I suspect that they are about the same. The director of NYU's program said that they are equivalent in terms of rigor. I've read many of the threads in this forum, and noone has been able to give a definitive answer on this.

FDAXHunter, nicobyron and N, Is the only "fun" job that tosh137 can get that uses the stuff he learned in FE, the quant trading job, or you don't know the answer?I'm interested because I'm considering this degree. Thanks.

N,Do you want to go into more detail? It seems your saying that not much of what this guy has learned can be applied. BTW, Derman is highly thought of at Goldman.

What do you think makes it the best? Columbia revised their curriculum this year and has Derman co-managing the program. Also, NYU's program is highly thought of!

The MA at Columbia is one year. The MS at Columbia is more like Berkeley's being one calendar year or the equivalent of three semesters.

I think that CMU is thought of more highly in terms of FE. Although, they are more well-known for their programming abilities. A dual-MBA-FE is a much more attractive package. Although, it will cost you more.

How would all of you compare Columbia to Berkeley then? The MFE at Columbia that is.

<t>I would think that some employers would hire people from a program that taught theory keeping in mind that the students would learn the implementation on the job. It's harder to teach theory on the job than implementation. I work at GS and I've spoken to some recruiters there, they look at the sc...

I think it partly depends upon the breakdown of your GMAT, what's the percentile for Quant? If over 95, you should be fine.

Then if people aren't comparing those two, how about job prospects for CMU grads vs. Columbia grads?

<t>Anyone have info on which of the top programs gets the most jobs? I think that the top are (not in any order): CMU, Columbia(both programs), NYU, Princeton, Cornell, Berkeley and Stanford? Love to hear people's thoughts on this since jobs are so hard to get.In my opinion, employers aren't hiring ...

<t>I am probably going to Columbia's FE program too. Although, it's difficult to get a handle on how employers view the programs. All of the students I've spoken with at Columbia feel that the FE and Math Finance are about the same. One student thought the job prospects were better at NYU's program!...