Profile Evaluation

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

Hello all,
My profile is as follows:

Currently working in BNY Mellon(India):
Experience: 1.5 years.
Profile: Qualitative and Quantitative Economic research with some daily tasks.
Projects include: 1) Sovereign risk of Emerging Economies like Hungary, Poland, Romania and Turkey.(in details)
- Regression and other statistical measures were used while research.
2) Watch list of Emerging Markets and Developed Markets- Used MS Excel to build it. There were 22 countries and 20 indicators taken into consideration and historical data was also taken care of.
- Calculation like # of SD points and all was done for Market based factors.
- Have also made a tool with this data for quantitative comparison between countries.

Internship:

Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund-
Experience: 3 months
- Prepared Newsletters on macroeconomic Indicators like GDP, Government Budget, Inflation and Debt.

Education:
Master in Economics
Fergusson College, University of Pune. (One of the top 10 colleges in India)
- First class with Distinction. 71.21%
- Top 5 students in the class.

Bachelors of Science, Economics.
Scottish Church College,Calcutta University
- Second Class 47.5% (highest was-61.5%)
- 70th Percentile
- Calcutta University has always been strict with its marks . I hope that will be considered by the university.

Technical Knowledge

- SPSS, Stata
- C++
- MS Excel- most of the required formulas used for data crunching.
- MS Power Point, Word and Publisher

Extra activities
- College representative of College for two years.
- Won debates during my bachelors.
- Participated in sports tournaments.

GRE-
307 (V-151,Q-156)
Toefl- 97

What are my chances of getting into :
1) NYU Poly
2) SUNY Buffalo

And, please kindly recommend any other colleges that are suitable for my profile.

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

and, I will be getting 3 great LORs.
One of them could be from a very senior Portfolio Manager based in America.

I hope that should help?

 

[moretodo]

you have really relevant and impressive work ex. improve your gre quant score to 166 or greater and work on your programming skills. you then would have a decent chance at tier 1 programs as well such as CU, UCB and Baruch

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

@moretodo : thanks for the encouraging words :D
the problem is .. I can't re take the GRE now!! But, will certainly add to my programming knowledge by the time I start applying.
BTW, I hope .. NYU Poly and SUNY with my current profile are safe??? and any other colleges that you would suggest?

 

[moretodo]

with your current gre quant score, im not sure if any univ is a safe bet. also the programs you are currently applying to are not worth it since there is no guarantee youll get a decent job from there in my personal opinion

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

Ok.!!

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

@Azamat Bagatov
@wayoung
@Ken Abbott

what do you guys think??

 

[utkarsh dalmia]

Hi Vaibhav, here is what i think:

1. you haven't described your math courses and grades in them. i think they are more relevant than your major and overall GPA.
2. Did you take classes in C++ during your undergrad/grad? If you have learnt programming yourself, it's fine but if you have taken courses during your undergrad, it's better.
3. Finally, In my opinion TOEFL and GRE Q is very low. Schools normally don't focus a lot on GRE verbal, but schools which require TOEFL would probably want a better score. And if you look at the tracker you will hardly find candidates with scores of less than 160. At 156Q, i dont think any MFE course is safe.

About the universities, NYU poly is decent- at least current students say so. You could give it a shot. And as far as getting a job is concerned, it's down to your own hard work. Off course, students going to CMU, CU, MIT, NYU will have better opportunities and will get interviews because of the school name on their resumes, you'll have to network more and work harder to get a good job.

 

[Azamat Bagatov]

Firstly, I saw someone with a GRE quant score close to yours and being rejected. You can check the tracker, it was pretty recent. Below is what I think:

I would ask you to still go ahead and apply (I think you may have a shot) but have a very good write up on your SOP explaining that your mathematical knowledge is superior and your GRE Q score is not a reflection of it. Also, add a sheet to your resume containing relevant courses and your performance in them (assuming that it is good).

You could also try Stevens IT but I have no idea about the quality of the program. At least here, no one discusses it much.

This is the only solution I could think of if you're not in a position to retake GRE.

Plus, as utkarsh said, TOEFL scores have a cut-off. You have to be above that cut-off and if you're not, they would ask you to take an english proficiency course as a conditional admit (another 3k dollars).

Even after you put up a strong SOP, there is still chance that you would be denied admission and you may have to spend sleepless nights until you get a decision. Avoid that if you can, maybe? There is ample time for you to take GRE again. I can also suggest you a online course** that I did which helped me improve my score with just a 2-3 week prep. PM me for more details.

** Just my suggestion as I thought it was excellent; I do not endorse them in any way.

 

[Ken Abbott]

@Azamat Bagatov
@wayoung
@Ken Abbott

what do you guys think??

I don't serve on any admission committees. I'm not qualified to have an opinion.

 

[ygmwy]

@Azamat Bagatov
@wayoung
@Ken Abbott

what do you guys think??

To be honest, I don't know the numbers for these programs that well. But I think your GRE Q and your toefl are pretty low for a top student from India. I'm used to seeing people from IIT, with better numbers. Honestly though, if you have work experience, I don't know what your reasons for applying to MFE are. You don't need it.

 

[Andy Nguyen]

When in doubt, check the Tracker

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

@utkarsh dalmia & @Azamat Bagatov : Thanks a lot for valuable feedback!! :D
there are my maths courses and grades
Masters in Economics , Pune University
1) Mathematical Economics (Mainly involved -Multivariate Calculus,First Order Differential Equation and First Order Difference Equations ,Single Variable Calculus & Growth Models ), Grade-4
2)Econometrics- Time series analysis,Regressions with Quantitative Independent Variables ,Hypothesis testing,Vector Auto regression)- Grade-4
3)Statistical Techniques-Sampling and sampling methods ,Theory of Probability,Probability Distribution Function ,Statistical Estimation and Testing of Hypothesis &Time series)- 3.5
Bachelors in Ecnomics, Calcutta Economics,
1) Mathematical Economics-Linear Algebra, Fundamentals of Matrix Algebra and Linear Programming,Optimisation with Equality and Inequality Constraints ,Difference Equations,Game theory)-3
2)Statistical Ecnomics- Central Tendency,Skewness and Kurtosis,Probability Theory,Random Variables and Probability Distributions,Bivariate Analysis ,Population Statistics)-3
4)Mathematic-2
5)Statistics- 2
There is one thing about the last two, that the topper's grade too would be close not 3. And not more than that. Since, CU is not that generous with marks.

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

@Ken Abbott : No problems!
Thanks! :D

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

@wayoung : my primary reason is : I want to learn the mathematical side of Finance with Programming knowledge like Matlab, R , etc which will help me build models as well.

@wayoung , @Azamat Bagatov , @utkarsh dalmia
I am not aiming CMU, Baruch and CU , as they would exceed my budget and other criteria. But I would certainly like to get into NYU Poly, SUNY buffalo, UCon, etc which are decent and in a way cost effective.

What do you think are my chances for these colleges?
and, any other colleges that you would suggest?
Should I look into only Financial Courses with electives in Computers?

 

[Vaibhav Dhabaria]

@Andy Nguyen : yes.... I am doing that!!
can you please suggest something here?

 

[Dataminer]

@wayoung : my primary reason is : I want to learn the mathematical side of Finance with Programming knowledge like Matlab, R , etc which will help me build models as well.

@wayoung , @Azamat Bagatov , @utkarsh dalmia
I am not aiming CMU, Baruch and CU , as they would exceed my budget and other criteria. But I would certainly like to get into NYU Poly, SUNY buffalo, UCon, etc which are decent and in a way cost effective.

What do you think are my chances for these colleges?
and, any other colleges that you would suggest?
Should I look into only Financial Courses with electives in Computers?

Rutgers maybe? Didn't even know Uconn had mfe program...and I did my undergraduate studies there...lol

 

[ygmwy]

Don't close yourself to FE programs. There's lots of data, OR, CS, and other related fields that can do what you want. At Columbia for example, since it is in New York City, and a lot of Financiers recruit there, there is a financial culture even among non-financial majors. In Georgia by contrast, you get many students actually going into OR. Do some research. I know many great ORs and CS people in Columbia that are better than some FEs with respect to financial intuition and background.

 

[utkarsh dalmia]

Its difficult to comment on your chances given your GRE-Q. But your math coursework involves a lot of Stats and less PDEs, numerical analysis and advanced calculus. I think this background might suit a risk management course such as Rutgers FSRM. I think NYU poly also has a risk management track. So yes, if don't want to write GRE again, give it a shot but you'll be facing stiff competition. Apart from all the all the international students you will have have Indian students with better prior coursework and test scores applying to these universities.