It was a thursday. November ninth. Six days after my older sister’s 20th birthday, she was in Arizona for a presentation just four days ago. She was back by now. She showed me a picture of her with a cactus they had a lot of those there.

I did know what to expect of the careers panel, because there is an entire facebook event dedicated to it. It would be a career panel of baruch alumni who work in the field of finance. They did not even all work on or near wall street itself, but I guess the name just relates to the finance aspect of their jobs and its relation to wall street. I am considering following the path of some of these panelist and also working in wall street related field. So I thought this would be a good chance to see some steps I may need to take to be successful.

The panelist started off by all telling a little about themselves. All of them, but one were relatively young having graduated in the last 20 years. One lady had graduated in 1990, so was a fair bit older than the rest. Another panelist told about his original plan to become a rapper, and his transition to finance after that failed. He started his own financial management company so he deserves some props. Many of them tried a different field first and later switched to their current profession. A younger female panelist started as an accounting major, found it boring and became an investment banker. Another asian gentleman, who talked very quietly, did very poorly in high school and was still able to succeed in finance, because he liked the creative aspects of it, and the math as well.

Much more was explained, and the panel was very interesting and insightful. The main take aways was “perseverance” as one of the panelist pointed out. The panelist emphasized taking full advantage of all baruch had to offer. And so, I will.