How good is Cass Business School?

[Victor90]

Its time for me now to choose what university I want to study at. I do not belive the grades will be any problem since I have 20/20 (the swedish ranking system) and I also have experience from manny things (Was at summer school at Karolinska Institutet, Europes best medical school. Worked for The Swedish Trade Council, and as a journalist at 2 magazines.) However, I been looking at Cambridge and Oxford but in my opinion there is not what i look for. But when I found Cass Busniess school my first reaction was: This is my type of School!

However, I seen that they are not in the top of the rankings and im worried that it will affect my possiblity to get in to a investment bank. But at the same time I do not wanna go to Oxford for 5 years if I dont find it to be intresting. So....Could i hear your views about how important the name of the school is?

 

[MrGecko]

You should consider the ranking of potential universities in subject classes; for example, I remember Coventry University being the best in the country for physiotherapy, sh!t at everything else. If you were going for an interview for a Physio job, your potential would be greatly enhanced by going to Cov (poly!)... my point is, pick a school that is well regarded in the discipline you wish to study - as long as it's not a mickey mouse course, the IB's will have their finger on whats hot where, and the calibre of the students.

Good Luck

 

[Victor90]

You should consider the ranking of potential universities in subject classes; for example, I remember Coventry University being the best in the country for physiotherapy, sh!t at everything else. If you were going for an interview for a Physio job, your potential would be greatly enhanced by going to Cov (poly!)... my point is, pick a school that is well regarded in the discipline you wish to study - as long as it's not a mickey mouse course, the IB's will have their finger on whats hot where, and the calibre of the students.

Good Luck

The problem is just that University Rankings League Table 2009 | Good University Guide - Times Online if you look there you wont even find Cass! =

 

[CHRISTO9HER]

I am going to try to write this understandaably, despite the fact that I havn't really stopped drinking for over 24 hours.

Cass have made a huge investment in recent years, they even have a trading floor. Essentially, it is the closest thing that you could get to a "vocational" undergrad finance couse.

However, the perception is that they have struggled to attract any academic talent to the school and have therefore produced a low level of research. You will be taught by people who are far removed from being at the academic forefront of their fields, not a good thing.

I take it you are talking about undergrad courses...and if you are then my advice to you would be to steer as clear of Cass as you possibly can. It has an awful reputation and you are far better off aiming to get into a uni that is considered to be an academic heavyweight, Oxbridge, Warwick, UCL, LSE. I honestly believe that it is not even worth the time invested to go anywhere else, especially if you are looking to get into banking. At the assessment centres, you will find that 90% of the students are from these places, the others all get weeded out earlier (or fail the numerical tests).

Also, steer clear of ANYTHING that sounds vocational, stick to academic subjects. A lot of people would rather employ someone who has done a completlely irrelevant but respectable degree (eg classics at oxbridge) than some chump who did Banking at Cass.

So don't go to Cass, if you still want to go later, you can go and do one of their masters programs; they do a really good course in quantitative finance and even do one in trading, although I would advise you to steer clear even at this stage.

 

[Victor90]

Thank you very much! That was far the best reasons i hear for not going there! =)

 

[Magos]

Its time for me now to choose what university I want to study at. I do not belive the grades will be any problem since I have 20/20 (the swedish ranking system) and I also have experience from manny things (Was at summer school at Karolinska Institutet, Europes best medical school. Worked for The Swedish Trade Council, and as a journalist at 2 magazines.) However, I been looking at Cambridge and Oxford but in my opinion there is not what i look for. But when I found Cass Busniess school my first reaction was: This is my type of School!

However, I seen that they are not in the top of the rankings and im worried that it will affect my possiblity to get in to a investment bank. But at the same time I do not wanna go to Oxford for 5 years if I dont find it to be intresting. So....Could i hear your views about how important the name of the school is?

CASS Business School is a good...
BUT
If you go there it will be difficult to get a job in an IB but not impossible.
There are always shortcuts and life is not fair.
Cambridge, Oxford and LSE, will guarantee interviews, City maybe not (or some).

 

[Magos]

The problem is just that University Rankings League Table 2009 | Good University Guide - Times Online if you look there you wont even find Cass! =

CASS is City University’s Business School Department

 

[Magos]

I am going to try to write this understandaably, despite the fact that I havn't really stopped drinking for over 24 hours.

Cass have made a huge investment in recent years, they even have a trading floor. Essentially, it is the closest thing that you could get to a "vocational" undergrad finance couse.

However, the perception is that they have struggled to attract any academic talent to the school and have therefore produced a low level of research. You will be taught by people who are far removed from being at the academic forefront of their fields, not a good thing.

I take it you are talking about undergrad courses...and if you are then my advice to you would be to steer as clear of Cass as you possibly can. It has an awful reputation and you are far better off aiming to get into a uni that is considered to be an academic heavyweight, Oxbridge, Warwick, UCL, LSE. I honestly believe that it is not even worth the time invested to go anywhere else, especially if you are looking to get into banking. At the assessment centres, you will find that 90% of the students are from these places, the others all get weeded out earlier (or fail the numerical tests).

Also, steer clear of ANYTHING that sounds vocational, stick to academic subjects. A lot of people would rather employ someone who has done a completlely irrelevant but respectable degree (eg classics at oxbridge) than some chump who did Banking at Cass.

So don't go to Cass, if you still want to go later, you can go and do one of their masters programs; they do a really good course in quantitative finance and even do one in trading, although I would advise you to steer clear even at this stage.

Dear CHRISTO9HER;472212,
First of all CASS does not have a Trading floor, they have a Bloomberg trading room, and a Reuters one. Students don’t trade they use them for research as well as Datastream.

A vocation I don’t know, it depends how your vacations are like….

Unfortunately I disagree with your whole idea about academic talent. For example there a lot of people who are well known in the CITY such as Keith Pilbeam. But wouldn’t know would you? There is a list of people, please try doing research before generalizing things.
Cass has a good reputation CHRISTO9HER;472212, do you work in the CITY? how do you know it has a bad one? Try check the MBA list? With Cambridge, Oxford and LSE I believe you are right he will easily get an interview not a job. With the rest you are just coping and pasting names from the University Guide 2008

At the assessment centres, you will find that 90% of the students are from these places, the others all get weeded out earlier (or fail the numerical tests).
(you are forgetting the international students, London is a central location in Europe)

 

[CHRISTO9HER]

I can try to respond to the parts of your posts that I understand........

Dear CHRISTO9HER;472212,
First of all CASS does not have a Trading floor, they have a Bloomberg trading room, and a Reuters one. Students don’t trade they use them for research as well as Datastream.

Right, a room, not a floor, got you

A vocation I don’t know, it depends how your vacations are like….

Not sure what this means, a joke??

Unfortunately I disagree with your whole idea about academic talent. For example there a lot of people who are well known in the CITY such as Keith Pilbeam. But wouldn’t know would you? There is a list of people, please try doing research before generalizing things.

Actually I have done quite a lot of research. I was considering doing a masters there this year (amongst other places) and did quite a lot of research for it. Having spoken to a lot of professors, they pretty much all concluded that Cass had not achieved its potential as they have failed to attract ACADEMIC talent to their faculty. For this reason, they have a faculty which has some names that may be respected in the city, but which are complete academic lightweights. This leaves them in a position in which the quality of their research, published articles etc are really not very good. Unfortunately this is a vicious circle, as the lack of good research will stop other professors wanting to go there.

Cass has a good reputation CHRISTO9HER;472212, do you work in the CITY? how do you know it has a bad one? Try check the MBA list? With Cambridge, Oxford and LSE I believe you are right he will easily get an interview not a job. With the rest you are just coping and pasting names from the University Guide 2008

I don't work in the city. As I said, I am basing it more on academics. 472212? No copying and pasting I promise, Imperial and Warwick are both emerging as real contenders to the three you just mentioned.

At the assessment centres, you will find that 90% of the students are from these places, the others all get weeded out earlier (or fail the numerical tests).
(you are forgetting the international students, London is a central location in Europe)

OK, of the students that were from the UK, 90% were from these places. I'm not forgetting the international students, but given that we were discussing UK uni's I don't see why this is relevant.

 

[BJ21]

I went to Cass, but did a Masters !!
The Masters courses are very good ....the Undergrad courses not so good .... very good location, bars clubs ect...... |

My masters class was full of top uni students from here and abroad !! IESE, SDA ,Judge , LSE, UCL Said warwick, InSead allsorts (and a lot of Greeks)

No Trading floor ....lol they have a bloomberg room and a retuers rooms .....i think i had 4 classes in the bloomberg room (so lets say 4h) a guy from Barcap came down and signed us up to bloomberg showed us around made us put in few option trades (not hard trades obviously) ect......

The main or maybe even the only problem with Cass is the lack of computer terminals !!!!

 

[Magos]

I can try to respond to the parts of your posts that I understand........

Originally Posted by Magos
Dear CHRISTO9HER;472212,
First of all CASS does not have a Trading floor, they have a Bloomberg trading room, and a Reuters one. Students don’t trade they use them for research as well as Datastream.

Right, a room, not a floor, got you

I hope you did, have you ever seen or been in a trading room? or work in one?, NO. You trade from home…
Not that is not bad, some people do it make a lot of money but Trading Room is where people trade.

A vocation I don’t know, it depends how your vacations are like….

Not sure what this means, a joke??

No that’s reality.

Unfortunately I disagree with your whole idea about academic talent. For example there a lot of people who are well known in the CITY such as Keith Pilbeam. But wouldn’t know would you? There is a list of people, please try doing research before generalizing things.

Actually I have done quite a lot of research. I was considering doing a masters there this year (amongst other places) and did quite a lot of research for it. Having spoken to a lot of professors, they pretty much all concluded that Cass had not achieved its potential as they have failed to attract ACADEMIC talent to their faculty. For this reason, they have a faculty which has some names that may be respected in the city, but which are complete academic lightweights. This leaves them in a position in which the quality of their research, published articles etc are really not very good. Unfortunately this is a vicious circle, as the lack of good research will stop other professors wanting to go there.

What a research… I am amused. I have a lot of friends from CASS who work in IB’s dear Christopher (including JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Citi group,etc.). But what difference does it make.?! you want to work from home.?You are not competing with them.

Have achieved its potential try look for its aluminums people. Also is based in the CITY where is Warwick in Warwickshire (village/maybe a bit bigger)
academic lightweights??? Looks like you think Warwick is the new Harvard or Cambridge, good luck

You don’t even work in the CITY or Canary Warf for first, how do you know about circles. Reading from the FT? or the Economist?


Cass has a good reputation CHRISTO9HER;472212, do you work in the CITY? how do you know it has a bad one? Try check the MBA list? With Cambridge, Oxford and LSE I believe you are right he will easily get an interview not a job. With the rest you are just coping and pasting names from the University Guide 2008

I don't work in the city. As I said, I am basing it more on academics. 472212? No copying and pasting I promise, Imperial and Warwick are both emerging as real contenders to the three you just mentioned.

Imperial and Warwick are emerging that’s right, this I will give you but try check university guides 10 years ago, and tell me where is Warwick(do some research)? Plz do.


At the assessment centres, you will find that 90% of the students are from these places, the others all get weeded out earlier (or fail the numerical tests).
(you are forgetting the international students, London is a central location in Europe)

OK, of the students that were from the UK, 90% were from these places. I'm not forgetting the international students, but given that we were discussing UK uni's I don't see why this is relevant.

It is relevant.

 

[CHRISTO9HER]

Originally Posted by Magos
Dear CHRISTO9HER;472212,
First of all CASS does not have a Trading floor, they have a Bloomberg trading room, and a Reuters one. Students don’t trade they use them for research as well as Datastream.

Right, a room, not a floor, got you

I hope you did, have you ever seen or been in a trading room? or work in one?, NO. You trade from home…
Not that is bad, some people do it make a lot of money but Trading Room is where people trade.

A vocation I don’t know, it depends how your vacations are like….

Not sure what this means, a joke??

No that’s reality.

Unfortunately I disagree with your whole idea about academic talent. For example there a lot of people who are well known in the CITY such as Keith Pilbeam. But wouldn’t know would you? There is a list of people, please try doing research before generalizing things.

Actually I have done quite a lot of research. I was considering doing a masters there this year (amongst other places) and did quite a lot of research for it. Having spoken to a lot of professors, they pretty much all concluded that Cass had not achieved its potential as they have failed to attract ACADEMIC talent to their faculty. For this reason, they have a faculty which has some names that may be respected in the city, but which are complete academic lightweights. This leaves them in a position in which the quality of their research, published articles etc are really not very good. Unfortunately this is a vicious circle, as the lack of good research will stop other professors wanting to go there.

What a research… I am amused. I have a lot of friends from CASS who work in IB’s dear Christopher (including JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Citi group,etc.). But what difference does it make.?! you want to work from home.?You are not competing with them.

Have achieved its potential try look for its aluminums people. Also is based in the CITY where is Warwick in Warwickshire (village/maybe a bit bigger)
academic lightweights??? Looks like you think Warwick is the new Harvard or Cambridge, good luck

You don’t even work in the CITY or Canary Warf for first, how do you know about circles. Reading from the FT? or the Economist?


Cass has a good reputation CHRISTO9HER;472212, do you work in the CITY? how do you know it has a bad one? Try check the MBA list? With Cambridge, Oxford and LSE I believe you are right he will easily get an interview not a job. With the rest you are just coping and pasting names from the University Guide 2008

I don't work in the city. As I said, I am basing it more on academics. 472212? No copying and pasting I promise, Imperial and Warwick are both emerging as real contenders to the three you just mentioned.

Imperial and Warwick are emerging that’s right, this I will give you but try check university guides 10 years ago, and tell me where is Warwick(do some research)? Plz do.


At the assessment centres, you will find that 90% of the students are from these places, the others all get weeded out earlier (or fail the numerical tests).
(you are forgetting the international students, London is a central location in Europe)

OK, of the students that were from the UK, 90% were from these places. I'm not forgetting the international students, but given that we were discussing UK uni's I don't see why this is relevant.

It is relevant.

We could carry on all day like this , but it clearly isn't going anywhere so this will be my last post on this thread.

You have raised many points to which I could respond (eg wtf is the relevance of where Warwick was on the league table 10 years ago??????) but tbh dragons den is about to come onto BBC i-player and its a bit more interesting.

You keep repeating yourself, saying I don't work in the city, I havn't done any research etc. I have quite possibly done more research than almost anyone on both graduate admissions and academic qualifications. Not going to elaborate further as you don't seem to be interested in discussing anything in a constructive manner.

I stand by my opinion that CASS is pretty bad for undergraduate courses and pretty good for Masters courses, as long as you choose one that will add value to your skill set (essentially one in which quantitative techniques are the primary focus).

 

[Magos]

We could carry on all day like this , but it clearly isn't going anywhere so this will be my last post on this thread.

Feel the same.

You have raised many points to which I could respond (eg wtf is the relevance of where Warwick was on the league table 10 years ago??????) but tbh dragons den is about to come onto BBC i-player and its a bit more interesting.

I agree dragons den is not bad, I prefer the Apprentice UK or Wall Street warriors

You keep repeating yourself, saying I don't work in the city, I havn't done any research etc. I have quite possibly done more research than almost anyone on both graduate admissions and academic qualifications. Not going to elaborate further as you don't seem to be interested in discussing anything in a constructive manner.

I am repeating myself because you think you are so special. Unfortunately in this kind of market no one is special. Unless you are making a lot of money and having a lot of clients (big black book). It doesn’t matter what University you graduated from, but what it matters if you can pay the bills. A lot of my friends have graduated better universities than CASS or Warwick and now they have difficulties to find a job. If you are looking for a challenge do CFA. Or go to Harvard and do an MBA. Then I will be happy for you. Even buy you a pint in the CITY.

On the other hand as you said you just finished Uni. The real world is very different.

I stand by my opinion that CASS is pretty bad for undergraduate courses and pretty good for Masters courses, as long as you choose one that will add value to your skill set (essentially one in which quantitative techniques are the primary focus).

A first is first. If you get one in undergraduate for instance Economics, you will have strategic advantage for internships only in this bad market conditions (personal opinion)

CQF is good for quantitative learning. (Certificate in Quantitative Finance)

 

[ft338]

christopher you clearly lack up to date info.

cass is the best in europe for actuarial science, has a really good emba program and if you actually check rankings the business school which is what cass is - is better than imperial (tanaka is mediocre), warwick, lse etc. the only school that is better is lbs.

as far as banks go academic research is irrelevant. they want people with more common sense who will slot in easily to the finance world. there is little surprise that a lot of the problems we are currently faced with in the markets are being linked with banks hiring a lot of academics who couldnt comprehend the possibility of 5 st dev events!

 

[ft338]

yeah cqf is building up a rep gradually. 7 city are a really good outfit, do cfa classes as well and their pass rates are better than most others aparantly.

 

[Victor90]

Anyone one this forum that works on a big IB? Maybe you can give us some information about how your bank view CASS! =)

 

[crude_lover]

Anyone one this forum that works on a big IB? Maybe you can give us some information about how your bank view CASS! =)

I think any big ib traders will be too busy trading to come on here

 

[chinabean]

I will give you a pointer, my friend did his msc at Cass (finance), worked with me at a prop shop then left and went to work for a tier 1 IB (joined their associate grad scheme) so IB's do rate Cass. I would say, it is more highly rated at post-graduate rather than undergraduate level, the reason being that at undergrad level, there is the opportunity to take a fresh grad who has all the raw skills and then mould them in terms of training etc thus, if you have a maths grad from oxbridge, imperial et al they will look a lot more attractive than a grad from Cass. That being said, the links that Cass has are fairly good, which not surprising since it is based in the city - actually it is based right next to the IB I work for, therefore you have the chance to network and also people in the city are fully aware of cass as a good business school. Anyway, as I said, at undergrad level, it loses some of it's potency IMHO however, it is still well regarded.

 

[jonnycycler]

the school wont find you the job in IB

I went to Cass and did the MSc Mathematical Trading; found it academically demanding despite the fact that I come from Mathematics background. Before graduation this summer in the midst of the crisis I got a grad job in a trading desk with top 5 ib quite comfortably. I competed with MIT etc. grads having comfortably passed all the tests* . The part time - full time mix was excellent. The full time student could get in touch with quants, traders and ib people (credit suisse sponsors it ). All part timers were from top ib's or hedge funds. Full timers included students from top universities in Europe and the UK.

The reputation of Cass in banking is great (even amongst senior bankers)

It may be that for Quant Finance (financial engineering): Go to Cass for either MSc Quant finance or MSc Mathematical Trading Finance.

For Financial Economics/ Ops Research/ Econometrics go to LSE

Both Cass and LSE are still expensive for anyones budget yet cheaper than both LBS and Imperial. Oxbridge are academically excellent and reputable as well but not in the City.

....but end of the day, it's mainly you that counts when it comes on getting the job. These guys get hundreds of thousands of CV's every year with excellent students etc. When it comes to interviews (because I feel that a commited person will not fail an on/off line test) they need people that will be somewhat different from the bunch that is otherwise very competent and will find jobs.

* quant tests are very easy and pretty standard; passing them depends only on practice.

 

[Clive Joss]

Hi! can anyone whos familiar or have heard of Cass Business School tell me anything about the school? Hows its reputation and standard like? or anything? thanks!
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