<p>From the articles I’ve read they were mostly engineers who landed top MBA degrees with “quantish” qualities and thought they could fit the job for the quant models cough cough <em>wharton</em> cough cough, as did their employees.
They didn’t have fully trained backgrounds, specialized in the quant field, and, in the end, made faulty models.
This is coming from a family friend who use to manage at Lehman brothers, who also explained to me that the market will undoubtedly move to valuing high profile quant degrees over the MBA.
Look at the UK, the quant degrees from Oxbrige are one of the most thought after degree in all of Europe, they have had the right idea for years. </p>
<p>There is nothing a quant jockey can’t handle that an mba financial analyst could do, but going the other way around is impossible. The quant degree seems like it could open up far more doors then an MBA could. I am not talking strictly about money, but research opportunities and a wide variety of different job opportunities.</p>
<p>I have no idea how this has become a debate concerning the value of quantitative analysists though :)</p>
<p>Uchicagoalum and newmassdad, thanks for the really good info concerning MFSM, it really seems like its important to set a good path for myself freshman year entering college, or else the stringent requirements of all these programs are going to bar me out if i just a well rounded education. </p>
<p>With the Core and all, and the quarter system, I’ll be able to invest deeply in the kind of background I want to achieve right?</p>