Latest reviews

I studied mathematics at a well-regarded but non-target university in the U.S. and initially got no interviews in quant finance. The only major change on my resume for the Fall 2024 recruiting season was this program, and the impact was immediate—I received interviews for qr from around 20 firms, including banks, hedge funds, prop shops, and exchanges. I progressed to the Superday at four of them, where the material from classes, as well as insights from professors, TAs, and peers, proved extremely useful. I got two offers.

While some courses were more interesting and applicable than others, none felt like a total waste of time, and several were particularly enjoyable. The program also provided strong recruiting support, including company visits, networking events, and direct engagement from firms that expressed a preference for program participants. The structured interview prep, resume curation, and active alumni network were particularly helpful, with alumni being highly responsive and willing to assist.

The curriculum includes a mix of core courses—typically heavy on mathematical foundations like stochastic processes and time-series analysis—along with electives that allow for specialization in areas such as derivatives trading, machine learning, and hedge fund strategies.

Overall, the program significantly boosted my recruiting prospects.

I finished my undergrad in Asia and secured multiple opportunities by joining this program as follows.

1. Interviews: BoA, JPMC, BnP, BlackRock, Fidelity, Akuna, DRW, ...
2. Internship offers: three of them
3. Online Assessments: Almost every company, except only Jane Street, Citadel Securities. (But I believe this was due to my undergrad background rather than the program itself.)

This program is definitely a target school, and it offers an excellent career service program, including:
1. Company visiting events (in-person) for major firms in NY, such as BoA.
2. A curated list of 2025 full-time/internship positions compiled by the career center.
3. Mentorship and virtual technical interview sessions organized by the department.
4. A lot of alumni events, hosting great people from good companies like citadel, millennium, etc.

The curriculum is also outstanding. We cover in-depth theoretical topics in stochastic calculus, which are not typically included in other top MFE programs. The program also offers a high degree of flexibility—you can choose courses from across the campus, and even take Ph.D. courses if approved. While achieving high grades is competitive, it is definitely worth the effort.

I understand that some may be concerned about the recent surge in reviews. However, this was due to the challenges we faced last year when our program director left. Our new director, Choi, is highly passionate, possesses both academic and professional expertise, and is committed to improving student placements. He is looking for excellent students.

I highly recommend you this program.

** Admissions Process
The program is extremely competitive and when I applied I could not
get an interview even as a re-admit.
** courses
Good mix of strong math and statistics in the introductory courses
generally taught by full time but not yet tenured faculty. Adjunct faculty
teach more advanced trading and portfolio management oriented courses in
their area of expertise. These courses usually have a project that you
can talk about in interviews. Almost all adjunct faculty are at bulge
bracket investment banks or large hedge funds.
** career services
Career services are excellent which is super important in a tough job
market. They are constantly searching for jobs and firms willing to
take a chance on non-traditional students (career changers, immigrants
and older students)

** Advanced Seminars

This program is strongest in Probability and Stochastic Processes.
Research faculty, both tenured and term, are extremely
active. Karatzas' class on Probability and Analysis is not to be
missed. Additionally, the math department hosts Minerva Lectures (this
semester given by Rama Cont, editor of Mathematical Finance), the
Optimal Stopping Seminar (think early exercise of American Options)
and the Optimal Transport Reading Group (think spread options and
Cheapest to Deliver). The statistics department also hosts a seminar
on Mathematical Finance.

** Workload

You are going to work hard, feel inadequate and be convinced of
impending doom. But that is when the faculty and the admin are there
for you pushing you but also telling you that it will be OK. I still
can't believe I graduated.

** Overall

Downside...the program is expensive. However, if you think education
(especially in finance) is expensive, you should try ignorance.

In short, I believe that the program is a great stepping stone for any future quant: A wide spectrum of courses taught mainly by industry professionals, combined with an outstanding career service, provides ambitious students with plenty of opportunities to specialize and network. That said, the program does (as many of the previous comments have already mentioned) promote students' individual initiative. Throughout the three semesters, you will not find many courses with mandatory attendance during class or extensive 'review' classes in the first semester that ensure all students are on the same level regarding math, programming, or finance.

Now for a more detailed review. First, the broad range of courses offers any student plenty of opportunities to improve on skills they lack and to further specialize in fields of particular interest. Program management is also very supportive of counting relevant credits obtained from other graduate faculties towards the final degree, offering an even wider range of courses available to students (e.g., Columbia Business School or Columbia School of Engineering). However, be aware that, contrary to other programs, the MAFN does not require students to complete any introductory classes aimed at bringing all students to the same level. For example, I needed to brush up on my programming skills before joining the program to succeed in the courses I wanted to take. Still, for ambitious students, the program offers courses over the summer (e.g., programming in Python and a great Interview Prep Course taught by an industry practitioner).

I don’t think there is much need to praise the faculty here (you can check them out on the program's website). Many of them have practical experience both on the sell side and the buy side which elevates their lectures and allows students to focus on topics important to the industry. However, I do want to stress that the appointment of the new program director in January 2025 so far promises a breath of fresh air and great opportunities for future students!

Finally, I want to stress the great career services of the program. The team not only does a great job advising the students (for all steps of the process, including drawing up a CV or mock interviews with alumni) but also actively connects students with players across the industry. Not only does the program facilitate many company visits, but the Practitioner's Seminar and the MAFN Investing & Portfolio Management Summit are great networking opportunities.

To conclude, a word of caution: As mentioned before, the program is rather large with approximately 100 students. That means that students are expected to study independently, actively seek personal advice/coaching from professors, and attendance is not strictly enforced. However, working a job in quantitative finance will require a similar ability to work independently, so I don't necessarily see this as a deal breaker.

I found this course through Baruch's college MFE application portal . The reason I took the course was because I wanted to do one of the pre-MFE courses from Baruch, and the second reason is because I read the reviews, and saw that it was really good and very well accredited . I had experience with cpp and c in college, and I have to say I learned more here than in my semester in college . It was very well organized, and very extensive . Thank you so much for everything, and I will be seeing you again soon for other courses .

As a new grad I feel so lucky that I chose the program. Although it was only a three semester program, I learnt the most practical skills in my life, which led me to my dream job, and was trained to came up with sharp intuitions that keep nurturing my professional development.

Initiative, the most critical and only thing I want to mention, help you make the most out of the program, and succeed in this competitive industry. The MAFN program features rich, if not the most resources covering all aspects from academic knowledge to career development, with easy awareness and access.

Our instructors are all from famous financial institutions and they teach you the firsthand knowledge, which will suddenly pop up in your mind during your interview, coffee chat, internship or a full time daily job. I talked to many friends from similar programs, and they all wish they could have those big name guys to teach the practice-oriented courses in their schools.

Our director and career advisors are another treasure of our program. They are not the high guys who sit in their office and talking about the common sense. Instead, our amazing teachers try to build a connection with all students, remember your names, keep posting opportunities public or exclusive, and even keep tracking your personal career development. Not many programs offer students a big excel table with thousands of job application links and highlighted priorities. Not every program has a huge network in the industry which sends out resume books, which results in you receiving email from time to time, inviting you to an interview even if you didn’t apply for a job. Those even includes very famous names who don’t accept public applications. And not to mention the career courses, mock interviews, career fairs, forum resources and so on.

But the program also gives you the “freedom” to choose an easy life with attendance-free lectures, few homework and easy exams, and still get the same degree. As the nature of human is to refuse stepping out from the safe harbor, indeed you will sometimes find the vibe to be over-comfortable, and pretend not seeing the few guys who work so hard on study and passionately seek for a job. There’s nothing to blame on the very nature of human, and even nothing to criticize about the program not pushing students hard. But this can cause people to underestimate the potential how strong a MAFN student could be. Nevertheless, I will never vote to be pushed, or I won’t develop a true love in my profession.

Here, I want to express my gratitude to my beloved teachers and advisors, giving me the best education in my life. I sincerely recommend self-driven students with initiative to apply to the MAFN program.

I am reading my post grad transcript to write this review.

This review is written to share my true feelings when I took these courses and what they brought me in career search.


MATH-GR5010 Intro to Math of Finance:
This is the required course in the first semester. It introduces different asset class and the basic pricing formula among them. It also introduces some stochastic theories, but not that detailed compared to Stochastic Process Application. I believe this course is great for those people who need a comprehend picture of the finance world.

STAR-GR5264 Stochastic Process Application/STAR-GR5265 Stochastic Methods in Finance
Those 2 courses teach measure theory, martingales, itos lemma, etc. Stochastic theory is inherently abstract and hard to grasp the essence of it(of course some really smart guys in the cohort are exceptions as you will see they already know everything). But no worries, Prof.Grame Baker is dedicated in teaching as you see his handwritten notes and he is always approachable to help you understand the concepts. I would say the derivations of black scholes formula help me the most in this course.

MATH-GR5380 Machines Learning for Finance
This is a must course in my opinion for everyone, because the industry wants it. Every interviewer is interested in your skill for machine learning even though they don't care if they have enough data purchasing from the vendors(data is expensive). I learn popular statistical models such as svm, tree model and neural network. Prof.Gordon Ritter knows how the industry uses the ML skills.

MATH-GR5300 Hedge Funds Strategies
The second must-take course from MAFN. The workload is high, like really high. But you will bring home a trading strategy in either asset class like fx, bonds, futures, options. Prof.Yeh will teach you how hedge funds design the strategy, hedge it, and backtest it. Even though these strategies are basic ones, he is willing to share with you where it can lead to money(you will need to find them out! Don't expect someone to tell you exactly how). I would say many people in this class are able to locate a job because you have many things to say specifically during the interview, which makes the interviewers to think: wow he/she knows something in my desk.

MATH-GR5360 Math Methods in Finance
The most interesting stuff I learn in this course is to use 5 mins data to build a momentum/mean reversion strategy for futures(we use push-response and variance ratio test to detect the pattern). You will need to know at least 1 low level programming language like c++ or java to finish the project. Prof.Chekhlov will also share with you many interesting things that link physics and finance world together. Don't panic when you hear vortices and shock waves in fluid turbulence during the lecture... Everything will work out.

MATH-GR5030 Numerical Methods in Finance
This is a mandatory course in spring semester. I picked Prof.Fung's section. Choose him! He works with traders directly and he knows where traders are interested in. The most useful I learned from this course are different interpolation methodologies for implied vol, greeks approximation, Adjoint algorithmic differentiation, pricing with PDE method, and monte carlo stability. We use VBA as the programming language in this course(Well I think it is hard to code language especially in debuging, but what language will you expect the traders to know how to use other than a click to play macro?) Take this course, and you will master in risk interview.

MATH-GR5420 Model & Trade Derivatives
Another must-take class. The hardest point in taking a career in exotic option desk, imo, is starting the first step. And Professor leads this start for you! This course teaches advanced greeks, implied vol surface, local vol model, and the most important aspects, exotic options and structured products like Double no touch, basket call, worst of put, autocallables, enhanced rates products. If you want to start a career in exotic desk, take this class! You will learn at least how to trade vol, variance, skewness using call/put spread, timing spread, strangle...

I will also share some advice as a graduate... I believe it is better to take some coding courses from engineering department. Please make sure you take COMSW4111 Introduction to Database. SQL is really an important skill, and most companies have their own database to store data. You need to at least know how to query to get data to do backtest if you are looking to work as quant/quant researcher/risk role. I also recommend you to take COMSW1004 Introduction to JAVA to learn a bit object oriented programming just in case your future projects will need it. The desert choice could be COMSW3157 Advanced Programming in C from Prof.Jae. He is also teaching c++ for the current spring semester but I didnt have a chance to attend it. I advise you to take 3157 before taking his c++ course.

The most strength in MAFN, in my opinion, is not only professors' professional experiences and academic teaching skills, but the alum network. We should grow this network to connect alum with current students, in a group chat or something like that. When I was in the first semester, I have few clues on which aspects of finance I will take. Am I going to work as a quant researcher? a trader? a risk guy? And I have no idea which asset I am going to work on, FX? bond? futures? options? equities? But you will find out in the process of learning in the courses I recommend above, and many alum is happy to share their experiences in sectors they focus on. The question is, how to know who is the correct alum to connect with, and how alum knows there is someone who needs advice.

It is a very hard time to locate a job. Compensation package of 300k is rare and flocked by math/physics/cs phd from MIT. But few traders get a phd degree and most of them spend years on their desk. Don't lose confidence. Always look for a job, a coffee chat, an interview, and ask many questions from anyone who is an expert in it.

Good luck applying!

I had a fantastic experience in the course. I initially discovered it after completing the previous course, C++ for Financial Engineering. That course sparked my interest in modern C++ techniques and applications. I wanted to build on the foundational knowledge I gained and explore more advanced concepts and practices in modern C++. This course provided the perfect opportunity to do so, offering in-depth insights and practical applications that have significantly enhanced my understanding and skills in the language.

I attended this program last Fall and have been in here for 6 months. I think I got a glimpse of how the program works along with its pros and cons. My personal experience has been very positive. Here are some of the main pros and cons.

Pros:

1. I like the program's course design, which offers a great deal of flexibility in choosing preferred courses each semester, taking full advantage of Columbia's resources. I found it easy to attend or audit classes in areas such as engineering or statistics without any issues.

2. The instructors for our electives are practitioners from the industry. Their teaching focuses on real-world applications, which helped me prioritize important topics and discuss them effectively during interviews.

3. I appreciate the career services, which include three full-time staff members who assist throughout the recruiting process by providing career and emotional support.

4. The program's location in NYC is a significant advantage, offering numerous opportunities for coffee chats, conferences, and company visits. It feels like you're in the center of the action.

Cons:

1. I wish both the elective and mandatory courses incorporated more coding elements. More programming assignments and projects would enhance the learning experience.

2. While the overall environment is relaxed, the lack of a common space means there are fewer opportunities for informal interactions and discussions with peers and professors.

3. Columbia's strict entrance limitations may hinder communication between graduated alumni and teaching assistants.

Since my admission to this program, I have been lucky to be so surprised every single day by the sheer quality of this program. I have recently begun my second semester. The coursework this semester and last, both mandatory and elective, have been nothing short of stellar. The majority of courses are taught by practitioners or former practitioners across a range of firms and high-level positions. The structure of the program ensures a deep understanding of both the theoretical aspects of mathematical finance and practical.

The new program director, Dr. Jaehyuk Choi, is incredibly determined to expand the program in terms of classes offered, ensuring graduates enter the workforce in firms and positions they deserve, and preserving a town-hall environment, being incredibly receptive to students’ wants and wishes for the future of the program.

My particular class is one of, if not the most, diverse MAFN cohort, comprising of students from sixteen different countries. As this is a Masters program, everyone is motivated to succeed and help each other succeed. We have a strong relationship within our own cohort and with alumni through multiple events throughout the year.

I cannot recommend this program enough. It has been, and continues to be, a joy to learn here.

I am a domestic student with a finance undergrad. Commenting on the professors, career development office (CDO), courses, etc.

Professors:
Roger
Roger is, as of this writing, the head of the program. That is the least of his credentials. More impressive: Roger has intuited the Black-Scholes pricing formula. Rattle off five input variables and he’ll compute output on the spot for all standard option types. Get him going on exotics and the temperature generally increases 1-3F in his immediate proximity, which is nice in the winter.

Mark
Mark is the personification of pedagogy. You won’t understand regression in his class, you’ll become the best linear estimator of a curve. I heard he was offered Fed Chair but declined it because teaching is his vocation. Understand the potential you have as his student. Mark will find and nurture that potential. He will imbue you with knowledge so arcane it will leave you speaking in tongue. All of that, and he’s handsome. Unfair!

Seb
Rumor has it, Seb’s first words were “100110100011…” He won a collegiate robotics competition at the age of four. He never conducts class from the same location twice (he once proctored a final while scuba diving 40 miles from the Seychelles archipelago). Some believe he employs holographic clones to teach at multiple universities simultaneously.

Brian
Brian is akin to a war veteran. Not the wars you know, but the wars that are too large to be seen. He fought in the great battle of the algorithms in the early 90’s and knows what actually happened during the flash crash of 2010. He is somewhat of a walking mosaic of corrected market inefficiencies—what were once lesser quants’ alphas.

Lawler
Long ago the world was deterministic. How deterministic? Too deterministic, if you asked Greg Lawler. That’s why Lawler invented randomness. And so, as Lawler prescribed, the world became flush with unpredictability. This pleased Lawler because he, ever the opportunist, had already written “Stochastic Calculus” and would go on to enjoy heightened book sales.

CDO+
Emily
Emily’s voice is like a summer’s breeze
Gracing quantlets’ hearts in need
Her song brings rest, salvation, ease
Her melody cures all student pleas

Meredith
If you’re reading this years from now and Meredith is no longer there, two things are certain: 1. That sucks for you 2. Meredith is still making the world a brighter place, as she did within those hallowed halls of the Stevanovich Center for Financial Mathematics. Meredith is the program’s best kept secret. Some say UChicago is where fun goes to die, but that was before Meredith arrived. You’d be best served getting to know her as quickly as possible. She quite literally can open doors for you (to the locked kitchen for a timely refreshment), or if you’re lucky, she may just end up being the sister you never had.

Courses:
Any course offered by the above instructors is worth your time. They’re great instructors and teach the most critical modules.

General
Job market
You’re typically well-suited for trading / market making and quant research coming out of this program. Your success on the job market is predominantly a function of your individual effort, which is true for any program, but with that said, their career development team is immensely helpful and a resource to utilize in your hunt. If you join the program with passion and intention (vs. uncritically following a path others left for you), then I think you’ll get everything you want out of this program career-wise.

Project Labs
Project Labs are my favorite aspect of the program—I did one every semester. Never will it be easier to get exposure to different sub-fields of quant finance (for those with an open-mind exploring the industry). Project Labs are quick, concentrated exposures to problems actual practitioners are facing. Most of all, they help you expand your network. I find that the average aspiring quant underestimates the importance of networking. You’re awkward, but take responsibility for it and don’t make that mistake. Networks are like cheat codes for getting the best finance jobs.

I’ve fielded occasional concerns from international students about the UChicago brand value, specifically whether it carries outside the US. UChicago is an institution. UChicago invented the free market!!! Ever heard of it?!? Your employers have. I digress.

Wrapping up: the program is definitely one where you come out the other end better equipped to *actually* solve real world problems. You’re paying for a skillset, career opportunities, and a great experience. Chicago is a beautiful and well connected city, your classmates are smart and accomplished, and I am increasingly proud to be an alumni.

I agree with almost all the negative feedback here, and those so-called positive reviews come from people the program privately reached out to, begging them to write something favorable. Just see how that backfires now.

I want to provide another perspective: I have repeatedly received misleading, useless, and annoying emails (30+ in total) from Sonia Moctezuma, the person responsible for student services. These emails include direct complaints toward students about low response rates and lack of class review participation—without ever reflecting on why students have lost trust in these processes. She has even issued threats that grades would not be released unless a subjective participation rate was met (after multiple begging). Ironically, even after this rate was reached, the grades were still not released until a month later. She is a despicable person who abuses her 'petty power' over students yet never considers why there has been so much negative feedback.

Additionally, she frequently sends emails without including necessary attachments (only to follow up with another email saying, "Sorry, I missed it!"—which has happened around 10 times). She also forces students to participate in useless events (even threatening them to turn their cameras on) and mistakenly sends emails intended for specific individuals to the entire group.

I am certain she will see this post—since students have been threatened not to leave any negative comments here—but I will speak out. Her complete lack of understanding of how a normal program should be managed has only further exacerbated an already terrible student experience—or perhaps this program is no longer normal, so to speak.

In fact, after the former executive director abruptly left the program without any notice or explanation in the middle of the academic year (l believe she worked in the program for less than four months), the program hired someone with no background in the financial industry. This person made fundamental errors in finance, repeatedly misspelled the names of well-known companies, and provided little to no career resources. Instead, all she did was encourage students to "network." l don't understand why our tuition was spent this way.

Piece of two-cents from the slide for MFE students:

1. Exploratory and Learning Outreach: based on reading you’ve done about the industry, finding people: SWE’s, recruiters (industry experts) to learn more about their background, gain industry insight, etc.

2. Proactive Target Company Outreach: after research, reach out to SWEs and recruiters at companies that excite / interest you to ask them about the company, the hiring process, how to prepare, etc.

3. Recruiter Follow Up Outreach: after you apply for a job, you message SWEs and Recruiters to talk about the specific role you applied for and insight about the company.

Looks like this person wasn’t even willing to spend five minutes replacing SWE with quants to 'fool the students.' Feel sorry for this—since this new career services person just lost her previous job before finding this one.

I knew C++ would be useful for my current role, and for potential grad school applications. The course was very well-paced, the homeworks were interesting, and I really enjoyed putting everything together in the final project. My TA, Avi, was also extremely helpful and provided great feedback on all the assignments.

Overall, the program’s pretty solid and would provide an excellent platform for you as long as your expectations are tempered.

Courses/Instructor:

The coursework is well structured and should equip you with knowledge you’d need to get the job done. The first term is comprised of mandatory core courses which, imo, are excellent for interview prep and for equipping you with the basic skillset you’d need as a quant on a day-to-day basis. Next term onwards, you can tailor your degree based on what you want to study using electives (and there are a lot of them). There also freedom to pick courses from other departments (up to 3, I think) and with the right mix of outside department and cross-listed courses you can virtually tailor your degree to focus on anything and everything

Student Quality:

Competitive and smart cohort, overall. But it is a big cohort (~150) so there is of course variability and diversity.

Career Services:

They really do try to put in their best efforts to get a job. Very responsive and will provide you with all resources you would need to prepare including recommended reading and putting you in touch with alumni. There’s also a constant flurry of networking events (which some find useful but I am, personally, not a big fan of). But don’t expect that the career services will just get you a job. That is still very much something you’ll have to do yourself. They will, however, provide you with resources which will surely help you on the job hunt path.

Career Outcomes:

The job market is in a bit of a mess right now so I am not sure how applicable might this be if/when the market picks up. However, as things stand, if you are coming in without much relevant experience or to pivot, the program will help you to get your foot in. If you are coming in with a quant or aligned background, the program will give you an edge in your attempt to step upwards. But if you are expecting the program will magically get you a QR/QT role at the CitSec/Jane Streets of the world when you weren’t getting any interview calls before, I am not sure it would work out. Front Office roles aren’t very common. A lot of the roles are MO/Risk/Support roles. Buy-side front office roles are even rarer and it would be fairly uncommon seeing folks getting these especially if you need visa sponsorship. That being said, afaik, mostly everyone in the previous batch who was looking for an internship got one and mostly everyone got a job too. The current batch is still in the internship search process and, hopefully, by summers a vast majority of the batch will have internships.

The curriculum provided a strong foundation in quantitative finance while allowing flexibility to choose courses that aligned with my interests, from stochastic calculus to machine learning applications in finance. The faculty is highly knowledgeable and approachable, always willing to guide students. Additionally, the Career Development Office (CDO) is extremely supportive, offering invaluable resources for networking, job applications, and interview preparation. This program significantly enhanced my technical skills and deepened my understanding of financial markets.

I learned about this course through a recommendation from a classmate who was admitted to Baruch's MFE program. He spoke very highly of the course (and after completing it myself, I completely agree, haha).

My reasons for taking this course were primarily career-driven. Quantitative finance demands high proficiency in mathematics, statistics, and computer science. In my case, after completing an internship in quantitative research, I realized programming was my weakness: while I might have had four or five strategy ideas to test, implementing just one through code could take me an entire week, significantly limiting my productivity. Moreover, looking at my long-term career goals, if I want to develop into a well-rounded manager, I need to be thoroughly familiar with all aspects of quantitative trading (research, development, trading, risk management, etc.). Through discussions with my friends working as quantitative developers, I learned that C++ is the predominant tool in development. To master development, C++ is essential.
Additionally, I enrolled in this course to prepare for my Financial Engineering Master's applications. Most Financial Engineering programs require C++ programming skills from candidates (including Baruch, which is undoubtedly my absolute dream program). "C++ Programming for Financial Engineering" comes highly recommended, making it an excellent choice for strengthening my application.

During the course, I made several observations:
1.The course materials are meticulously organized. The instructors clearly have a profound understanding of C++ and extensive teaching experience. This made our learning progression very smooth (fundamentals, OOP, inheritance and polymorphism, etc.).
2.The forum is undoubtedly a treasure trove of valuable experience and debugging solutions. Regular reading can solve most problems that learners encounter.
3.Online learning offered the flexibility to arrange my study and homework time, which is particularly beneficial for those of us with full-time jobs or university courses. For instance, due to PDE midterms and final exams, I had to pause my studies twice (potentially not studying for up to a month each time). However, the flexibility in scheduling allowed me to successfully complete the course and achieve a distinction.