Careers in Statistics

Careers in statistics

What are the UBC courses that are useful preparation for the actuarial exams (Society of Actuaries = SOA).?

The latest information on SOA (Society of Actuaries) exams is at:

https://www.soa.org/education/exam-req/edu-asa-req/

There have been several recent changes.

1. Exam P: Probability; prepare with Math/Stat 302 and part of Stat 305.

2. Exam FM : Financial Math (this covers much more material than compound
interest)

3. MFE: Models for Financial Economics 
https://www.soa.org/education/exam-req/edu-exam-mfe-detail/
After July 1, 2018 this exam was revised and renamed the Investment and Financial Markets Exam. 
It is no longer required in 2023; some of this might be absorbed into
the new exam FM.

4. Exam MLC: Models for Life Contingencies 
https://www.soa.org/education/exam-req/edu-exam-m-detail/
After July 1, 2018 this exam was revised and renamed the Long-Term Actuarial Mathematics Exam. LTAM. 
In Oct 2022, it becomes 
FAM = Fundamentals of Actuarial mathematics, or
ALTAM = Advanced Long-Term Actuarial Mathematics.

5. Exam C: Construction and Evaluation of Actuarial Models
https://www.soa.org/education/exam-req/edu-exam-c-detail/
After July 1, 2018 this exam was revised and renamed the Short-Term Actuarial Mathematics Exam STAM.
In 2023, it becomes ASTAM = Advanced  Short-Term Actuarial Mathematics.

6. VEE (Validation by Educational Experience) 
https://www.soa.org/education/exam-req/edu-vee

VEE for Economics remains.
The previous VEE for Applied Statistics (regression, time series)
has been replaced by VEE Mathematical Statistics (most but not all
of the material is covered by Stat 305 at UBC).
 

FAQ Category

How does the job of Statistician rank compare with other careers?

Input something like "top careers 2019" into a search engine. Here are some results from https://money.usnews.com/careers/best-jobs/rankings/the-100-best-jobs

#1 Software developer (Education Bachelor's)
#2 Statistician. (Education Master's)
#17 Mathematician. (Education Master's)
#24 Accountant. (Education Bachelor's)
#25 Financial Manager. (Education Bachelor's)
#27 Computer Systems Analyst. (Education Bachelor's)
#33 Actuary (Education Bachelor's)
#34 Operations Research Analyst (Education Bachelor's)
#60 Market Research Analyst (Education Bachelor's)

FAQ Category

What are some careers for someone with a Statistics degree? What kind of skills and grades do I need?

Here are some possible careers (job titles) with their qualifications.

  • Career with quantitative analysis, such as actuary, benefits analyst, insurance underwriter, market research analyst, data scientist, survey analyst. Qualifications: BSc in Statistics (A/B average) with communications skills, computing/coding skills.
  • A.Stat designation from the Statistical Society of Canada. This could be useful for statistical project work as a consultant. Qualifications: courses in Statistics major with grades exceeding B-.
  • Job title of statistician. Qualifications: MSc in Statistics, which requires a BSc with an A average (maybe a B+ minimum), with harder courses in Statistics/Mathematics.
  • Job title of biostatistician (health-related). Qualifications: MSc in Statistics/Biostatistics.
FAQ Category

What is Statistical Science? What is Data Science?

The field of Statistics is quite interdisciplinary because statistical methodology is used in all areas where research studies are carried out, data are collected, and statistical analyses are done to make comparisons, predictions, and forecasts.

The study of Statistics can be combined with business, data science, economics, finance, genomics, health studies, insurance, pharmaceutical science, etc.

A statistician's work can vary from a focus on application areas (requiring knowledge of subject areas), to theoretical development of methodology (requiring advanced mathematics), and the development of statistical software (requiring skills in scientific programming).

Data science focuses on data visualization, data management, data analytics and large databases; data scientists should understand variation and uncertainty, representativeness, efficient data collection, meaningful data reduction and summarization, and analytic tools from different sciences.

The American Statistical Association (ASA) has a good reference page called This is Statistics.

FAQ Category