Computer Engineering vs Finance

College Majors Business Major
1

Hello everyone,

    I would like to get some expert advice from this forum. I am a high school senior. I have taken all IB and AP classes my entire high school career. I have a 4.0. My ACT and SAT scores 30 in Math-31 in reading-28 in science and 620 in both Math/CR. I don't this the test scores are good reflection of my academic abilities because I have taken all high aptitude classes along with AP Calculus AB and AP Physics Mechanics and got a 4 on both of them,last year. Right now, I am taking AP Calc BC and  AP Physics C:E&M, IB Chemistry SL and IB Biology HL. I would have I have a very good grasp on all these subjects but I am not a very good standardized test taker as I panic and make silly mistakes that I would not have made in normal school environemnt. 

    Everything said, my dilemma is as follows all my life I have been a science student. I like everything about science. The main fact is that my father have never limited me to a particular field's peculiarities rather he took time and showed me the amazing world of science in all the different branched of science and how they are inter-connected: Phy, Chem and Bio. 

    Therefore, it was hard for me to choose a particular field but later I realized that I connect more with Phy than Bio and that I kind of loved the subject of Physics. When I was young I would try to break the parental lock on my network and I discovered many things and that would fuel mu intelligence like: cookies, c:/ root, registry entry. I loved mystery and the amazing feeling you get when you break a lock or find a hidden glitch in the system. Recent incident: My home laptop had Windows 7 in it but it would not get the Windows X installer. So, I had to manually rewrite registry and change it so that it would download the installer and run it. I even posted it in a forum and got many likes for my methodology. I am very good in finding solutions and learning as I work my way out. 

      So, in my start of my Senior year I have decided that I would major in Comp Engg or Finance. Why I choose, Finance could be seem off but I choose Finance because people told me that smart people can make a lot of money in that field. But, the problem is that I don't see myself getting up every morning so that I can check balance sheet. Rather,my interest lies in the Fraud Dept. in banking system and I even did a job shadowing at a local bank and have a pretty good idea of what those people do. To be honest, I loved the job. People have told me Finance is a medium stress job but has a higher pay than Comp Engg in the long run.

     Another concern is that people have told me that Computer Engg have to do a lot of hard Calculus and Probability math that those concepts are really hard to understand. I am confident with the Calc part but not so sure about Advance Probability and computation math as I have never done those.  But, I love the computer engg's cyber security sector. I want to get a masters in Computer Cyber security and be a cyber security expert.

  Now, that I have gotten admission to my dream colleges and they are giving me good scholarship , I think its time to decide what I want to do in my life. I am looking for expert advice in which line should I choose Comp Engg or Finance or should I choose comp Engg as major and Finance as minor or do a Comp. Engg major and do MBA finance?

Please give me suggestions and thank you for your help and guidance.

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Finance may have a higher pay ceiling than computer engineering, but finance is definitely not a “medium stress job.” If you work in high finance (where you get paid a lot) such as investment banking, private equity, or hedge funds, you will be working a heck a lot of hours, almost double the hours of working in engineering. It is not unheard of people in investment banking working 80-100 hours weeks. I would recommend you major in computer engineering because you have a clear interest in science and becoming a cyber security expert. Then after working a few years you could pursue an MBA if you still want to work in finance, because MBA programs love engineers.

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@BigNoodle thank you for your info.

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I generally don’t think it is a great idea to decide on a major before you take even one introductory level class in a subject. If you got in as an engineer take a couple of engineering classes and see what you think. If you applied to business schools, take a couple of finance and a couple of IT classes and see where your interests and aptitudes lie. In the long run you will do better studying a subject you enjoy and are good at.

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@happy1 Thank you for the information.

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@kunkun29 Everything you mentioned points to your interest in becoming a security engineer so that is what you should pursue at the start. Usually your first 2 semesters cover a core curriculum that will give you flexibility in officially declaring your major for your remaining 2 years (although you can honestly just change it whenever you want as long as it fits into your credit schedule). During that time you can decide, through your classes, whether or not you’re really interested in security engineering, finance, or if it’s something else.

If you are strictly deciding between finance and some type of comp sci or specialized cybersecurity program.The good thing is a lot of your early quantitative courses might be applicable toward a career in finance anyway so you wouldn’t be losing that much.

The company that you are a security engineer for doesn’t really matter as once you get your degree you can move pretty liberally between industries. The social media company I work at regularly hires security engineers from bulge bracket banks so it’s not like you would need a finance minor or any academic experience to specifically be an engineer at a bank.