<p>I realize now that what I wrote could be misinterpreted. I was not telling a story against any undergraduate involvement in graduate courses, it was more one against undergraduate involvement in professional school courses, where the undergraduates are not imbued with the professional school culture, and not particularly interested in the practical things on which the professional school students focused. I imagine that's why, at the GSB, they have separate undergraduate sections of some of the classes open to undergraduates.</p>
<p>As an undergraduate, I had almost exactly the same experience and nmd's daughter, except in the humanities. I attended a public lecture series by a famous professor, went to his office hours to talk to him about it, and wound up with him as my advisor. He let me audit his main graduate course the next year (about 1/3 of which was comprised of other faculty members), and set up an independent study so that I could write a paper and get credit for it, without being officially registered in the course. (I also never, never opened my mouth in that class. I was not good enough. It was massively intimidating.) And when I was in law school, I audited a graduate seminar on feminist literary theory (about which I knew a fair amount -- I wasn't intimidated there) that also included three undergraduates, who were active participants, and whose participation was enjoyed by everyone.</p>
<p>At Chicago, my daughter has taken several courses that were cross-listed as graduate and undergraduate English courses. But, really, everyone is on the same page in such situations, and there isn't a huge difference between a well-read, confident undergraduate and a first-year graduate student.</p>
<p>The MSFM is one of the few, perhaps only, UChicago programs that allows no cross registration into its courses (in large part to keep out ill prepared MBA students and science PhD students looking to jump ship on their fields).</p>
<p>Additionally, as Columbiaa Financial Engineering Director Emanuel Derman recently noted about quant finance in general, there are few Americans in it at all, and even fewer from elite colleges. Prior to the market meltdown this year, top performing domestic UGs with mildly quantish backgrounds could easily land decent jobs in plain vanilla finance or consulting (i.e. no fancy math or programming), and after a few years tended to opt for the golden halo of a top tier MBA (stressing generic accounting, corporate finance, management strategy, etc.) </p>
<p>In contrast, very few opted to rack up relatively low paid experience in the applied sciences and also earn a related MS or PhD in fields like statistics or computer science, the combination of which is increasingly becoming a prerequisite for admission leading schools. I suggest looking at Berkeleys program (which vies for best in the world) site to get a better sense of what one is up against </p>
<p>It was my understanding,
that mortgage back securities were the fault of ill prepared quant analysists coming from relatively new quant programs,
and that the quant field itself opens an entirely different field then one could enter with an MBA, and that an MBA alone isn't nearly enough for what I want to enter
JHU, i think you are grossly underestimating the quant field and its importance/ progressive nature </p>
<p>and the top quant schools Berkley, Chicago, Stanford, Columbia, and Princeton are still the leaders of quantitative finance and economics</p>
<p>that being said, will the Math with specialization in econ properly prepare me for these programs? They seem to focus on a lot of math and, in most cases, programming.
Maybe math with specialization in comp sci is a better fit? But I still am incredibly interested in econ.</p>
<p>There is no one best way to do what you want to do. Consider:</p>
<ul>
<li> "quant analysts" don't all do the same thing or use the same tools. And the approaches, goals and such are constantly evolving (except for the overarching one: make money!)</li>
<li> people doing quant research have a wide variety of backgrounds</li>
<li> there will always be a tension between people with very specialized backgrounds who may only fit a few positions in the country, versus those with broader backgrounds that can either learn on the job or can play in more diverse roles.</li>
</ul>
<p>There's a lot of time for you before you need to make hard decisions. In that time, the profession will be further evolving, so what works now may not work in a few years. So focus on what you enjoy and can do well in, and keep asking questions once you get to college. Most importantly, if you are serious about quant analysis, start thinking about internships and outside the classroom experience from the beginning - making contacts, asking questions and such.</p>
<p>Newmassdad has it right. Invest in durable intellectual skills (analysis, statistical inference, C++) and keep an open mind as your interests and various fields themselves evolve. Any of the UG hard science degrees at Chicago from econ with a minor in math to pure physics will prepare you well for host of careers later on, which inevitably will require a graduate credential anyhow.</p>
<p>Impressive brainpower in the Berkeley Fin. Eng. program. One can't help but think it would be put to better use in traditional engineering activities - making faster chips, designing computers that don't crash, building bridges, whatever. Anything but how to squeeze the last nanocent of profit out of financial instruments. At the very least, I hope they all take the course on the failures of 2008 (and the earlier debacles such as LTCM).</p>
<p>Don't blame the quants for the failures of the past year. Models are just that - a concept of what has our could happen. The key variables that go into a model (such as backtest time period, range of variables to use, heck, any assumption) are subjective decisions often made by the management using the models. And, the even bigger issue is how the models/results are used. The quants don't often have a lot of say in that. </p>
<p>To put it another way, I would not blame the guy who first observed and quantified that there was an untapped borrower segment out there if one used more subprime loans. Instead, I'd fault the management who decided to use such results and throw all their eggs in that one basket. Or worse, designed programs such that they scored (in the short term) off the transaction fees, got their bonuses and quit...</p>
<p>Sorry, newmassdad and nblazer. In many cases, the quants WERE management. They certainly were at LTCM. And if they weren't top management, they were the people deciding what inputs to use and collecting their bonuses based on transaction fees.</p>
<p>
[quote]
It was my understanding,
that mortgage back securities were the fault of ill prepared quant analysists coming from relatively new quant programs
[/quote]
This really made me chuckle. You are talking about a major profit driver for Wall Street, especially Lehman Brothers, not to mention ratings agencies, over a period of at least two decades, with trillions of dollars of securities issued. It wasn't the work of two or three 25-year olds who would have done better if they had listened harder in class. It was the work of really, really smart people some of whom had been working on risk and prediction issues since the emergence of junk bonds in the late 70s. (And they weren't coming out of "quant programs" because quant programs generally didn't exist when it all started. Quant programs came into existence in part to feed the beast this became.)</p>
<p>Agree with LTCM and other boutique operations, but not at the major I banks. I'm sure you know the leadership at these funds came from other areas, and were most interested in interesting product that could be sold through the institutional sales forces, in order to get the syndication fees, markups and such. I think in these firms, the quants developed the product, but were not particularly behind the abuses (inadequate disclosure etc.), or the greed among the buyers. But heck, I've been an outsider for years. I could be wrong.</p>
<p>From the articles I've read they were mostly engineers who landed top MBA degrees with "quantish" qualities and thought they could fit the job for the quant models cough cough <em>wharton</em> cough cough, as did their employees.
They didn't have fully trained backgrounds, specialized in the quant field, and, in the end, made faulty models.
This is coming from a family friend who use to manage at Lehman brothers, who also explained to me that the market will undoubtedly move to valuing high profile quant degrees over the MBA.
Look at the UK, the quant degrees from Oxbrige are one of the most thought after degree in all of Europe, they have had the right idea for years. </p>
<p>There is nothing a quant jockey can't handle that an mba financial analyst could do, but going the other way around is impossible. The quant degree seems like it could open up far more doors then an MBA could. I am not talking strictly about money, but research opportunities and a wide variety of different job opportunities.</p>
<p>I have no idea how this has become a debate concerning the value of quantitative analysists though :)</p>
<p>Uchicagoalum and newmassdad, thanks for the really good info concerning MFSM, it really seems like its important to set a good path for myself freshman year entering college, or else the stringent requirements of all these programs are going to bar me out if i just a well rounded education. </p>
<p>With the Core and all, and the quarter system, I'll be able to invest deeply in the kind of background I want to achieve right?</p>
<p>If the core is successful, it will help you discover worlds you didn't even know existed. </p>
<p>I went to a college that had nothing like the core, only a set of distribution requirements and a basic series of humanities and social science courses that one could test out of, which I did - I was focused on the sciences. It was my loss, one I did not realize for years. </p>
<p>Keep open minded, ask questions and explore no matter where you end up. You may be surprised.</p>
<p>The writing skills you carry away from the core will be very important to your future success, while the science courses develop the right mindset for any type of quant finance field. Solving complex chemistry problems has a lot in common with pricing options and so on.</p>