2020 QuantNet Rankings of Financial Engineering (MFE) Programs

We are pleased to announce the release of our QuantNet 2020 Rankings of Financial Engineering programs, to be available online at 9AM EST on Dec 16th.
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[IntoDarkness]

there is nothing to hide but trying to present the placement stats in the best way possible

 

[ApolloChariot]

there is nothing to hide but trying to present the placement stats in the best way possible

Very much so.

great way of putting it.

 

[Xiaoyu.Du]

Very much so.

great way of putting it.

I am a student in Gatech QCF, the graduation date of 2019 Fall is just last weekend, everything changes day by day, I know someone who planed to study PHD suddenly get a job, it's understandable that the data is different from the data reported to Quantnet. I guess for the data to Quantnet, it might be the students of 2018, otherwise how do they calculate 3 month after graduation? And for some other programs(CMU MSCF), they are still doing finals and haven't not graduate yet.
You could check with the staffs and post the answers here.

 

[Chilbal]

i wonder what differences exist between quantnet's methodology vs program's.
I will contact these programs personally to check what is happening.

 

[quanttrader]

View attachment 32864

How is it that official stats are so different from what quantnet is reporting, I have seen this discrepancy last year also.
Can anyone explain why is this the case? quantnet reported 98k as avg total salary vs 115k stated here

115k on the website is average TOTAL compensation, i.e. including bonus. The salaries in the rankings are BASE salary, plus signing bonus.

 

[Chilbal]

you mean (average total comp) vs ( avg base + avg sign-on)

But aren't they both same? even if we assume some people don't get bonuses then actually the ( avg base + avg sign-on) which is quoted by quantnet should be higher than the average total comp clearly!

 

[quanttrader]

you mean (average total comp) vs ( avg base + avg sign-on)

But aren't they both same? even if we assume some people don't get bonuses then actually the ( avg base + avg sign-on) which is quoted by quantnet should be higher than the average total comp clearly!

yes, that's what I mean. average total comp should include a first year year-end bonus, i.e total comp = base + signing bonus + year-end bonus

 

[Chilbal]

oh ok did not know about the year-end bonus being included in the total comp

 

[ParthRShah]

Hey! Can somebody share an insight regarding the Rutgers MQF Program? It jumped a whooping 3 ranks in the new ranking. I have a standing admit from there and have really mixed opinions about this program.
Also, a comparison between NYU Tandon vs GAtech vs Rutgers MQF in terms of reputation in the job market would be really helpful

 

[Matt A]

For areas like NY what's considered a decent starting total salary?

 

[Chilbal]

i would rank GATECH > NYU > RUTGERS
NYU has location advantage and the program has improved a lot under peter carr.
peter carr is the best thing that happened to nyu tandon mfe program.

But still, gatech qcf is a very old program and its taught by 3 schools iyse, math dept, scheller
iyse is ranked 1 worldwide last 29 yrs and math dept is also pretty good. Its cs dept is also very reputed
in gatech you can take free electives from other depts and there are finance based cs courses on ML deep learning etc.
math dept courses are also very rigorous.
there is also an option to double count credits to get a dual masters degree in CSE.

coming to the fees and costs Gatech has the best return after baruch.
NYU program is 2 yr vs gatech 1.5 year

NYU Tandon, on the other hand, is very close to the city and has its advantages but although peter says high-class size is beneficial I'm a bit sceptical about that because I don't feel that at nyu tandon with 150 people you get the same one on one attention as Georgia tech.
i got to know that some people are struggling to get internships at nyu tandon although it depends on the individual skill, I like the fact that georia tech has 100 per cent internship placement.
I know that quantnet rankings are based on factual data but in my mind, i rank georgia tech above nyu tandon because the quality of the students in gatech seems a bit higher than tandon because gatech has interview and a 4 min video and generally higher standards due to the low class size.


coming to rutgers, its considered as a safe school but it has improved a lot recently but nowhere near the range of NYU tandon and georgia tech.
i would consider rutgers to be the best safety program overall.

 

[Chilbal]

There are some pros to NYU Tandon as well.
You get a lot of flexibility in courses there are like zillions of courses in different concentrations.

In 2 years you can do the internship twice and can continue the internship over the last semester as part-time due to being very close to companies.
although working full time after graduating in 1.5 years is an even better deal
some Courses taught by practitioners might help in getting an industry perspective.
although cohort size is big class size is small as said by peter carr.

 

[Xiaoyu.Du]

There are some pros to NYU Tandon as well.
You get a lot of flexibility in courses there are like zillions of courses in different concentrations.

In 2 years you can do the internship twice and can continue the internship over the last semester as part-time due to being very close to companies.
although working full time after graduating in 1.5 years is an even better deal
some Courses taught by practitioners might help in getting an industry perspective.
although cohort size is big class size is small as said by peter carr.

I joined gatech in 2019 fall and I am doing dual master degree in two years in gatech too, CSE+QCF, which enhance my understanding of models and programing implementation, and this fall semester, me and more than half of our chinese students got internship(We get internship in the first semester), some in Barclay, some in Bank of America, other in funds and financial services companies. I got two offers from two funds and have to make decisions.

Gatech is better for getting jobs in America.

I rank Gatech higher than Tandon just because in the U S. News school rank 2020, we are the same rank with NYU, however we focus more on technology(Math, Engineering and CS),no offense.

 

[Chilbal]

my previous message highlights all these pros u said about georgia tech and i also said the same thing about ranking gerogia tech higher than nyu.
second post was just highlighting some of the pros of nyu tandon.

 

[Chilbal]

is CSE computer science or computational science and engineering?

 

[Xiaoyu.Du]

is CSE computer science or computational science and engineering?

Computational science and engineering, I believe this is the best combination with Financial Engineering, CS is another way.
The core courses for CSE are here:
I have taken the following two courses:
Comp Sci&Engr Algorithms, very useful when you are designing codes, write fast algorithms, choose the best data structure and doing interviews.
Computation Data Analysis, Math and implementation details under Machine learning models, get a solid understanding of them and implement some models such as SVM, logistic regression, K-means, PCA by your own.

These three I am going to take in the next semester
Model & Simulation: Found&Implement
High Perform Computing
Numerical Linear Algebra, the good foundation for all numerical analysis methods.

 

[fangjiren]

Hello! Can anyone tell me which is better between MMF of Boston University and MQF of Rutgers University? I will try to get a internship in NY or Boston. Which one is easier to find a job?

 

[binomial-torrent]

this might be very ambitious but are there plans to branch out to masters programs in general for getting into the quant industry? mfe or not mfe. like i’m sure a data science degree at say NYU or harvard or a ms stats at uchicago or ms cs at stanford will carry similar if not more and perhaps a lot more weight

 

[Chilbal]

this might be very ambitious but are there plans to branch out to masters programs in general for getting into the quant industry? mfe or not mfe. like i’m sure a data science degree at say NYU or harvard or a ms stats at uchicago or ms cs at stanford will carry similar if not more and perhaps a lot more weight

Dont be so sure about that quant is not all data science though.
I mean except PhD in applied maths stats or physics which carries more weight surely but I don't think any kind of masters carries that kind of weight.

 

[Chilbal]

Hello! Can anyone tell me which is better between MMF of Boston University and MQF of Rutgers University? I will try to get an internship in NY or Boston. Which one is easier to find a job?

This is a tricky one Boston ranking is falling hard along with its program's reputation and Rutger's program is improving.
Boston MSMF is much more rigorous than MQF that's for sure.
But Boston Fee is significantly higher than MQF.
there is also the Boston vs closer to NYC debate.
so I would say if you are confident about your networking skills and interested in a math rigorous program you can choose Boston.
If you are indifferent to what kind of a quant you want to be and a bit worried about getting internships etc then you can go with Rutgers.
But I will say generally Boston is recognized more than Rutgers generally due to its brand name but it's not everything