<p>Hi, I am thinking of going into financial engineering and heard that Columbia's is very good.
Is this only for the Master's degree though, or is the "concentration" in the OR Undergrad degree respectable as well?
And finally, if I'm thinking of ultimately applying for the masters degree at columbia. Would it be beneficial to do the Undergrad Financial Engineering concentration at Columbia, or to major in math/physics/some engineering at another school?</p>
<p>This is exactly what i'm wondering....i think they have an undergrad program too...but i'm not for sure.</p>
<p>they do have an undergrad program....to major in that, you've to be in IEOR (Industrial Engineering And Operations Research) for 2 years, and I think sometime in your sophomore year, you can choose FE as your concentration....you cant be in FE directly in your freshman year</p>
<p>you apply to the concentration/major.. (it's not a concentration in college's concentration sense, it's like a different track within a major) during fall of your sophomore year when you declare.
they admit people after winter vacation and in summer. as long as you have good GPA in your tech classes you'll get in.
FE undergrads gets to take a few grad FE classes (data analysis..) and have alot hearvier of a major requirement.
the main advantage of being in FE is pretty much that you can be sure you are at the top 20% of the class. in that sense, yes FE is more prestiges. </p>
<p>as for recruiting.. first class of FE graduates are this year so you really don't have any data to say anything about it. IEOR department prides it self on its FE reputation so you can expect them to be doing PR for the FE undergraduate program</p>
<p>So is it more beneficial to go into Financial Engineering in undergrad or specialize later in grad school?
I'm debating between Applied Mathematics+Economics, Electrical Engineering+Economics, and Financial Engineering+Economics</p>
<p>all three of those are good choices for studying FE later down the road. as long as you are strong in probability/stochastic MFE shouldn't be a problem (phd is another story)
apam, EE and OR are three very different departments, if you like the three study equally as much, then check out the departments once you are on campus.</p>