Actuarial studies

Jay P

Anyone doing actuary studies in UCC? Is the course good? I need to know because this is pretty much the only thing im thinking about doing when i go to college

bafs4

Do it in ucd.You get more exemptions and a way more prestiguous course dont bother with Cork.Also beware that you wanna be very smart if you are gonna pass the exams I got 590 in leaving and am finding it very difficult most of Dcu and Cork will never qualify because its too hard for them altough there are are a few..you also get work experience in ucd which gets you a job generally.

nesf

Seriously, don't drag up old threads just to rubbish a course in another college. No one cares if you got 590 in the Leaving and honestly, if you talk to any really good people at academic stuff they'll tell you straight out that getting very high points in the Leaving is no indication for being able to do difficult courses at Third Level.

Jay P

bafs4 wrote: »

Do it in ucd.You get more exemptions and a way more prestiguous course dont bother with Cork.Also beware that you wanna be very smart if you are gonna pass the exams I got 590 in leaving and am finding it very difficult most of Dcu and Cork will never qualify because its too hard for them altough there are are a few..you also get work experience in ucd which gets you a job generally.

Yeah I know about the rep UCD has, I was wondering about the UCC course because I'm not entirely sure if I want to go all the way to Dublin for college.

bafs4

A guy in my year switched from cork after a year...I presume the course is quite good in cork as it is a quaility university...but from my personal experience and discussing this with my friends best jobs go to ucd grads then dcu then cork then galway and the latter two find it very difficult to good a good company that give study time for exemptions and also tutor you for exemptions....if you get the point dont worry bout moving to dublin everybody is in the same bout and the course has people from ever corner of the country..pm me if you want any further information on ucd...i can also inform you about the work experience situation in ucd...from what i believe cork have a shorter placement but rarely to any get into the top firms such as watson wyatt mercer canada life etc etc so you want to be careful in where to decide to go especially if your considering doing actuary

nesf

I still think you're looking at it too much as the person being limited by their degree. If you're very good, you should be able to find work regardless of whether your degree is from UCC, UCD or wherever. Companies hire the person not the qualification and while doing a degree in UCD might be more prestigious in some respects if you're very good then you'll probably stand out regardless of where you did it.

The biggest error people make when they're choosing undergrads or in the early years of doing them is viewing their degree as a limiting you to a certain field. For the most part they don't and especially with any quantitative degree, companies tend to just want to see that you've done a lot of quant stuff rather than caring about the specific degree (ie once you know the person has a good head for maths you can train them in house to specialise in a particular role with a fair amount of confidence that'll not be wasted money where the person won't be able for the role versus taking a risk on someone who seems to be good with maths but doesn't have a degree background that can back this up. It's a lot risker to attempt to train someone for a quant role in this case and most companies won't bother unless the person scores very highly in some test or another).

I'd bet that if you looked at the top of the UCC class of graduates (rather than the lower end) they probably do quite well and it follows the same pattern as most other degrees in this country. If you are good in your area you'll generally be able to earn a nice bit from the start, but if you're only middling then your prospects aren't necessarily as good.