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- 3/31/25
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Hi.
I'm from Brazil. I have a bachelor's degree in Applied and Computational Mathematics from USP, the best university in Brazil and Latin America. However, my GPA is low. Without counting the failures, my average is 7 out of 10, which would be like a GPA of 2.8. If you consider the failures, it drops even more. However, many of these low grades are due to the fact that I chose to work since my first year of college, because I entered college again 'old' (I had already entered USP once, too, to study engineering, but I dropped out because I didn't like it), and I was afraid that I would have problems finding a job because of my age. So I always demanded work from myself. I don't know if that counts, but this course is the most difficult course in the entire University. Almost 50% of students drop out and the average GPA of students in this course is 5 out of 10. On the other hand, I had good work experiences, the last one being the best of all. I started as an intern in the risk management area at a promising hedge fund in Brazil, which was led by 3 ex-JPMorgan's. The CIO was the former treasurer for LATAM, the chief economist was the former chief economist for Brazil, and the third was a senior equity trader. I evolved a lot and was promoted there. I became a partner and was invited to develop and manage the entire quantitative part of the front office, acting as a quantitative analyst on the trading desk. I worked mainly with FX, Rates and Commodities, but I also worked with Equities.
Anyway, I consider this professional experience very solid, but I'm worried about my GPA. I want to apply for the MAFN at Columbia, and also for other Masters in Finance at NYU and Berkeley.
What do you think? Do I have any chance at all?
I'm from Brazil. I have a bachelor's degree in Applied and Computational Mathematics from USP, the best university in Brazil and Latin America. However, my GPA is low. Without counting the failures, my average is 7 out of 10, which would be like a GPA of 2.8. If you consider the failures, it drops even more. However, many of these low grades are due to the fact that I chose to work since my first year of college, because I entered college again 'old' (I had already entered USP once, too, to study engineering, but I dropped out because I didn't like it), and I was afraid that I would have problems finding a job because of my age. So I always demanded work from myself. I don't know if that counts, but this course is the most difficult course in the entire University. Almost 50% of students drop out and the average GPA of students in this course is 5 out of 10. On the other hand, I had good work experiences, the last one being the best of all. I started as an intern in the risk management area at a promising hedge fund in Brazil, which was led by 3 ex-JPMorgan's. The CIO was the former treasurer for LATAM, the chief economist was the former chief economist for Brazil, and the third was a senior equity trader. I evolved a lot and was promoted there. I became a partner and was invited to develop and manage the entire quantitative part of the front office, acting as a quantitative analyst on the trading desk. I worked mainly with FX, Rates and Commodities, but I also worked with Equities.
Anyway, I consider this professional experience very solid, but I'm worried about my GPA. I want to apply for the MAFN at Columbia, and also for other Masters in Finance at NYU and Berkeley.
What do you think? Do I have any chance at all?
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