There are something I can understand and some else I can’t agree in the previous reviews. But basically, I would like to share my personal experience with the program as a 2018 cohort student going for a math finance PhD.
Courses are indeed very rigorous, but not in a bad way
The program comes with a very rigorous line of math courses in math finance, getting you well prepared for an application to a PhD in this field, but I think even for getting a job. I didn’t go through the entire job seeking process, but I did do several online assesments from those quant big names. I can say most (if not all) of the math questions in OA’s and interviews are well covered in course materials. So most of what you learned from class is actually necessary for a quant interview. (You might not use them later in work, but they definitely appear in tests.) Sometimes advanced topics are introduced, but not included in the exams, so don’t seem add your workload too much.
Course selection is flexible
Don’t know why the other post says not, maybe vary from personal experience. Quant program students have almost highest priority in course enrollment within math and stats department (and relatively high priority as Rackham grad students in other departments). And our director of the program is actually quite flexible on the curriculum, as long as you can provide him with a clear plan of yourself. Also, beginning from my cohort many students graduated with a certificate in data science, recently even a secondary master in applied statistics or data science is available.
Instructors are caring
I think it’s very very unfair to say that they don’t care about the students. Umich math department has a strong group of math finance, our courses are all taught by active researchers in the field. Some of them might be unfamiliar with the job market as they mainly live academic lives, but this does not necessarily suggest they are not nice. I once had an instructor who held his helpful office hours as long as lecture times.
Building good foundation for PhD preparation
This point has been repeated even by those who don’t quite like this program. Other than rigorous math courses and wonderful faculty members in the field of math finance, I also would like to mention the rich academic resource at Umich. As a public university strong in almost all subjects, Umich holds a variety of seminars in related areas like math, stats, economy and business. Especially for math finance, not all university can hold a biweekly seminar specifically focussing on math finance.
