Which Quant class to take?

Question

I need to round out my profile (sociology major, marketing professional) with a quant course this summer. I took a statistics class 9 years ago in college and got a B (it was a motivation issue, not lack of understanding).

What course would best serve me on my way towards bschool and show the adcoms that I don't lack in the quant field:

Calculus
Intro to Statistics (again)
Intro to Financial Accounting
Intro to Managerial Accounting
Intro to Microeconomics
Intro to Macroeconomics
Basic Corporate Finance

Thanks!

Hjort · Answer

How about a more advanced statistics class, e.g., Applied Regression or Multivar Methods?

GMATT73 · Answer

If you are applying for 08 admissions, I'd suggest taking as many of those courses as possible.

mba2010 · Answer

With all of my activities this Fall, I only have time to properly take one. This is the list of online courses offered by UC Berkeley extension, which is why I'm limited to those specific courses. I travel 50% for work in the Fall so I can only take the self-paced online courses. I can take two more in the Spring, which may hopefully help if I'm in waitlist purgatory...but will ultimately serve me in my bschool pursuits.

So...which one do I start with?

rhyme · Answer

Calculus -- no, you dont need calculus for grad school 

Intro to Statistics (again) -- no, you already have it and a B is fine... plus in marketing, I know you have experienced some data mining... you can always talk about that.

Intro to Financial Accounting - yea...

Intro to Managerial Accounting - #1.5 choices (managerial accounting is usually something you take after financial accounting in my experience)

Intro to Microeconomics - yea good choice

Intro to Macroeconomics - less interesting than micro in my own opinion - and usually not as quantitative either. Its more about policy and a few basic concepts around money supply, interest rates, etc. Micro is more algebra, graphs, supply and demand, intercepts, calculating areas under a curve, etc.

Basic Corporate Finance - Not a bad choice but usually these courses can be hard for someone with no background at all. 

So, I'd just look at

Intro to Financial Accounting
Intro to Microeconomics
Basic Corporate Finance

And see which one interests you most. Note that accounting isnt quantitative, but its a classic staple of b-school.... so if you are just trying to show you can handle bschool its a good choice. if you want to talk about building quant skills, its probably not as strong of a choice as micro...

mba2010 · Answer

thanks rhyme!

rhyme · Answer

no prob... thats just my take though... others may have other views.

aaudetat · Answer

I'd differ with Rhyme on the calc issue. At Duke, they REQUIRE you to take calc. On the app, they ask you when you did it and what grade you got. If they let you in and you haven't had it, your admission will be contingent on successful completion of the class.

I don't know how much calc is really used in b-school, but Duke's math review CD does include a section on calc. Someone in admissions at Cornell told me that calc was valuable, but I didn't need to take because I had done it already.

It might be helpful to take a look at your target schools and what they recommend.

rhyme · Answer

Interesting, the GSB pretty much said not to worry bout calc.

aaudetat · Answer

well, we all know that GSB is not very quantitative. Don't you guys do a lot of market?

rhyme · Answer

Heck, they probably meant "Don't worry bout Calc I, worry about Advanced First Order Diff Eqs Calc III" hah

3underscore · Answer

A can't see how you could ever do econometrics without calc.

Maybe it is more "don't worry about it" in the "you will learn it here, no need to start early" style.

rhyme · Answer

Really? I managed fine in econometrics and don't think I ever really needed cany calc. Maybe now and then..... but I'd venture 98% was more dependent on a solid foundation in stats than in calc.

mba2010 · Answer

hmmm...I've never taken Calc. and Duke is one of my Top 3 choices. I guess I've gotta take Calc too. I wonder how Math will translate into an online course.

3underscore · Answer

I remember deriving the whole ARMA models from first principles at one point, but maybe not well enough to know whether it was calculus we were doing. It is stats heavy though. Micro is pretty laden with calculus (industrial behaviour and optimising in that), as is Financial Economics when you get down and dirty with it.

rhyme · Answer

I hate derivations.

3underscore · Answer

heh. I know what you mean. It depends how it goes - some people learn it as ROTE, some kind of actually understand it. Depending on the topic, I switched between the two - I can learn and recite a derivation if you need me to, I would prefer to actually get to the understanding of why it is so. EMH and CAPM was like that - you could see the problems it suffers in the derivation of the model.

I am getting excited about some of the classes that 90% of the student body won't even consider!

Which Quant class to take?

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