts for 50% of the final outcome is it’s very hard to tell you with confidence what will happen because chance plays such a big variance. For example, you may meet someone at a coffee chat that leads to a job, on a plane, etc.

MBB consulting recruiting is solid out of Tuck and Kellogg. Tuck has consulting as the primary focus. Kellogg has a number of areas such as consulting, tech, marketing, some finance, etc but Tuck is fully committed to consulting.

1. I think the biggest difference is the small fish in a big pond vs. big fish in a small pond. What is your best fit?
2. How are you planning to use the program? Are you planning to network a lot, are you a more introverted or extraverted person? Being more introverted will fit the tight knit community concept. (Tuck) or being more Extroverted and engaging in many activities within Chicago, etc (Kellogg)
3. I would take money out of the equation because while it is $50K over 2 years, that's potentially 3-4 months of pay after MBA. if you find a job in October vs. July, that's the difference more or less (taxes make it more like 5-6 months but still). You are comparing an investment of $400K vs $450K if you consider tuition, cost of living, and opportunity cost.
4. Finally, are you financially risk averse? VC says you are a betting man (and if you are not, what are you doing in VC?

)
5. VC and similar highly competitive elite industries like to have a pedigree of H/S/W and maybe Booth/Kellogg. Tuck can be a niche play (no time to research though)
6. If all you want is MBB shot, both will give you the same chances most likely, and arguing that since Tuck is so focused on consulting, you will get more value, experience, exposure, and focus on drilling mock interviews. Moreover, consulting salaries are absolutely the same, there’s no reason to spend extra 50,000.
7. What is the long term play? What is after MBB? You can't eat in airport bars and sleep in hotels forever ... 😇 while this should not impact your choice of school since the power of the school's brand will be weaker and weaker as you spend 5, 10, etc years working, still there may be something that may point to one or the toher.

one more question- do you have any additional round two applications in play? My guess is no but just checking.

) 5. VC and similar highly competitive elite industries like to have a pedigree of H/S/W and maybe Booth/Kellogg. Tuck can be a niche play (no time to research though) 6. If all you want is MBB shot, both will give you the same chances most likely, and arguing that since Tuck is so focused on consulting, you will get more value, experience, exposure, and focus on drilling mock interviews. Moreover, consulting salaries are absolutely the same, there’s no reason to spend extra 50,000. 7. What is the long term play? What is after MBB? You can't eat in airport bars and sleep in hotels forever ... 😇 while this should not impact your choice of school since the power of the school's brand will be weaker and weaker as you spend 5, 10, etc years working, still there may be something that may point to one or the toher. one more question- do you have any additional round two applications in play? My guess is no but just checking.

bb · Answer

P.S. Have you checked the other discussions?
https://gmatclub.com/forum/booth-full-v ... 20883.html
https://gmatclub.com/forum/kellogg-vs-t ... 36630.html

My suggestion for you for borrowing money would be to borrow as much as you can borrow in the first year. Interest rates can go up in the second year or it can get tricky with getting access to additional $$, so having a reserve of $$ and option to borrow less in the second year (if rates go up), would give more flexibility. Most people run out of money in bschool and get deeper into other forms of debt, not just student loans, and while 7% on a student loan can seem high, paying 17-25% on a credit card is even higher.

bb · Answer

I am totally spamming this topic, so I am sorry for the 3 replies to a "simple question" but my 30-second short answer would be:

if you are looking at VC, you should go to the max. It is all or nothing. You are not throwing caution to the wind, you are trading off some potential opportunities presented by an M7 and some argue a top 3 program vs. reward of lower costs.

1473 · Answer

bb ,

I'm matriculating this fall (haven't decided where yet as some outcomes from R2 are awaited) and would like to understand this a little bit better. I'm listing three questions below. I have been trying to figure this out without much success and perhaps some of the questions are not super well-informed..

1) Please help me understand 'access to additional $$ gets tricky in 2nd year'. I won't try to guess what you meant, but do you mean lenders are going to question why you need more money than you did in 1st year, using 1Y loan numbers as a benchmark? This is similar to a 'use it or lose it' thing we see in corporates where getting more money allocated for projects is tough because they benchmark against prior year expense.
2) my understanding is that between merit based scholarships (awarded based on grades, contributing to clubs, working with profs and at school research centres etc) many folks get scholarship (not super high but still meaningful amounts) in 2nd year. I heard of these from 3-4 current students. They were clear that these aren't big numbers, but basically said you will not be spending more on school in 2nd year than you did in first, unless you start travelling/partying significantly more. Some of those students actually did, after having secured offers. Have you heard such things too?
3) Some schools will co-sign for your 2nd year loans based on GPA etc - have heard from a current student that this is the case for tuck at least. This significantly moves interest rates downwards for internationals. Have you heard things that back this up/contradict this?

bb · Answer

MikeD727  - what did you end up doing and deciding? 😎

bb · Answer

I was talking about additional = beyond what is specified in the budget. The loans are based on the max budget provided by school each year. I was also talking specifically about a situation of when someone is looking to borrow only a portion of the funding so instead of borrowing 80% year 1 and 80% year 2, my suggestion is to borrow 100% in year 1 and then decide what you want to do in year 2. My statement was taken out of context

I have heard of promises and potential of "we may award you a named scholarship but it is only for students, so we will only consider you once you accept the offer and pay a deposit... " but never actually heard of anyone getting a scholarship after they matriculated.... I think this highly depends on the program and potentially if you have a very fancy one there may be some named scholarships for specific applicants or with specific background after you matriculate. However, I am yet to meet a person who got one of these scholarships. Perhaps one day I will. As a rule, schools like to front-load the financial aid because it allows them to bring in better students and potentially can be a huge difference for someone so all assistantships and other kinds of fellowships are usually given upfront during the admission timeframe. I have not heard of schools handing out dollar bills

most of the folks I knew took on campus jobs of some kind to help offset their costs. In terms of money for the first year vs. second year, I think the costs should be consistent. You will no longer need to purchase all of your housewares, sheets, setup your house, etc in the second year so you can save that. You also will have some $$ from an internship in the summer hopefully but that's going to be drowned by your summer expenses that are NOT counted in the student loan budget as I learned the hard way 😬 You get much better handle of your finances the second year and know which recruiting trips to go on or not and which parties to skip. In general your spending will be consistent in both years - it will be to the bottom of your account

because there is always an event, there is always a trip, and always a study abroad or a new iPhone... I have not heard of Tuck providing a cosigner option for 2nd year students. However, it does not mean it is not so if I have not heard. I have not heard of a lot of things probably

Many of the top 20 schools have had relationships with local credit unions and their own financing programs that allowed them to offer co-signer free loans to international students. Over the last 5 or so years, Prodigy has pretty much eliminated this need since they would offer funding for almost anyone for the Top 20 MBA programs. Then during the pandemic there was a hickup in processing for a few months and lots of people almost got stranded when they could not get their loans issued on time. This all got resolved and fixed but a few folks were pretty scared or deferred their start. So I can see programs wanting to restart relationships and have in-house financing to make their programs more attractive but I have no idea why they would only do it for the 2nd year students and not first... if they do it, it is a nice thing I have not see any mention of this on their site, so I would check with AdCom about this during their admitted student event or after you get admitted. The level of communication and focus is pretty high for admitted folks.

1473 · Answer

bb

Thanks for taking the time. Understand about the first question.

On the second question, agree it does sound like future promises to help with securing yield but basis conversation with more than a few l 2Ys I'm fairly confident there are small amounts granted. These are usually in the 10-20k range so definitely not significant.

On the third, prodigy is notoriously unreliable. The only thing that I've heard has worked reliably with them is if they pay out the first tranche, and then cause problems you can simply tell them that seeking to wriggle out of their commitments will give you the option to wriggle out of yours. When threatened with non-payment they seem to come around. Still, there seems to be a fair amount of time spent in back and forth with them for the unfortunate candidates who get caught up in this.

Posted from my mobile device

bb · Answer

Hm.... this is not what I am hearing. I have not seen or heard comments like that since the pandemic when there was a complete stop to travel, visas, and loans. People were in some sticky situations but I have heard that all of them got resolved. It was not easy but they got resolved. Now you are reference things like co-signing 2nd-year loans (why not first year?) by Tuck, Schools giving out free money (10-20K is a significant amount by the way - that's a 6-month budget for living expenses for most schools. If you give that to 20% of the class, that's potentially $500K-1M. That's something every MBA program should shout about to their admitted students, so why are they not doing it?), and also Prodigy deciding to not fund a student in the second year, thus potentially risking their expulsion, and not ever collecting their first year loan balance back ... I can imagine having to jump some hoops from time to tome, but these seem to be a collection of horror stories from hell

. I am not saying they are not possible but it just seems contrary to what one would be motivated to do. What is the source of these?

1473 · Answer

Hi  bb ,

I agree, perhaps these ideas are illogical and maybe I am super misinformed.

All the questions you raise are valid and I don't really have an answer for those.

Apologies for my lack of further information. I will try my best to find out more and if I do, will be happy to share with you.

PS: Think you edited your post. I can't see the part where you called out the lack of logic in what I had said. I wrote this response in the morning and tried to check these things with my friends again. Unfortunately, could not get answers to your questions but my friends are standing behind the facts they relayed to me. I'm just as confused as you.

bb · Answer

Thank you. Yes, i have proof-read my post after posting and edited within the first few mins to make it more friendly as it read confrontational to me (sorry about that - that was not the intent; I was simply pointing things out). And please correct me where I am wrong if you get additional background or details. I think the more information we have, the more we can confirm, the better everyone's experience will be!

daldilaimi · Answer

Hello, Mike.

I understand the challenge. I'm sorry you're having to deal with that. I believe the choice is straightforward. Kellogg is the best match for you based on your professional goals. Chicago is surrounded by an outstanding entrepreneurial ecosystem. Although Hanover is near to Silicon Alley (New York City, Boston, etc...), Tuck is recognized for being a consulting school.

I hope you've made your choice and are satisfied with it. Best wishes, and please keep us updated! I'm pulling for you!

Tuck ($40k total) vs. Kellogg (full price)

Which should I choose?

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