Friday, July 23, 2010

A Year In Review

With the Class of 2011’s summer internship almost half over, I had a little bit of downtime and was reflecting on the Booth experience I have had thus far.

Unquestionably, career services was on the forefront of my mind – both because they helped me prepare for and land my current internship in consulting, but also because they have already starting engaging our class for fall recruiting.

While it might seems trivial, having recently experienced MBA recruiting, I now truly understand how competitive the process can be and how helpful it is land a job that you really enjoy straight out of business school. Booth Career Services is more helpful in facilitating this goal than I ever imagined. From sitting down and discussing long-term career options, to facilitating impressive on-campus and off-campus representation from the world’s leading companies, there is no doubt in my mind, that Booth has one of the best Career Services departments in the world (as we enter into the Fall quarter, I will unquestionably talk more about my experiences with Career Services).

Equally impressive are the 550+ fellow classmates I can easily call friends. From backgrounds spanning working at the White House to playing in the NFL, I am surrounded by an equally ambitious and talented group of people who are, as it turns out, also incredibly fun to hang out with (I will be creating a Facebook account to highlight the social aspect of Booth… while it is common knowledge that Booth has an impressive academic reputation, it is time we shed some light on the fact that it is also a group of individuals that really enjoy having a good time – look for the Facebook group early in the Fall).

Finally, as I progress through my internship, I am being exposed to areas and topics that really interest me. While I am learning as much about them as I can, it is nice to know that when the school year starts again, Booth’s flexible curriculum (yes those cliché words that we hear so often) is going to let me really hone in on those areas. For me, this means I am going to be able to purse an operational concentration, and more specifically, will have the ability to take a linear programming class (optimization), that I feel will help me stand apart in the field.

All in all, halfway though the internship, I couldn’t be gladder I am a Booth student. Hopefully you want to read more about the Booth experience. If so, please use the survey on the right to tell me what you want to hear about or shoot an email to Booth.DSAC@gmail.com. As one final FYI, once the school year starts, these posting will become significantly more frequent.

Take care,
Todd

3 comments:

  1. How competitive is the environment out there? I often here about marvelous student body, how friendly and helpful everybody is... BUT, it's business school and you have to be ambitious and competitive in order to succeed, don't you?

    So, where does the thin line between friendliness and ambitiousness go in Booth?

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  2. Hi Guys! I am a prospective student and here to know more about Booth.

    Great initiative to start this thread and overall the Booth website gives a lot of insight into the activities and academics at Booth. I was hoping if any one of you can share your experience in Booth till now. I mean when you entered you would have gone for the lead program, how did it benefit you. After that choosing the courses within major concentrations in the first year, and then the totally flexible curriculum in the second year. What kind of guidance was provided from Booth community, apart from interacting with co-students for seeking a fitment of courses with your Goals.

    Basically, if you can write about your "Life at Booth" it would really help us get a better understanding of the resources and expectations from the institute.

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  3. Booth has great professors and pretty good career services but the program itself does not add as much value as you would expect a top 20 business college would. Reason is the administrative staff (including the adcom) and the rules they impose on students. I am a current Booth student and if I could go back in time, I would rather pick schools that add true value such as Columbia or Tepper or even Emory.

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