Why did you attend the business school you did?

I was accepted to UC Berkeley when I was 16, but my parents couldn't really afford to send me and didn't want me living hundreds of miles away. So I attended community college for a year. With maximum class loads, including two summers, I was able to transfer as a junior to a local university. It did not have a great reputation for business, but I made the most of my time there by getting involved in extracurricular activities. There was also no recruiting program. I do feel like this set my career back.

Five years after graduation, I was working in the Finance department of a large company with tuition assistance, so I decided to get my MBA part time. There were two local options: 1) Sacramento State, which would be free to me and less rigorous, and 2) UC Davis, which would require loans and be difficult. I chose Davis for the small size, quality of the professors and curriculum, and great reputation. Although I will be paying off loans until I'm 55, I feel that I gained a high quality education that made up for my earlier choices. My fellow students were an extremely important factor.

When you choose a business school, you'll want to look at average GMAT scores and diversity measures like age, job function, and country of origin of entering students. You'll also look at the teaching staff. Most of them should have PhDs or another advanced degree. For instance, your business law professor will probably be an attorney with a JD and maybe an MBA. You may have some classes taught by post-grad students. Look at what the professors have published in academic journals and which text books they have contributed to. If you are interested in a specific area like hospital administration, there will be a limited number of schools that offer that focus. Of course, practical matters like geography and cost will influence your decision greatly.

Great question! I honestly took a less traditional course than most. Feeling that I would get lost in a big school, my freshman year I went to a small college that was very friendly and I aready knew a few people there. After being there though I recognized that it wasn't right for me. The only activities they had at that time were a few intramural sports, and one of those was drinking. After that first year I transferred to Illinois State University and I finished school there. I got involved in lots of activities there and was much happier, and the school had a widely recognized program for turning out quality graduates.

All schools have a reputation of being good or not for a specific area(s) of study. This is important too, is the school known for your field of study or not? Not to say that other schools don't offer those areas and provide a qulaity education, but if you go to a school known for theatre, and you are studying accounting there, the recruiters will not be going there looking for accounting graduates, this will put the job hunt much more on you at graduation. You will not be able to take advantage of recruiting events aimed at your area of study. at your school, you will have to do a lot more legwork to get that job.

Spend some time thinking about the whole college experience. Obviously academics are important, but it is about more than the academics. Are you the type that is very social and like to be involved with other activities - sports for the average person, student government, faternity/sorority, or whatever. Does the college have those activities as an option?

Another factor you should always consider, is of course the cost. There is nothing wrong with doing the basic classes in a community college and then transferring to a 4 yr college. In fact I encourage it cost wise especially if you are paying for college yourself. Your degree will not say anything about the fact that you did some classes at the community college. It just says you graduated from that college having met all the requirements for that degree.

Good Luck and I hope this helps!

Hi Rob M. from Atlanta!

Q. I'm a sophomore in high school and just starting to look into colleges to apply to next year. Are there certain schools you recommend I apply to if I want to ultimately have a successful career in business? I'm wondering why it is you chose to go to the school you did - what appealed to you? what did you love about it? do you recommend it?

A. Great question, and love the ambition. Grad school wasn't even on my mind when I was a sophomore, so commendable at that. I chose an undergraduate school where I felt I could afford the loans in the long term and I would have an enjoyable time while learning. You have to find a fine balance.

What I would do in your selection of a school is to think about what you can afford, consider the availability of scholarships, and start to investigate their business website. You can find sponsors or local businesses that the school is affiliated with and you feel carries a strong brand. Look for extracurricular activities that the business school involves themselves with as a means to understand how productive your time there will be.

My graduate school (MBA) is a whole other story. I had found employment after college and worked my way into a company for five years. They helped me pursue my MBA part time while I worked for them during the day. This is a great way to share the expense, build your resume, and develop incredible relationships. I eventually picked a school that was near my work, had fantastic accolades, and was known for having a superb business facility with state of the art applications.

The end story here is this. Look for a graduate program where someone else pays you to go( you will likely have some skin in the game, they want to share the risk). Do this by demonstrating your value to a company over time. Land the ability to demonstrate value by proving yourself in college. During college you go out of the way to take part in those extracurricular's. And lastly, you pick a school that had extracurricular's and academics that you felt were recognized by the community, you could afford this school, and you knew you could still have fun while you started your path to become rich and famous.

Keep working hard, love the ambition, don't take NO for an answer.

Congratulations on starting your college search - this is such an exciting time! For your undergraduate degree, I would look at the different majors at each school and try to talk to an advisor at that college to learn about the focus of each major. I went to UCSB (University of California - Santa Barbara) and double majored in Business-Economics/Accounting and Communication. For my business degree, I had many accounting courses, but also many theoretical economics courses. My brother went to the University of Colorado - Boulder, and his business major had similar accounting and economic courses, but instead of being theory focused, it included more real-world examples of successful businesses.

Most business/economics/accounting majors include a good mix of accounting, economics, and business classes, so you should get a well-rounded education in most Business or Economic majors.

I highly recommend a business degree. It helped me significantly when looking for my first job out of college (a lot of places I looked at asked for a Business, Engineering or other technical degree). It has also helped with other post-college financial certification exams.

Good luck applying in the coming year!