Need help with choosing a school - UNC or Gtown?

[shaselai]

I am down to UNC and Gtown as my 2 final choices to go to and need some help in choosing one over the other - below are some stats i grabbed from usnews rankings for reference:
UNC:
Full time employed at grad/3months: 60.3%/78.6%
Full time grad 270
Consulting 26 - avg. 105k
finance 67 - avg 90k
Notable recruiters taken from brochure (3+ hire) : amazon, american express, bank of america, barclays, credit suise, cse consulting, deloitte, goldman, IBM, Intel, JPMorgan, Boston consulting group, wells fargo securities
Link to recruiters but 2009 stats
https://www.kenan-flagler.unc.edu/Progra ... ecruit.cfm

GTown:
Full time employed at grad/3months: 58%/88.1%
Full time grad 238
Consulting 46 - avg. 97k
finance 51 - avg 93k
Notable recruiters (hired more than 1): American express, bank of america, Beiersdorf, booz allen, capgemini, citi, deloitte, morgan stanley, pwc,accenture, wells fargo, world bank
https://students.msb.edu/admissions/empl ... rofile.pdf



I have the finance and consulting figures here to show the 2 areas i am interested in but I am more interested in Consulting right now though. Seems Gtown has more grads with jobs post MBA (3 months) than UNC but i think it might be due to the area in DC though? GTown also seems to have more students in consulting and finance in terms of percentage of total full time grads so I am not sure if that means UNC is not ideal for consulting or not? UNC seems to have more company selection in consulting and finance than gtown..

Please help me out ... thanks!

[Lisa Anderson]

Dear shaselai,

Congratulations on your offers! You can make a decision purely on placement statistics, but I don't know that it is the best approach as placement statistics are not the best indicator of your future success. These statistics are helpful in terms of information about industry connections and where graduates go to work, but the type of job you secure at the end of your MBA program is ultimately determined by you. Being in Washington, DC is an advantage for Georgetown at the moment as many graduates are probably taking positions with firms working with the federal government or are taking positions with the federal government; all of the consulting firms have government practices, so that makes sense. If you are interested in doing consulting work with the federal government, then Georgetown is more geographically desirable. However, I would bet many UNC grads are being hired into those practices as well as NC is not that far.

In my humble opinion, I advise you to broaden the criteria for your decision to include other factors about these programs like culture, curriculum, resources, and alumni connections. Business school is an intense 2 years where you will be immersed in the program, so you need to feel the culture is a good match for your personality and learning style. Both programs are excellent--you will receive a solid education and have access to consulting firms--but one might have stronger connections to the types of finance and consulting firms you are interested in than the other. Perhaps think about what you want and expect from your MBA experience and rank that list? Then you can evaluate the two programs against your list to see if one is a better match.

Good luck and all the best as you embark on your MBA journey,
Lisa