<p>Saw this site, Department</a> of Industrial Engineering & Operations Research and had a few questions about it.</p>
<p>How does Columbia's program compare to Penn Fisher or Princeton ORFE? What does the program look for in applicants? How well known is it?</p>
<p>are you looking for graduate or undergraduate?</p>
<p>i think first thing to do is look at some posts on here - beardtax is a commenter who has a decidedly negative opinion of columbia’s IEOR program, though i don’t know where he/she would place it in comparison to other programs. i presume you might also be able to find a contrary opinion on here. </p>
<p>as someone who did not major in IEOR i’ll keep my mouth shut further, but i guess an observation is that the department has the most majors in total (across its 4 areas) than any other departments in engineering. so it is pretty popular, ranging from the apply-for major in financial engineering to the somewhat notorious EMS.</p>
<p>i’d be looking at undergrad.</p>
<p>already went through the columbia forum, looked through all 8 pages, saw nothing with ieor in its title. i am right in assuming that the focus of ieor is somewhat similar to Fisher or ORFE, right?
ems is…engineering and management science?</p>
<p>thanks for the input!</p>
<p>the fisher program as far as i know is a special apply for program between SEAS and Wharton, and it is quite competitive. it also as far as i know seems to have more of the ethos of a b-school program than the exclusively technical background of the IEOR majors. indeed it seems IEOR is closer specifically to Princeton’s ORFE.</p>
<p>Engineering management systems is EMS. </p>
<p>Do a search of the forum, it is easier than browsing for titles. Go to the ‘Search this Forum’ on the top right of the Columbia page, and search for IEOR or financial engineering, and you can see various opinions.</p>
<p>ranking-wise, Columbia IEOR > Princeton ORFE. </p>
<p>But Princeton’s ORFE is harder to get into than Columbia IEOR. </p>
<p>Columbia’s IEOR is definitely top-notch in the country, especially if you want to get into financial industry.</p>
<p>So the department is strong, but is every major included? I know financial engineering is strong, but how about operations research and engineering management system?</p>
<p>I’ve said this quite a bit. You don’t have to believe me that the IEOR department teaching in SEAS is quite bad. </p>
<p>Check [CULPA</a> - Columbia Underground Listing of Professor Ability](<a href=“http://www.culpa.info%5DCULPA”>http://www.culpa.info) and click on the IEOR department ([CULPA</a> - Industrial Engineering and Operations Research](<a href=“http://www.culpa.info/departments/57]CULPA”>http://www.culpa.info/departments/57))</p>
<p>Read the reviews of some of the professors, especially ones who teach undergraduates. The good professors in the department are Karl Sigman, David Yao, and Emanuel Derman. Look at the professors you’ll be taking classes with and read their reviews. There’s no point in hearsay, just read the reviews on professors and make a decision yourself.</p>
<p>FE is recognized depending on what jobs you apply for. Almost no manager has heard of FE, but many younger analysts within S&T will have heard of the major. Regardless, the major has just been starting to take off within the last 10 years so it will be a while before people know exactly what it entails.</p>
<p>I’ve heard Princeton FE is much harder than Columbia’s. Princeton tends to have more difficult technical classes that emphasize proof based understanding. You can definitely get away in the IEOR department (B+ and above) with a solid cheat sheet but little to no theoretical understanding. As for recruitment, Princeton and Columbia have similar recruitment from banks, depending from firm to firm of course.</p>
<p>Sorry, I can’t help but point this out because it bugs me so much. When people say “Financial Engineering at Columbia is strong”, what exactly does this mean? That the graduates of its program go on to do very well for themselves? Yes, it’s true that FE grads usually end up quite well off in terms of getting a job in finance, but how much the FE program contributes to that is questionable. FE selects the very top students in SEAS who have displayed an interest in finance very early on (they now require students to submit resumes for the application). It is highly likely that these students would have gone on to good jobs in finance no matter where they went or what they majored in. </p>
<p>Remember that study that showed that students who got into Ivies but chose to attend state schools instead were doing just as well (career-wise) as their counterparts who actually attended Ivies? This is something like that.</p>
<p>As for the value add of the FE curriculum itself (independent of its graduates’ innate capabilities) for someone looking for a generic, non-quant finance job, I leave that to beard tax, who has posted extensively on this issue.</p>
<p>disagree with the notion that “almost no managers have heard of FE”. </p>
<p>FE is a very poplar major across the country. Many top schools have master programs in FE. And those who didn’t are starting to offer new programs in FE. Why? Because there is huge demand in job market. </p>
<p>I have no idea how you can say almost no managers have heard of FE.</p>
<p>I am a current undergraduate at Columbia IEOR FE program. I kind of agree with the idea that beardtax has presented, because I see what he is saying about some of the professors where you take the course and end up with something better than a B+ and still don’t know ***** about the subject. But on the other hand there are numerous course where you actually learn a lot, like Kachani’s Industrial Econ and Derman’s courses. The reason FE is hailed as one of the best in the country is because of the competitive procedure to get into the program. You need a 3.8 during your first two years while completing the rigorous prerequisites for the program. Thus, people who end up as FE majors all have very high GPAs with a hard course load. And therefore they all end up doing really well, come the recruiting season, thereby boosting the FE program’s reputation.</p>