Firstly, Notre Dame wasn't my first choice when applying. However, 7 months into the program if I had to pick first choice again, I'd pick ND any day. Here are a few reasons why:
1. The brand
Internationals, ND is a huge brand. It's just crazy how much brand power ND has here. No matter which part of the US I am in, people know and respect the ND brand (Some may trash their football team, though!) It is commanding. I had no problem talking to recruiters in any company since I never had to explain how good ND is.
2. People
ND attracts some top talent, and importantly, everyone is really friendly and helpful. There is no sense of competition - classmates are not trying to one-up the other. Its very collaborative and people genuinely care for each other. I already know that some of the people I've met here are going to be amongst my closest friends for a long long time.
3. Location
Sounds crazy, yeah. South Bend? I love the place. It's close enough to Chicago to allow opportunities to travel there for networking while also being so cheap to live in. Besides, this place is so awesome during home football games. When you see thousands of passionate fans streaming in to campus, the ND pride starts to become real.
The professors, by and large, are good. Some are truly exceptional, while some are ordinary. Irrespective of whether you like their teaching style or not, these are respected academicians, invited by leading news organizations to comment.
Classes are lecture based and perhaps more emphasis on cases would have been nice.
Career services used to be a weak link. But they are now truly trying to transform themselves. They've made some great hires into the team, including an ex-recruiter from Apple and things should be much better.
For our batch, they didn't begin on-campus recruiting till January to align with other schools.
For me, I did a lot of my internship search myself.
FYI - I already have an internship - so if you put in some work, you can get one fairly quick.
Overall BSchool experience (5.0)
Schools contribution (4.0)
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