Moving from Puerto Rico to Chicago (Harvard, Time: credit, budget, rent)

[laurieb73]

Hi,

I'm planning to apply the University of Chicago next year to do an MBA. I wanna know how good is the MBA program? How is the city in terms of cost of living compared to other cities in general?. How good are the job opportunities in the marketing/advertising industry? Any advice would be great.

[chet everett]

While the MBA program at UofC is generally regarded as among the best in the world, it is extremely competitive and rather heavily biased toward those interested in the most rigorous finance careers. Almost 60% of grads pursue those areas. Given the huge upheaval in the global credit markets this winter there could be some dramatic shifts in hiring.

In terms of budget the UofC advises students that they should prepare to spend about $1500/ month on rent and a total budget of almost $75,000 per year while in school making it among the most costly options. The average student is about 28 yr. old and has over 5 years of work experience. About 30% of students are international.

The cross town rival, Northwestern, is generally regarded as a better bet for those intent on product marketing and/or advertising. It has very similar costs/demographics.

I've also tossed Harvard and Wharton on to compare:

BusinessWeek Online: Full-Time MBA Comparator 2006 (broken link)