It seems that if you a wanting to teach or interested in financial mathematics, such as actuarial work, then mathematics jobs are available and advertised.
I keep hearing how this is a scare skill and how people want to encourage woman into scientific and research industries, yet nobody is looking for the skills.
I have my BSc degree with applied mathematics (and Computer Science) as a major and I did fairly well, yet it has been useless to me in terms of employment. This is not for lack of looking for an opportunity.
It looks like if you are in a university at an advanced level then some opportunities are available, but it appears as if nobody has as any interest in adult learners, or graduates under honors level.
There are some learner-ship and internship opportunities at the research institutions such as Meraka and CSIR, which I have applied for. I must have been shortlisted because I at least got the response that I had not got the position’s, however since they don’t give any real feedback, I am unable to establish whether I did not fit their age profile, academic mark level or other.
Is it that people looking for these skills are only willing to train up youngsters or is it because the industry is recruiting only through universities, or is there some other criteria?
Perhaps the skills aren’t that scarce after all, or they only become recognized at higher levels of training. Perhaps it is because the skills are only valid for those who pull straight distinctions.
I would love to combine my programming and mathematics skills, but I am finding no gaps to do so.
It’s most frustrating because I can’t think of any other options to pursue at the moment.
gargunzola said,
January 15, 2012 at 4:09 pm
There are 2 reasons I can think of:
1. My maths fundi friend was working at the CSIR for a while,but did nothing but listen to vinyl in his office (besides his own research). This because maths goes over most people’s heads and they couldn’t think of something for him to do or to help them with, so they’d rather just avoid it.
2. The recent financial crisis put everyone with solid technical skills under a bit of suspicion. You should in all likelihood still find employment with accounting or insurance firms, but this is a wild guess.
You could alternatively just publish research papers on arxiv.org to show that you have passion for the subject, to keep your skills sharp and to network with those in the field. Alternatively you can become a bread and butter code monkey, which is stressful put pays enough to support yourself.
coralf said,
January 17, 2012 at 8:13 am
Sadly I’m already playing code monkey.
The question remains though. Why are people touting the shortage of Math skills when there is no shortage.
I’d love to get hold of some of the social media data. It could be really fun to analyze and look for patterns.
There must be more of these (or one’s you can train into):-
:~(