College Fed Challenge opens doors for Lehigh senior

Mac McGuire ’15 has leveraged his participation in the College Fed Challenge competition into a full-time job with the private banking division at J. P. Morgan in New York.

McGuire, an economics major who plans to begin his new job July 8, was among five Lehigh students who participated in the Philadelphia Reserve Bank District regional competition, held last fall at Lafayette College. He credits the team competition, in which students analyze economic conditions and formulate hypotheses, with giving him an edge in his job search.

“It’s an incredible way to boost your resume and to gain a working knowledge of what’s going on in the economy,” said McGuire, 21, who competed in the challenge in both his junior and senior years.

“Employers love to hear that you’re passionate about the economy and that you have experience presenting your opinion on the economy to important, knowledgeable people.”

In the most recent challenge, McGuire portrayed William Dudley, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and vice-chairman of the Federal Open Market Committee. His Lehigh teammates took on other personas in their debate on U.S. economic policy, using extensive technical knowledge in the presentation. Scoring was based on economic analysis, the team’s responses to judges’ questions, teamwork and presentation.

The team prepared by making presentations at Barclays Investment Bank and Market News, with economists advising them on ways to strengthen arguments.

Although the team did not win the competition, McGuire said his participation helped him show his knowledge of macroeconomics in interviews with prospective employers, as well as demonstrate his ability to develop and test hypotheses about the economy. In every interview he had, he said, he was asked about the Fed Challenge, which he had included prominently on his resume.

“It allows you to let the interview play out naturally, in a way that highlights your strengths,” he said.

Alex Nikolsko-Rzhevskyy, assistant professor of economics, taught the three-credit course last fall that helped prepare the team for the competition. Also taking the course were students who provided research to get the team ready for the presentation.

In addition to working as a team, Nikolsko-Rzhevskyy said, students in the course learn how processes and events fit together, read a plethora of often-conflicting economic and financial reports, process and analyze information, and come up with their own views.

“If they are asked a question during a job interview, the Fed Challenge students not only know the ‘right’ answer, they can easily present several points of view and argue why their answer is the best,” he said. “Moreover, compared to most other students, their knowledge is never outdated, since [they] have to come up with an analysis of the most recent economic events.”

McGuire learned that firsthand. Even if interviewers did not always agree with him, he said, “I found that if you’re able to defend your position that always, always helps.”