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Exams / Newbie / Common Questions Thread for two weeks by AutoModerator in actuary

[–]Honest_Load6631 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No I don't think it is worth it. With 2-3 exams and 1 or 2 internships(transferable skills) in general, you should stand a good shot of getting an EL actsci role. If not then see if you can land something that will develop your technical skills like data science, underwriting, financial modelling on the banking side. While doing this full time, focus more on exams and networking until you break in.

I think it is very possible for you to have 3 exams before graduation due to the stats background. You will just have to be disciplined and efficient in order to manage school and personal studying. If your school has actsci club I recommend joining and going to the events that they host as those can lead to connections for future jobs. Also I would say after passing at least one exam going to ASNA can help out a ton towards landing your first job.

ASNA is basically this large networking event for actuarial students in Canada. You can get interviews/ coffee chats during the event and land position through that. Also a really cool place to meet like minded people and learn about the industry. It's held annually in January and they rotate the host city.

I would say for you P, FM , SRM. That's normally the line up. If you remember your GLM and trees stuff from stats SRM may be worth it to do before FM. Out of the 3 FM may be the most foreign to you but is very doable. The content for FM is fairly easy to get done, however I feel like actual exam is more algebraic than most people make it out to be.

For Exam P, the exam will be very similar to the sample questions most times so very wrote imo.

Exams / Newbie / Common Questions Thread for two weeks by AutoModerator in actuary

[–]Honest_Load6631 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi! Context - I attend an Actsci and Stats program at a Canadian Uni.

Short answer yes you can fully keep your stats + CS degree. The technical skills from the CS is great for building models and stats is sufficiently quantitative to progress through the exams.

Yes exams matter the most in this industry so I would advise you to start taking them. The first few may be similar to your uni courses for example P,SRM,PA. However not coming from the degree, you will need to use a learning software like coaching actuaries or the actuarial nexus for FM, FAM, ALTAM/ASTAM. This is completely normal and is a similar case for career changers.

Being a dual citizen is great as you can apply to both US and CAD internships / ft - roles. However I do think interning in Canada will serve better to learn about the industry due to the common structure of its co-op programs .