Latest reviews

I found the course through the Baruch MFE program. The course helped me to understand the concepts of OOP and generic programming quite smoothly, especially through the exercises, which are extremely well designed. Before the course I had little programming experience and was especially afraid of OOP, but now it seems like an easy concept.

If you're considering the UC Berkeley MFE programme, ask yourself this: are you prepared to spend a fortune and 12 months of your life navigating chaos, incompetence, and institutional gaslighting? Because that's what you're signing up for.

Let’s not sugarcoat this—the programme is a mess, top to bottom. During my time here, we had three executive directors in under a year. For half that time, there wasn’t even anyone leading career services. It felt like no one knew—or cared—what was going on. Students were left scrambling for jobs while the leadership played musical chairs and patted themselves on the back for “long-term vision.”

And let’s talk about cheating—because the programme certainly won’t. It’s everywhere. Students share answers, submit work they didn’t do, and openly collude on take-home exams. No one stops it. Why would they? The system practically rewards it. The administration turns a blind eye.

The career services “function” is a joke. For months, there was no one running it. When they finally hired someone, they somehow found the least qualified person imaginable.

The students are smart. But many are out for blood.It’s a shark tank—and not the fun kind. There’s no sense of community. No shared ambition. It’s survival of the sneakiest, and if you stumble, you’re on your own. Don't expect help, empathy, or even basic decency from some of your classmates.

This programme is living off an outdated reputation and the UC Berkeley name. It is broken at its core—academically, administratively, and culturally. You will not be supported. You will not be protected. You will not be told the truth.

I came into the Berkeley MFE programme expecting world-class instruction, strong career support, and a collaborative student environment. Unfortunately, what I found was a disorganised, poorly managed, and at times, downright demoralising experience.

Let’s start with leadership. In just one year, the programme cycled through THREE executive directors. For six months, there wasn’t even a career services director—an unbelievable failure for a programme that advertises career outcomes as one of its main strengths. During this time, students were left completely unsupported at a crucial stage of their job search.

To make matters worse, the programme office, led by Diane, made life difficult for students whose ambitions didn’t align with the office’s narrow view of acceptable career paths. I’ve never seen an administrator act so openly against student interests. Rather than supporting students in their goals, Diane and her team seemed to actively discourage independence, even when students were working hard to secure top-tier roles on their own.

Academics: Promising but Poorly Executed

The coursework itself is interesting, and some professors are genuinely excellent. The problem lies in the delivery. Cramming such dense material into eight-week modules makes real learning incredibly difficult. There's barely time to absorb the basics before you're thrown into exams or rushed group projects.

Even more concerning is the culture around academic integrity. Cheating is widespread—and worse, tolerated. The system unintentionally encourages students to game assignments and collaborate unethically. There’s no incentive to learn properly when it’s so much easier—and more effective—to cut corners. Linda, who is supposed to uphold academic standards, seems largely indifferent.

Career Services: A Stunning Letdown

To describe the current state of career services as "non-existent" would be to offer an unearned compliment. Career support, at present, is a disaster. Several students who landed roles at leading hedge funds or quant firms did so entirely on their own. In some cases, the MFE office actually stood in the way. When Ann Marie was finally hired to lead career services, many hoped things would improve. They didn’t. She lacked even basic knowledge of the finance world—unable to distinguish between banks and hedge funds, unfamiliar with firms like BNP Paribas, and utterly unaware of what quantitative roles entail. She encouraged students to apply to unrelated start-ups in San Francisco, which felt like a complete misunderstanding of our goals.

The new programme director, Dr. Ananth Madhavan, appears more enamoured with abstract curricular reform than with the immediate and pressing needs of job-seeking students. His “long-term vision” may bear fruit someday, but it offers little comfort to the current cohort staring down fast-approaching graduation dates.

To her credit, Linda has an uncanny knack for securing placements—but only for those lucky enough to fall within her circle of favour. If you’re considering this programme, take note: success may depend less on merit and more on the quality of your flattery.

And let me be clear: the placement numbers the programme advertises are heavily manipulated, if not blatantly false. They are designed to impress prospective students and recruiters, not to reflect the truth.

Cohort and Culture: Competitive to a Fault

The cohort is undeniably smart. But the culture is cutthroat. Students don’t share resources, don’t help each other, and in some cases, actively withhold information to gain an edge. One student, for example, accepted a job in January but kept his résumé in circulation, gathering ten offers—each one taking away an opportunity from someone else. It’s every man (or woman) for themselves, and if you're expecting a collaborative or supportive group of peers, you're in for a rude awakening.

Final Verdict

Unless you have absolutely no better option, I would not recommend the UC Berkeley MFE. You’ll likely leave the programme frustrated, possibly underprepared, and without meaningful support in your job search. The teaching has potential, but is rushed. The career services are dysfunctional. The office politics are exhausting. And the community is anything but supportive.

If you're serious about a future in quantitative finance or asset management, I would strongly advise looking at other top programmes—Princeton, CMU, Columbia, or Chicago all offer better structure, fairer environments, and more reliable career support. Berkeley may have the brand, but right now, the programme is not living up to it.

I had a really good experience throughout the entire course. I came in with zero formal training in programming, and now I feel that I have a good understanding. The course forum was very valuable, as well as the TA's feedback. I definitely recommend this course for those looking to learn C++ with a focus on Financial Engineering applications.

I took this course in preparation for applying to Financial Engineering programs, and found it directly through QuantNet.

The MS in Financial Engineering program at Lehigh University is a rigorous and well-structured program that effectively combines finance, mathematics, and computational methods to prepare students for careers in quantitative finance, risk management, and financial technology. With a comprehensive curriculum covering stochastic processes, derivatives pricing, machine learning, and fixed income, the program ensures a strong theoretical and practical foundation. Lehigh’s renowned faculty, industry connections, career support services and practical projects provide students with valuable insights, networking opportunities, and strong job prospects. The state-of-the-art computational resources and collaborative learning environment further enhance the academic experience. The program Manager also support students in their job search. Given its academic excellence, industry relevance, and career preparation, I highly recommend Lehigh’s MSFE program to anyone seeking a successful career in quantitative finance.

The course proved important to get a solid understanding of the basics of C/C++. It was easy to follow with logical structure and exercises that helped you to understand the content well. The support throughout the course was excellent, always responding in a timely manner.

Lehighs MFE program is a great way to both grow your quant finance skills and connect with professionals for career opportunities.

The program is designed to educate as well as get a hands-on experience through diversified projects. Excellent courses that challenge you and projects that force you to rise. The professors help out a lot and there are numerous opportunities for networking.

The classes were very rigorous is you decide to take the good ones, especially from ISyE. There are some legendary professors in that department(Obviously as ISyE is always ranked #1). As someone with prior hedge fund experience I had a clear idea of what gaps I had, Gatech courses helped me to fill those gaps.
The scheller business courses were not really useful. At least to me. But some courses were fun as the students are much more diverse than a typical ISyE class.
Also a big shoutout to career services. Helped me stay on top of my game.

I learned about this course through the Quantitative Investment Association at our school. At that time, I was chatting with my colleagues and we mentioned how slow Monte Carlo simulations are when using Python. They recommended that I learn C++, especially the C++ course on QuantNet. Overall, the experience has been great! I have learned many important programming concepts and made new strides in my journey into quantitative finance.

"Ever wonder what it's really like to step into the world of Wall Street, after all that studying? That's exactly what the MFE class of 2025 got to experience this fall. Imagine going from classroom theories to actually applying them in a high-stakes environment. And guess what? Every single student – 100%! – landed internships at a diverse range of companies, from big investment banks to fast-paced trading floors."

The Berkeley MFE blog posted this on their blog today. I have been talking to a lot of students from the class of 2025, and this is a lie. About 20% of the batch did not have any internship this fall, and they had to work with profs during the fall break.

I understand there have been a number of leadership changes in the program, but the problem needs to take accountability for their lazy approach towards career services.

PS: The only shining light in the armour is Linda, without her this program would be dead

Graduating this year. I used to keep quiet the last 10 month, until I learned that career person left this week, again, in less than three months working for nothing. Honestly, career service here deserves a 1-star rating (would give 0 if I could).

It’s shocking how the school and program selected an Executive Director and Career Director, only for both to leave after just three months. Maybe they just did a 3-month intern here or maybe this whole situation is just a lesson MFE is trying to teach their students (or anyone reading this):
1. If something is wrong, it’s probably even worse than you think—so take your time and walk away.
2. If you landed a job mainly because of MFE connections with BlackRock or some other partner on certain projects, you can be let go just as fast, market will speak and do the correction very swiftly.

Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if the new Executive Director takes the same route to leave tomorrow—imho, it might be the smartest move to avoid further embarrassment. Former ED Linda kept begging alumni to give the class some jobs (clearly she did not trust this new ED) - I hope this will help me and other people (80% still got 0 offer).

The course is very well-structured and extremely useful. The active users from the forum and TA make the whole learning experience more comfortable. I found out about this course first when I browsed on QuantNet, at that time I did not realize how useful this website is.

Professors/course instruction: The course material generally leans towards more theoretical and much of the content takes an academic approach. You may use more complex versions of formulas or take assumptions that are not true in real markets or that you would see as a junior at work, but I found this very helpful for deeper understanding when applying said material to real scenarios that are imperfect. Professors in this program are excellent and students are able to take cross-listed courses with other departments as well (notably, CS/Stats). Excellent faculty includes Roger Lee, Seb Donadio, Greg Lawler, Brian Boonstra, and Alex Popovici. Other students also especially liked Mark Hendricks - personally, his teaching style didn't work out for me. Special shoutout to Lek-Heng's optimization class as well.

Students: made a lot of lasting friends here. It's a large cohort so there is a bit of variance in seriousness and background, but you will find that there are many very talented students. Met a couple of guys here who are possibly the brightest I've run into, you know who you are.

Career outcomes: overall excellent. A fair number of students are headed to leading hedge funds and proprietary trading firms. I would say that this program helped me with landing a trading role and understanding markets on a deeper level.

S/o Meredith