The Second Year Sprint

As 2012 draws to a close, Nupur Bhargava reflects on the first quarter of her second year at Booth. Life as a second year is certainly action-packed, but in a different way than it was during first year, as Nupur describes.

Dana
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Happy holidays!! It’s been a while since my last post and as the year draws to a close I thought it might be a good idea to reflect on the quarter gone by.

This quarter felt a lot calmer than my first year at Booth in some ways, and a lot more hectic in others. On the calmer side, getting used to Chicago being home played a big role. When I came back this year I looked forward to being in the city, seeing my friends and navigating my way from downtown to Harper Center again. I knew what the weather would be like, and I knew how to find cheap coursepacks (thanks to a classmate, Farhan Ahmed, who created boothsell.com!) and I just felt a great deal more comfortable. Recruiting, on the other hand, did come a little bit faster and more intensely than first year. Whereas first year recruiting was more of a marathon, second year recruiting was a full-out sprint for a month. After our summer internships, most of us came back with a better answer to ‘what do I want to do when I grow up?’ or in many cases ‘what I definitely don’t want to do when I grow up’, which was important, as we needed to quickly act on these thoughts in order to secure full time positions. A large percentage of my friends have found jobs and our overall anxiety levels are significantly reduced.

The good news is the lightning fast sprint was over quickly and allowed me plenty of time to get to know lots of first-year students. It’s amazing how the caliber of students gets better each year, and I have to say I was completely blown away by the accomplishments and stories of many of the first years. My job now is to assist them in polishing and tailoring their stories to effectively navigate the first year recruiting marathon that they will go through in Winter Quarter. Helping many with resume reviews and coffee chats about the summer this fall was both rewarding and nostalgic, as I could remember going through the very same process last year and the people that helped me so much during that time. I’m very happy to pay it forward and am sure the tradition will continue!

Outside of the official work, be it classes or resume reviews, it has been fantastic to relax a little bit with my fellow classmates; whether it’s a game of Taboo, a quick Thanksgiving trip to Jamaica, or a night out in Chicago with my closest friends, it’s been a great quarter to further strengthen the bonds with my classmates, and I look forward to continuing to do so in the last couple of quarters we have left before we enter the big bad “REAL WORLD”!

In keeping with the holiday spirit, I wanted to have some fun and do a Booth fall quarter summary in numbers for me:
Number of admissions applications read (I'm an Admissions Fellow) = 24
Number of on-campus recruitment interviews conducted = 5
Number of coffee chats with first years = 8
Number of resume reviews done for first years = 15
Number of case interviews with fellow second years = 45
Number of books read (non-coursework related) = 1
Number of house parties attended = 15
Number of movies watched in the AMC theatre near Gleacher Center = 10
Number of holidays planned = 4 (executed 2, 2 more being figured out)

Happy holidays and good luck with the applications, especially as the Booth Round 2 (Jan. 9!) deadline draws closer!