Major Selection

[Kody]

Greetings everyone! I am a sophomore in SEAS at Columbia University. My goal is to become a QT or QR, and I am currently Engineering undeclared. I have until this friday to declare my major, and I am stuck between ORFE and CS. I have a gut liking for one more than the other, but would like to know which would give me higher odds of success in quant . Hope this isn't too vague, I appreciate the help.

 

[Andy Nguyen]

ORFE as an undergrad is too rigid a structure unless you know 100% you will go to graduate school in the same subject. How is the recruiting scene for ORFE at Columbia for undergrad? What kind of roles do graduates get with this degree?
With a CS, you keep your option open but do not much FE courses on the curriculum. To compensate, you can work on quant projects to strengthen your profile and distinguish yourself.
As long as the major is STEM and you can demonstrate your ability and knowledge in math, coding and finance, you will get opportunities in this field.

 

[Kody]

Thank you for the response! I looked into the roles FE undergraduates get, and it is usually more quantitative analyst roles at big banks rather than trader/researcher roles at the boutique banks I am targeting. For a little bit of context, IF I were to major in CS, I cannot minor/double major in FE due to course restrictions. It seems like most FE courses are restricted to FE majors. The benefit I see of majoring in FE is having access to those fe + MFE courses, and it WOULD be possible to take supplementary coursework in CS and obtain a minor. At Columbia a double major is practically impossible, as almost no courses are allowed to double count.

When I look at it, my options are CS Major + Stat/Other quantitative minors vs ORFE + CS Minor. The benefit of CS major is that I will be programmatically stronger, but the benefit with FE are that in my final semester I can take masters financial engineering coursework that is really interesting to me. I am unsure about grad school as of now, but I am pursuing research to see if PhD is a potential path for me. Thank you for taking your time to respond, this is a big decision that I am excited but nervous to make .

 

[Andy Nguyen]

The ORFE dept at Columbia is strong. I'm not familiar with the career services for undergraduates there but there have been many recent complaints from their MFE students which is a more well-known program there.
I strongly advise you to do proper research on the career services for BS there. Don't rely only on data you see on the website. Reach out to ORFE BS grads on LinkedIn to see what's what. If you are self-sufficient and can secure leads by yourself, it's good.

Columbia University - Masters in Financial Engineering - Reviews

quantnet.com

 

[Kody]

I see. The problem I've heard about FE was that the courses may be slightly outdated, whereas ML is more relevant in QR nowadays. Im leaning CS major, and hopefully will be able to get instructor permission to take those upper level FE classes that interest me. If not, I can always find the resources online and do personal projects.