There are two things you should do, one for banking and one for the next step:
On banking, set up an appointment with Xavier Sztenjberg, who basically is the leader, heart and soul of WSFM. Tell him everything. The advice above is all very good. Kill your self your first semester and first year, as those are the grades that matter. Oh, and I am shocked by people who don’t read the paper. Pretty much everyone on Wall Street are voracious consumers of news. Young people (not you) read instagram. The key for NY is some blend of the WSJ, the NYT and the NY post.
You will never get into the buy side without a good banking job, so focus there.
A very good point was made above that it’s not typical for somebody to jump from banking to PE from the associate ranks. I agree with that in general, but if you look at PE shops that have specialization, a lot of the laterals they take from banks have experience in banking in a subsector. So, in consumer that is the LCatts and the TSGs, BX tac ops just hired a guy from Lazard to lead financial services, etc…. I also agree that the energy shops in TX can be more forgiving, but that means you are in Houston not NY (and, while my heart is in Texas, my ass is in NYC). Most folks in PE were analysts in a bank for 2 or 3 years, and that is it. So, you will need to be smart. One idea is to find Ken Wiles, who leads the PE effort at UT. Get an appointment with him and start networking with some of the folks he recommends.
Oh, and if you want to go into PE, you pretty much have to be in a M&A focused banking job. They are not hiring from the ECM team…
first things first, get the best IB job you can.