Am I wasting my Ivy degree on CS? Do I make the switch to Wharton? - Advice Needed!
Hi all,
I am a Freshman in college, and I am currently doing Computer Science and Math at Penn in CAS.
I have the opportunity to transfer to Wharton for next semester if I want, but I'm not sure what I should do.
Here is information about my situation and some of my thoughts:
About me:
- I'm pretty advanced in math, but I just started programming this semester. I am decent at it, but I can't help but feel lightyears behind those who have been coding since 7th grade.
- I definitely have very high aptitude in math and related subjects (have gotten a 4.0 so far, perfect SAT etc.) HOWEVER, I'm not one of those geniuses who is winning international math competitions.
- My personality is good; I'm pretty social, but I can get nervous especially in interviews and stuff.
My thoughts/fears:
- Computer Science is a very meritocratic field (from what I've heard), and being at Penn supposedly doesn't give me much advantage over someone at a state school. This makes my time here feel like a waste, especially when I contrast it with a field like finance where my brand name helps immensely.
- If I stay in compsci, I will start at like 120k but not go much higher from there.
- I will never be at the top of the compsci industry because there's too many people who have been coding since they were kids.
- However, I feel like going in to finance might be a waste of my potential in math; I'm worried it will be boring.
I would love if someone with more experience could help lead me on the right path.
Thank you!
There's always quantitative finance if you love CS and math. Plenty of opportunity to make a lot of money and you don't have to be a complete genius or whatever. If you aren't super passionate about CS/math then going to Wharton would be a great idea as the campus recruiting can't be beat.
Thank you for the response!
Is there a relatively stable career ladder within quant finance?
I know if I did quant stuff, I would be doing great out of college; I'm worried about what my prospects will be down the road however.
I'm not sure what you mean by stable career ladder. It depends.
At quantitative hedge funds, you are either a researcher or a portfolio manager/head of group. There isn't an analyst --> associate --> senior associate --> vp -->.... type of progression. But that doesn't mean your compensation doesn't increase. You can have the same title in a hedge fund for 8 years and see your compensation quadruple. In a hedge fund the titles just don't really matter.
In banks there are also lots of quant roles in which there is a defined promotion path no different from if you were a banker. The career path for quantitative roles or even software engineering is no less well defined or more meritocratic than banking, private equity, etc. It's just that the parameters of what is considered success in those roles are different. In client facing roles, you are measured by more subjective parameters. But you're still measured nonetheless. If you suck, you suck.
Also your comment about the 120k cap in software engineering isn't accurate. There's promotion structures in place, office politics, etc. at Google too. And it certainly does not cap out at 120k. There's just less of an expectation that you get promoted after a certain amount of time. That is, if you want to (or in most cases unable to), you can stay as a relatively junior engineer and only make 120k. But if you're killing it in your CS and math classes at Penn.
Maybe if you clarified what you mean by "stable career ladder" I and others could be of more help.
First off, you're in a good spot. You have an extremely strong skillset and have options. I recruited tech IB in SF and met a lot of guys with backgrounds similar to you. Learning finance concepts will be easy for you considering your strength in math, so I wouldn't worry about that. From my experience, it seems like you could continue your current majors, and simply recruit for banking. Your background makes you more unique than the traditional finance major. You could develop a pretty cool story in my opinion. This way, you keep the upside of having your degree in CS, while still having the ability to recruit for banking. Obviously, if you don't have a huge passion to do anything with you CS major as far as a career goes, then going to Wharton seems like the best choice.
Transfer into Wharton if you don't really like cs/math that much and prefer to go into finance or business. Don't just follow the Penn mentality and join because it looks more "prestigious." If you don't like finance and end up in IB you're just going to hate yourself later.
Study and do what you love, as you will appreciate this decision later in your life. CS kids break into investment banking all the time. Your passion will guide you towards where you should go.
Fellow Penn / Wharton student here -- I think there is value in adding the Wharton degree. The Wharton curriculum itself is not demanding (nothing compares to workloads in classes like CIS 120 / 160). Maybe try looking into the dual degree. There are obviously lots of people who do Wharton, say a Finance concentration, with SEAS, especially Computer Science.
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