You hear that McKinsey “cut its sophomore program.”
So you assume second-year recruiting is basically over.
That would make planning simpler.
It may also make you miss the point.
The label can change before the opportunity disappears.
As of September 2026, McKinsey's own university pages are not uniform: some currently list a Sophomore Summer Business Analyst opportunity, while others list only the regular Business Analyst and Summer Business Analyst paths. McKinsey also operates Connect with McKinsey for North American undergraduate and non-MBA master's students seeking future internship or full-time roles. In other words, you should verify your school, geography, and current eligibility rather than treating “the sophomore program is gone” as a universal rule.
Your mistake would be searching for one program name
Students often think early consulting recruiting works like this:
Find the sophomore program.
Apply to the sophomore program.
Get the sophomore internship.
But early recruiting is messier.
Different schools, offices, firms, and candidate groups can have different programs, timelines, events, and internship structures.
A program name disappearing from one page does not tell you that every second-year path disappeared with it.
Search for the outcome, not the brand name.
Your outcome is simple: get closer to a junior-summer consulting internship.
That may involve an early internship, a discovery program, networking, another firm's sophomore opportunity, or simply building a stronger profile before the main cycle.
For the broader route, use Sophomore Pathway to Consulting.
Second year is useful even when you do not land consulting
This is the part ambitious students resist.
A sophomore internship does not have to say “consulting” to improve your consulting candidacy.
Suppose you spend the summer at a startup and own a market analysis.
Or at a nonprofit and redesign an operating process.
Or in corporate strategy and build a recommendation for leadership.
Or in research and turn messy evidence into a decision.
Those experiences can create something the consulting resume needs badly:
Evidence that somebody trusted you with a problem.
| What you might chase | What recruiters can actually use | The better sophomore question |
|---|---|---|
| Consulting logo | Demonstrated impact | What did you change? |
| Famous employer | Real responsibility | What did you own? |
| Perfect title | Analytical proof | What did you solve? |
| “Business” internship | Leadership signal | Who did you influence? |
The logo helps.
The story survives longer.
Your sophomore year can also buy information
There is another reason to start early.
You can discover whether you actually like consulting before junior recruiting becomes intense.
Talk to analysts. Attend events. Try a case. Explore different firms. Learn what an engagement really looks like.
Then when the major internship cycle begins, you are not making a career decision from a job description.
You have evidence.
If you specifically want to understand which early opportunities may exist beyond one McKinsey pathway, Consulting Internships for Sophomores takes that next step.
The vanished-program panic points at the wrong problem
Suppose your preferred sophomore program truly is unavailable to you.
You still have roughly a year before the next major recruiting decision.
That is not an empty year.
It is runway.
Build one substantial experience. Create measurable impact. Meet people who can explain the process. Learn the basics of case interviews without turning sophomore year into a twelve-month casing marathon.
You do not need the perfect second-year internship.
You need to arrive at the next recruiting cycle with stronger evidence than you have today.
The program name was never the real asset.
What you build before junior recruiting is.