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I got the admission to these two programs, MFE, I mean, and I'm confused and don't know what to choose. Any ideas and suggestions for me? Or could anyone share some information about these two? Thanks a lot!
Michigan MFE How to choose between Michigan and UIUC
- Thread starter Sally Wang
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So you mean neither of the two is good enough for intnl student to find a job, right? Is it because they are not tier one programs? Or because of their location?
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If you could connect me with him ,of course it will be great. Thanks a lot.I have a colleague in my office from Michigan MFE 2009 batch I guess.... If you want I can connect you with him...He may be able to better answer your queries.But as I can infer from tracker , you have applied to other places as well..Y not wait for their results
I did applied to other programs and I'm still waiting for their replies. But the deadlines for the deposit of these two are approaching, so I may have to make the decision quickly.
What MFE is good for international students to find jobs in America? It sucks to spend a fortune on tuition fee and so much time to prepare for application to competitive MFE programs just to end up not able to find a job and have to go home empty handed
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This is a good question but hard to answer because not many MFE programs post their data. We will need to change this big time sooner or later.
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Here's my opinion as a former international, engineering, undergrad there for what it's worth:
- Michigan brand name > Illinois. This is how I decided between them as an undergrad. This goes for the B-school especially.
- The career resources even as an undergrad were actually really good if you use them and network properly. Posting a high GPA and appropriate program does get you interview calls from the career sites. I got some from NY S&T firms with my less than stellar GPA. Additionally, there are a lot of on-campus inverviews with a lot of big name trading companies and consultancies coming in.
- Plus, as MFE you get to use the engineering, business, MFE dedicated, and university-wide career sites all in one go.
- Less important, but Ann Arbor is a really nice town (better than UC) and it's quite easy to get to Detroit Airport to fly out for your interviews and stuff.
- Michigan brand name > Illinois. This is how I decided between them as an undergrad. This goes for the B-school especially.
- The career resources even as an undergrad were actually really good if you use them and network properly. Posting a high GPA and appropriate program does get you interview calls from the career sites. I got some from NY S&T firms with my less than stellar GPA. Additionally, there are a lot of on-campus inverviews with a lot of big name trading companies and consultancies coming in.
- Plus, as MFE you get to use the engineering, business, MFE dedicated, and university-wide career sites all in one go.
- Less important, but Ann Arbor is a really nice town (better than UC) and it's quite easy to get to Detroit Airport to fly out for your interviews and stuff.
Both schools are pretty strong in Chicago, but Michigan's strong reputation extends to the NYC Banks, while Illinois' reputation extends to west coast tech firms and engineering firms. On the trading floor at a firm like Morgan Stanley or Citi, Illinois is simply a state school like SUNY.
I would be inclined to steer you towards Michigan-Ross simply because they have a more established program that's a little more respected among professionals. But if you come to Illinois and decide that you really like the campus, students and professors, you are not going to hurt yourself too much by choosing UIUC. Especially if you want to wind up at a Chicago prop shop.
Purdue is another solid Big Ten school, but I would think UIUC would be superior in terms of recruiting opportunities. The fact that the school is two hours and ten minutes from the Chicago Board of Trade- and you can make it down and back in a single evening- makes things a lot easier. There's brilliant people at both schools, but Illinois generally has the stronger engineering reputation as well.
Reputation should be a primary consideration, but between Big Ten schools like Illinois, Perdue, and Michigan, things like cost, quality of the teaching, academic culture, and how much you like the campus can EASILY swing things.
If you can, visit the schools and campuses.
I would be inclined to steer you towards Michigan-Ross simply because they have a more established program that's a little more respected among professionals. But if you come to Illinois and decide that you really like the campus, students and professors, you are not going to hurt yourself too much by choosing UIUC. Especially if you want to wind up at a Chicago prop shop.
Purdue is another solid Big Ten school, but I would think UIUC would be superior in terms of recruiting opportunities. The fact that the school is two hours and ten minutes from the Chicago Board of Trade- and you can make it down and back in a single evening- makes things a lot easier. There's brilliant people at both schools, but Illinois generally has the stronger engineering reputation as well.
Reputation should be a primary consideration, but between Big Ten schools like Illinois, Perdue, and Michigan, things like cost, quality of the teaching, academic culture, and how much you like the campus can EASILY swing things.
If you can, visit the schools and campuses.
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Or you can simply check the list of companies attending the career fairs in these three schools. It seems like some Chicago based prop shop will go to all three universities. But U Mich has more bulge brackets.
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I need to caution that when it comes to professional master programs like MFE, there is little correlation between how much career services from business school will help because the MFE students/programs are often on their own. And there are programs that run by math department where career services is a foreign concept so much homework needed to be done by applicants in this aspect.
Andy, in general, career services at Big Ten schools aren't very helpful.
The student organizations usually organize the career fairs and the companies usually come. At Illinois, it's Engineering Council.
This is what $5K/semester of tuition buys you.
The student organizations usually organize the career fairs and the companies usually come. At Illinois, it's Engineering Council.
This is what $5K/semester of tuition buys you.
UIUC just posted some names of the companies who hired their students. http://msfe.illinois.edu/placement
But what is the statement "UIUC's placement is significantly worse than Umich" based on? Is there a side-by-side comparison?
im a UIUC student and i got some friends in MFE program. in general i agree that opps from Chicago area are pretty OK but connections to big banks seems limited. Almost all major prop firms and some hedge funds in Chicago hire a lot UIUC graduate. These include both trading and developing positions as we got a great CS dept. For the MFE program, they offer some exclusive job info but you got to be very outstanding to secure them. So if you're confident you will be the top 3 or 5 students within the class, im pretty sure u'll get a very good job, either quant, trader or developer. Thats also the case for the first class. If not, you may not benefit a lot from the program. After all UIUC is not a prestigious private school, that's all it can offer.
