<p>What undergrad programs are best for someone who wants to pursue a career in financial engineering?</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>You might want to think broadly about what you call this new, interdisciplinary major, and you might want to think broadly about whether you want a major, a concentration, a minor, or a program. The major obviously is the broadest way to study the subject, but in combination with a major such as compsci or mathematics, you could get a similar education to a major with a minor, concentration, or program. Having said that, you might want to look at QuantNet for information on such quantitative financial fields of study. I’d look first at those schools that have a “financial engineering” grad program to check for either an undergrad “major” or a way to combine the disciplines you want in a “financial engineering” “major.” Some are listed here: </p>
<p><a href=“Top Masters Programs for Financial Engineering”>http://financecareers.about.com/od/mba/a/Financial-Engineering.htm</a> </p>
<p>Do not neglect those schools that will allow you to build your own major and that have strong math, compsci, and finance programs. </p>
<p>I’ve heard Notre Dame, Columbia, Stevens Institute, and James Madison mentioned as having an undergraduate “major.” I’m familiar with the University of Maryland College Park, so I’ll suggest looking at their Quantitative Finance Fellows, for instance. I’m not associated with UMD or any of these universities.</p>
<p>Thank you and what do you think about Drexel’s business and engineering program? Is it made for a career in finengineering? @jkeil911</p>
<p>well, financial engineering does not necessarily involve hard core engineering. It often involves computer science and high-level mathematics and finance. I’m pulling from a wiki for the quotes I use: it does not involve “methods” of engineering and so “does not belong to any of the fields in traditional engg.” It is in this sense much more a product of programming, financial ideas, and quantitative mathematics. So I don’t think you need a college of engineering to put together a self-made major in financial engineering. Notice in my response above I don’t refer to engineering schools–because traditional engineering is not a factor in most kinds of financial engineering. FE is about the technical and theoretical tooling and re-tooling of financial systems. That’s ugly, but that’s how I think of it. The compsci that is part of FE is not computer engineering; it is largely programming and not hardware design, say.</p>
<p>I don’t know of the Drexel “major,” but I suggest you reach out to the faculty member on the Facebook page and see what he can tell you about the course of study. Note that the FE “major” is in the School of Business, as most are.</p>
<p>thanks again so would you say a major in compsci or math and a minor in finance? how bout ID studies in Econ/math?</p>
<p>@jkeil911</p>