Landing a CA Firm Internship/Full Time

[CommerceGuy11]

Hi guys,

This is my first post :D. A little bit about me, i just finished my 2nd year as a accounting specialist at Rotman and I'm currently taking summer school. My goal is to become a CA when I graduate. My question concersn recruitment for the 3rd year summer internship.

I know that recruitment starts during the fall, so I'm assuming the CA firms see grades up to your second year summer semester. The thing is my CGPA and my ICAO gpa are both under the minimum of 2.7 (I messed up 1st year). My cgpa is 2.53 and icao gpa is 2.6 Im currently taking summer school to boost up my gpa's.

Now I was wondering if I had ANY shot at all. I mean, I pretty sure Im good with the customer service part (I have a sales associate position) and I was heavily involved with extracurriculars (Varsity Sport and Student Exec on a Commerce Group). I attended networking sessions, applied for the CA summer programs (but rejected from all).

[HTTP04]

Hi guys,

This is my first post :D. A little bit about me, i just finished my 2nd year as a accounting specialist at Rotman and I'm currently taking summer school. My goal is to become a CA when I graduate. My question concersn recruitment for the 3rd year summer internship.

I know that recruitment starts during the fall, so I'm assuming the CA firms see grades up to your second year summer semester. The thing is my CGPA and my ICAO gpa are both under the minimum of 2.7 (I messed up 1st year). My cgpa is 2.53 and icao gpa is 2.6 Im currently taking summer school to boost up my gpa's.

Now I was wondering if I had ANY shot at all. I mean, I pretty sure Im good with the customer service part (I have a sales associate position) and I was heavily involved with extracurriculars (Varsity Sport and Student Exec on a Commerce Group). I attended networking sessions, applied for the CA summer programs (but rejected from all).

Going to be brutally honest here

With that GPA and lack of work experience, unless you have mad connections, Big 4 is out of the question.

Best plan of action, imo, network your ***** off (I cannot emphasize this point any further) get a position at a smaller audit/accounting firm then hopefully leverage that experience + network to break into Big 4

[Cryptic_Soul]

the above post is right, if you icao average is under the minimum then CA intern positions are out of the question.
The only thing you can do is work your ***** off in third yr in order to get it above the minimum and apply the following yr to get the full time positions.

[bythehour]

Sort of.

Summer internships at the Big 4 are pretty much entirely based on GPA. It's not about hiring skills or giving you a well-rounded experience. It's about each firm locking up the brightest (on paper) students from each class.

Aside from that, your only other hope is nepotism.

I would suggest that you focus on getting a good summer job for next year, even if it is NOT in an accounting firm. Get some interesting life experience that will make you stand out come time to find a full-time job.

[Nucks]

They say GPA isn't as important as the personality and the experience.....except when it's that low. That will most definitely hurt you. No one really knows how it really works since it differs from firm to firm, but I believe the first cutoff is GPA and then the rest are pooled together and the ones that have friends, networked well, etc get pulled aside and then the rest get a quick glance from the reviewer.

With that GPA, unless you networked extremely well or know someone, chances are it wouldn't even get reviewed. I've known some people with GPAs at that level to get into big4 but he was extremely charismatic. Ended up failing one of the modules twice and got laid off in the end though.

[bythehour]

For the summer intern positions, it's ALL about GPA. The firms want to skim the top the class.

For the full-time hires, it depends on the intake requirements. If the workload is there, they'll take anyone who has a decent GPA and won't embarrass the firm when they have lunch with a client.

[bluejazzy]

Maybe you should find a PT A/R A/P role. At least you'll have something. Big 4 is definitely out of the question, even if you know someone, everything will still run through multiple levels of people and departments.