COMPARE NYU Tandon MFE vs University of Washington CFRM vs UIUC MFE

[taiyouxiule]

Below is an email from a professor at NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering.

1. How many full-time students and part-time students will be enrolled in this program(2014 Fall)?
We try to have between 75 and 90 new students each fall. Sometimes there are more, sometimes fewer. Almost all are full-time — perhaps 90%.

2. How is the diversity of students like? How many are Chinese students?
Students right now come from (I think) 23 countries. As we look for students with the highest mathematical abilities and China has a wonderful mathematical education for young people there are a lot of students from China — right now, about 1/2 of the student population.

3. How is the placement of international graduates?
Job placement depends mostly on the strength of the economy. Things have been getting better each year since the crisis of 2008-9, but we are not yet back to the days of 2007. Our top international students generally have good job offers, and some have multiple offers to choose between. Our average students usually get good jobs too. The students who graduate with the lowest grades or who have problems presenting themselves in English or as professionals take longer time to get employed. As a rule, students don’t tell me everything about their situations so what I am writing to you is a summary of anecdotal data and not the results of statistical analysis.

 

[PolyQuant]

For these interested in location for the program, it seems like Poly has a separate batch of Financial Engineering students this year who will be located in Manhattan, a few blocks away from Wall Street and I'd imagine with a much smaller enrollment size than Brooklyn.

 

[antwnia]

For these interested in location for the program, it seems like Poly has a separate batch of Financial Engineering students this year who will be located in Manhattan, a few blocks away from Wall Street and I'd imagine with a much smaller enrollment size than Brooklyn.

I contacted them about the location of the program (because the offer letter and the application form indicated Manhattan as the campus location but the website still indicates Brooklyn) and they replied that the courses will take place in Brooklyn and that the Department of Finance and Risk Engineering is located in Manhattan.

 

[antwnia]

This means that there is no seperate batch of F.E. students who will be located in Manhattan. Course will take place in brooklyn

 

[C S]

any semi-sane person who srsly prepared interview wouldnt answer "because my dream is to earn a lot of money and get rich". its a retarded cautionary tale.

I have heard from multiple people at Goldman about this happening when they interviewed someone. Perhaps more commonly though, people don't try to understand why this is a "retarded" answer, and end up making subtler mistakes. No, it's not because you're not supposed to reveal the "real" reason people work for Goldman. You have to think deeper than that. They (GS) do ask this question a lot. Typically they will ask someone whose background is not in finance. It's important to be able to relate your skills and motivation to finance. Many people cannot do so, despite seeming like seriously prepared interviewees in other aspects.

 

[GoIllini]

I went down to UIUC yesterday (April 4) and spoke with the Assistant director. Unfortunately, I was not able to meet any student, because they do not have classes on Friday and some of them were in Chicago for the practicum. I believe that the program is improving and from talking to her it looks like it is getting some exposure to the big companies in Chicago. Apparently, recruiters are starting to come from Chicago specifically for the MSFE program to hire and find interns. I know that was one issue many past students were complaining about, that career services was not (maybe still isn't) geared enough towards the program for its caliber and price tag. They have a couple Bloomberg terminals in the computer lab and a Maxeler provided by one Chicago company (CME if I remember correctly) that is sponsoring a Practicum project. She mentioned that all domestic students are placed in either Chicago or NY with the vast majority in Chicago.

I hate to be mean, but the words "caliber" and "Career Services" have never gone together at UIUC, at least as long as I can remember.

Look, there are some helpful people who work there, but they are seriously understaffed. At a small private college, there is a lot of handholding in the recruiting process- at UIUC, you are generally on your own. Your best resources really will be business and engineering clubs and friends.

 

[Jason Zou]

Hi all, I got admissions from these three programs and I am looking for some suggestions on deciding which program to attend. I have some thoughts about these programs as following.

NYU Tandon has been changing since it introduced its new program director, career placement director and new faculty. The great location of NYC is advantageous. The large cohort gives us large alumni network but also more fierce competition. I was just wondering if only the top-ranked students from the program can grab the resources. I believe the program has huge potential, but I am not sure what we new students can achieve in its early period of transition. The program does not have a very good reputation in the past, and I heard that some hiring managers will have discrimination over Tandon (Poly), which I am quite concerned about.

CFRM is under the Applied Math Department which is quite prestigious, so I believe the curriculum should be solid. The class size is small (around 30), so the individual student should get more dedicated and tailored career service and personal development assistance from the program. The extensive instruction of R language can be both good (be specialized in one language) and bad (R may be not as commonly used as C++). Seattle is really a good place to study and live in, however, there are not many job opportunities related to quantitative finance. As the placement statistics on CFRM website shows, there are not many big names and some jobs are not related. Location and placement (for fantastic and decent jobs) is the only drawback I concern in this case.

As for UIUC MSFE, I heard that students can take courses offered in computer science and CS is strong in UIUC. The curriculum is quite solid. UIUC is not that far from Chicago and maybe job opportunities is not bad compared to UW.

I am looking forward to seeing your options. Thanks.

 

[TehRaio]

go to chicago. I will always vote for the midwest.