COMPARE Help!! Claremont VS. Florida State

[redbloodz]

Can anyone help me to choose between Claremont Graduate University (Financial Engineering) and Florida State University (Financial Mathematics)? I know these two are not that famous but I have to respond to both of them soon while I'm also waiting for other responses from other universities. I found some reviews on Claremont but I couldn't find any for Florida. Can anyone give me your comments about these universities? How much for the tuition fee overall? Reputation? Which one is better in order to find a job? Every comment(academically or not) will be helpful for me.

Thank you in advance,

 

[Joe Yu]

Can anyone help me to choose between Claremont Graduate University (Financial Engineering) and Florida State University (Financial Mathematics)? I know these two are not that famous but I have to respond to both of them soon while I'm also waiting for other responses from other universities. I found some reviews on Claremont but I couldn't find any for Florida. Can anyone give me your comments about these universities? How much for the tuition fee overall? Reputation? Which one is better in order to find a job? Every comment(academically or not) will be helpful for me.

Thank you in advance,

PS. I attached some information I have right now

I see you also have 20% tuition fellowship. Go to Claremont. Better brand.

 

[Joy Pathak]

Are you an international student?

 

[Sanket Patel]

As an FSU alum, I can say that the MF program is heavily geared towards math; it truly is a 'mathematical' finance program.

Unlike other programs, FSU doesn't boast an all-star faculty, but the rigor and quality of teaching of the math department is by no means sub-par.

Let me know if you have any specific questions about FSU or Tallahassee, for that matter, as I spent 7 years in the city.

One factor weighing heavily in favor of FSU: Seminoles Football!!!! (y)

 

[redbloodz]

Yes, I am an international student. Thank you for your replies.

About Florida State, do they apply math to finance? Actually i know they have to be applied but are they heavily apply to finance or mostly study calculating mathematic equations and connect just a little to finance? What kind of programming languages Florida State use? I know only Claremont that mostly use Matlab and VBA but I heard that they are starting to emphasize more on C++.

Any other responses is appreciated

 

[Joy Pathak]

Yes, I am an international student. Thank you for your replies.

About Florida State, do they apply math to finance? Actually i know they have to be applied but are they heavily apply to finance or mostly study calculating mathematic equations and connect just a little to finance? What kind of programming languages Florida State use? I know only Claremont that mostly use Matlab and VBA but I heard that they are starting to emphasize more on C++.

Any other responses is appreciated

You should really think hard about your decisions when it comes to programs here as an international student. With both of those schools it is going to be very hard. The proximity to LA will be more beneficial than FSU.

CGU is a decent named school in the finance community due to Peter Drucker with a very good MFE program. They have a good list of professors with some new faculty who were practitioners. One of their profs has some famous patents under his name from his time at Oracle. He developed bunch of unique credit risk models. They have a very devoted staff to the program and they are working very hard to make it better everyday. I was given admission there with 25% scholarship. I research the program extensively. One of the best parts of CGU is the fact that you have access to the WHOLE Claremont College Consortium. This includes Claremont McKenna which is a top 5 liberal arts college with a famous economics/finance undergrad school. Their faculty consists of only the top 10 school PhD's.
If you were to look at the recruiting from last year you will see that UBS, BCG, Bloomberg, Thomson Reuters, Lazard , and so many more goto Claremont McKenna to recruit. If you goto the career fairs at the other schools I am told the recruiters are more than happy to interview you if you have a good resume. You won't get interviewed for the top positions but you will get your leg into some big firm if you are good.

This year one of the students who is about to graduate got a position at a big foreign investment bank and will be doing electricity trading for them. He will be working out of Houston. Many other students have got jobs already. Unfortunately most of the students who have got jobs are American students. The situation is not the same for international students. They are having a hard time finding a job. That is why I am skeptical. Usually it is recommended to attend one of the top branded schools if you're an international student.

Think about it...I just put some of the things I found out about CGU program.

 

[redbloodz]

How about the internship? Did every student get the internship recently? Or only American?

 

[Joy Pathak]

How about the internship? Did every student get the internship recently? Or only American?

I think majority secured internships at the firms in and around LA. There aren't that many students. They have very small classes. They are quite selective actually. Goto their "current students" page, and send them all emails and ask? There are only 10-15, won't take that long.

 

[cjcranston]

Florida State might be a better choice if the person is a florida resident. Also, I am pretty sure that SOME students in the FSU program get an Assistantship of some sorts, as it is not a money machine for the university like most other similar programs. Also, it will be realluy easy to get a quant internship at the State Board of Administration on just during the summer, but part time during the regular semesters. Florida State also is known for having the most attractive girls of any campus in the world. In regard to not having any highly regarded faculty, Dr. Paul Beaumont splits his time between economics and financial math and is absolutely brilliant. He has experience in quant trading, and has hired many successful traders and therefore has great insight into the personal attributes needed to succeed. His Phd is from Penn and he considers himself a financial econometrician. I took him as an undergrad economics major and he is incredible, forced undergrads to be able to mathematically prove all of the statistics formulae used in undergraduate econometrics, as well as solve multivariate regressions by hand, no calculator, proving each step mathematically. He also encourages students to learn programming languages and our projects were done in R. Great professor!!

With that said, outside of going to FSU for free, Claremont's proximity to L.A. and affiliation with world class undergraduate institutions make it the better choice.

 

[Andy Nguyen]

We have a new review of the CGU MFE program. Career services has been the single item most people complain about but it seems things are being worked on to address this.

Claremont Graduate University Financial Engineering Program - Reviews

quantnet.com

 

[Sanket Patel]

In regard to not having any highly regarded faculty, Dr. Paul Beaumont splits his time between economics and financial math and is absolutely brilliant. He has experience in quant trading, and has hired many successful traders and therefore has great insight into the personal attributes needed to succeed. His Phd is from Penn and he considers himself a financial econometrician. I took him as an undergrad economics major and he is incredible, forced undergrads to be able to mathematically prove all of the statistics formulae used in undergraduate econometrics, as well as solve multivariate regressions by hand, no calculator, proving each step mathematically. He also encourages students to learn programming languages and our projects were done in R. Great professor!!

I second this. Dr Beaumont is absolutely amazing. It was, in fact, Dr Beaumont who introduced me to quantitative finance. I had opportunity to take his Financial Economics course as an undergrad and it was nothing short of amazing.

That aside, one thing I can add about the program at FSU is that unless the curriculum has changed over the past couple years, there is a greater emphasis on theory as opposed to application. While programming is a part of the program, it is not as prevalent as it is for some of the other programs.

 

[physEcon]

I think majority secured internships at the firms in and around LA. There aren't that many students. They have very small classes. They are quite selective actually. Goto their "current students" page, and send them all emails and ask? There are only 10-15, won't take that long.

The class sizes are decent, between 25-45 usually for anything shared with MBAs (like corp fin and fin accting) but the pure MSFE courses are usually between 5-20 students (stuff like electives in quantitative risk management, etc).

Also, your table at the top looks wrong. You don't take 3 courses in financial accounting. Check here http://www.cgu.edu/pages/1657.asp. You take one course in Fin Accting, Corp Fin, Asset Management Practicum, and Financial Derivatives.

The program's actually pretty nice if you are unsure about what exactly you want within the FE space. After the core courses you have a ton of freedom in your electives. While there I audited a course at Harvey Mudd which is a top school for science, math, engineering. You also have full access to CGU's business school and the math school as the program is co-run by the two.

 

[gradaplicant]

I would be quite interested in what school you ended up going to?

 

[edcvivi]

Help, I just wonder to go to FSU for master in finmath or to go to Stevens for MFE

 

[Ken Abbott]

I recently joined the Claremont faculty as an adjunct and I like what I see. They have given a lot of thought to the curriculum.

 

[jondan]

This year one of the students who is about to graduate got a position at a big foreign investment bank and will be doing electricity trading for them. He will be working out of Houston. Many other students have got jobs already. Unfortunately most of the students who have got jobs are American students. The situation is not the same for international students. They are having a hard time finding a job. That is why I am skeptical. Usually it is recommended to attend one of the top branded schools if you're an international student.

Think about it...I just put some of the things I found out about CGU program.

Hey guys, is it that difficult for international students to find jobs after MFE programs in US? I am Canadian and I maybe qualified for the TN visa if got hired by a firm, but do recruiter still interviewing people from outside USA given the lackluster job market now?

 

[physEcon]

I recently joined the Claremont faculty as an adjunct and I like what I see. They have given a lot of thought to the curriculum.

This is exciting to hear! What course will you be teaching?

Hey guys, is it that difficult for international students to find jobs after MFE programs in US? I am Canadian and I maybe qualified for the TN visa if got hired by a firm, but do recruiter still interviewing people from outside USA given the lackluster job market now?

From my personal observations it is not being an international student per se that holds students back. It is generally the difficulties that international students have with soft skills. They tend to network less and they have difficulties with some communication skills. Thus, if you are an international student who knows how to network, give a good presentation, tell some entertaining stories, and "talk shop" then you will probably be fine. It's hard to make such soft skills "pop" on a resume and cover letter though so network, network, network! The only caveat is visa sponsorship. For some positions the employers won't even consider people requiring visa-sponsorship. Just try to figure out upfront if a potential employer will sponsor your visa, if not then ask them for any advice on other firms that might.

 

[Ken Abbott]

This is exciting to hear! What course will you be teaching?

Quantitative Risk Management

 

[Quant4Life]

Hi, I have been admitted to FSU's phd Program in Fin Math with Full support. My goal is to get a phd so going through expensive MFE's is very tough. I have also been admitted to MIT MFin, U of Chicago, waiting on NYU and other. So my dilemma is either go to FSU for free without worries or do MFE (NYU seems best option) and try to get into top phd programs maybe after a year of experience. Feedback would be greatly appreciated!