Education decision quandary! I need help!

[Ryan Shrott]

First and foremost, I apologize for making this quite long. I literally can't sleep at night thinking about decisions like these, and need all the help I can get! I wanted to supply you with all the details I could to allow you to help me to properly inform my decision. I should also mention that I am new to Quant Net.

I am currently in my fourth year (undergraduate) studying Applied Mathematics & Mechanical Engineering at Queen's University in Canada (I am 21 years old). Every semester, I take 2-3 courses in the Mechanical Engineering department, and 3-4 courses in the Applied Mathematics department. My cumulative GPA is 3.44/4.0. My fourth year, second semester GPA was 3.9/4.0. My GRE scores were 148 Verbal and 158 Quant and 4.5 AW (I plan to rewrite the GRE). I have job experience at a chemical engineering firm in China. I should also mention that my programming skills are limited. I can use Matlab adroitly (but that's about it). I have also uploaded my full resume to this post. It supplies more details.

I have taken all the basic/essential math courses including: linear algebra, real analysis, complex analysis and probability. In third year, I began to take courses in: control theory, signals and systems etc. I am currently enrolled in 2 graduate courses, namely, Time-Variant Control System, and Lagrangian Mechanics. I enjoy these courses, but have doubts towards their importance in Financial Mathematics. I was planning on applying to the top schools in the US for Financial Mathematics; however, I don't think I will be accepted!

Here's the most important part of this post. I was just in one of my professors office to talk about graduate studies. He brought up the idea of doing a 1-3 year graduate program at Queen's (something I have never considered). The program is also totally funded (even for a year). I would do a 1 year grad program in the math department at Queen's. This would give me an additional year to improve my resume. I will also be able to take several courses directly related to Financial Mathematics. I could take courses related to advanced probability, stochastic calculus and information theory. I could conduct research related to Fin Math. The program starts in September and therefore I will have the whole summer to work. I would apply for a research job at Queen's related to financial math. I should also mention that I know most of the professors in the math department very well and some on a personal basis. Informally, I have already been offered admission to the graduate program at Queen's. It is also worth noting that I will have an additional year to improve to improve my GRE score.

It seems to me that there are too many pros to not take the aforementioned route. At this point, it seems as though the only negative aspect would be that my life would be delayed by one year. What am I missing?! Do many people take this route. Keep in mind, the ultimate goal for me is to be accepted to the Fin Math program at schools such as NYU and Columbia. Please help me make an informed decision by shedding some light on the pros and cons of the options I have provided. Maybe it’s the case that undergraduate students fresh out of university are wanted more? Maybe it’s the case that taking a graduate program beforehand can be looked upon negatively? I simply don’t know.

I appreciate all the responses you provide.

Thank you very much,

Ryan Shrott

 

[Ole Bueker]

First of all, your resume looks bloated and too detailed (for me). In the last week, someone in this forum was posting about resumes in LaTeX, I would advise you to search for that thread and recreate your resume based on those templates.

Unfortunately I don't have much time to write now, so I will edit this post to add more information when I get back from classes tonight.

 

[CasanovaJ]

1) A resume should never be more than one page, especially when you're 21... no one knows what "Guinea Alumina Corporation" is, and no one cares.
2) What makes you interested in quant finance when it looks like you've never taken a single finance course?
3) What do you know about what's happened to the industry since the financial crisis?

 

[Ryan Shrott]

First of all, your resume looks bloated and too detailed (for me). In the last week, someone in this forum was posting about resumes in LaTeX, I would advise you to search for that thread and recreate your resume based on those templates.

Unfortunately I don't have much time to write now, so I will edit this post to add more information when I get back from classes tonight.

Thank you for your response. I will look into your suggestion re. LaTeX. Looking forward to your updated response.

 

[Ryan Shrott]

1) A resume should never be more than one page, especially when you're 21... no one knows what "Guinea Alumina Corporation" is, and no one cares.
2) What makes you interested in quant finance when it looks like you've never taken a single finance course?
3) What do you know about what's happened to the industry since the financial crisis?

I agree that my resume is too long and contains extraneous information. I have always been interested in applied math and only recently (the past year) a professor of mine sparked my interest in Financial Mathematics while discussing the 'Brownian Model of Financial Markets' - I want to apply my knowledge to models like this. I agree that without a course in Finance, I am lacking a severe amount of background information. Another pro to taking a 1 year masters program before I apply to quant fin would be to allow myself an extra year to understand more about finance, and better understand my own interests (which are clearly lacking).

I know that since the financial crisis, the financial sector is under more scrutiny than ever. As a result, strict regulations of bonuses for staff at banks were enforced, and bankers were receiving much less in immediate cash. Given that the crisis was caused by banks, governments deemed it appropriate to enforce annual taxes on banks. I also understand that the banking system is safer now; investment and retail must be dissociated. Also, the level of protection has essentially doubled.

I appreciate your response. But would you mind responding to my original question: will taking a 1 year masters program in Applied Math be wise?

Thank you.

 

[C S]

Thank you for your response. I will look into your suggestion re. LaTeX. Looking forward to your updated response.

I write my resume in LaTeX, but I have to admit it's a case of diminishing returns. It's not worth your time right now. I took several years before my LaTeX resume started looking halfway decent. Look into using a decent template like the IAFE one (not great, but it's a vast improvement over what you've got now).

 

[C S]

I agree that my resume is too long and contains extraneous information. I have always been interested in applied math and only recently (the past year) a professor of mine sparked my interest in Financial Mathematics while discussing the 'Brownian Model of Financial Markets' - I want to apply my knowledge to models like this. I agree that without a course in Finance, I am lacking a severe amount of background information. Another pro to taking a 1 year masters program before I apply to quant fin would be to allow myself an extra year to understand more about finance, and better understand my own interests (which are clearly lacking).

I know that since the financial crisis, the financial sector is under more scrutiny than ever. As a result, strict regulations of bonuses for staff at banks were enforced, and bankers were receiving much less in immediate cash. Given that the crisis was caused by banks, governments deemed it appropriate to enforce annual taxes on banks. I also understand that the banking system is safer now; investment and retail must be dissociated. Also, the level of protection has essentially doubled.

I appreciate your response. But would you mind responding to my original question: will taking a 1 year masters program in Applied Math be wise?

Thank you.

Let's take things one at a time.

Your resume isn't just long. I'm not a big believer of resumes getting thrown away because of typos and such (at this point, I've seen too many people that get the job that have glaring typos and misformattings in their resume); however, I'd throw away your resume. It's garish. Maybe it just looks bad on my computer because I'm using Libre Office, but the font looks humongous. Color is bad too. People don't put color in Wall Street resumes. I know they're hyperlinks but find a way to turn off the color. Statements like "in 4th year of a challenging program, unique in Canada in its rigorous focus on mathematics in engineering" impress nobody. I can make a ton more comments, but I have to get back to my life

There's not much point to a course in finance per se. Someone as good as you in math will find topics like bond pricing (as taught typically in undergrad) to be quite easy, but it's exactly the type of thing that they drone on about for weeks in a course. A reading course/independent study with a professor on Black--Scholes theory (say using Shreve volume I) might be quite interesting and useful for you.

Basically to cut to the chase, the reason people don't really do what you're asking about is because of opportunity cost. You're giving up a 90K+ salary so you can do what you described. That's very expensive tuition indeed. As long as you enjoy and learn, there's not much harm to it at this point. As you say, you can learn more about what you want out of life and strengthen your resume in various directions. But let's not fool ourselves. Once you've gotten the piece of paper that says you did a college degree, most of the reason you attended college in the first place is accomplished. If you learned a lot more than most people in the process, more power to you, but that kind of thing is a long-term investment that pays off when you have some work experience, not so much in the first couple years, when you're still learning what the job entails.

 

[Ryan Shrott]

Hello again. I finally fixed it up. What do you guys think?

 

[C S]

Hello again. I finally fixed it up. What do you guys think?

Much better indeed. The part for your queens university background is odd, as it wraps around with bullet points. If you need more space, remove some space above your name.