 Hey guys, it's MJ the student-actree and we're going to be talking about which University is the best for studying actuarial science So without further ado Yeah, let's see which one is the best So whenever you think about universities, I mean the top four always come to mind Yale Harvard Oxford and Cambridge and I would really recommend that you guys use the resources that these universities make available publicly When I was at university, I was able to go. I think it was called iTunes U or Podcast or something online where you can actually access the lectures from these universities so from Yale I did a whole third year economics course and that aligned with first-year actuarial science and I mean that was brilliant. It was given by a guy who just last year won the Nobel Prize in economics and He would have guest lectures from guys like coral icon who are big active investors in Apple and Motorola To other guys who have started these massive private equity funds that the Chinese government's bought up I mean it was amazing just the guest speakers that they had so Really worth getting it getting that it was I think it was called behavioral finance It was a third year economical course and your ties in very nicely with actuarial science. I Also got a few from Harvard Now that really stood out for me Oxford I got a whole course on building a business and that was quite nice to see it from all the different angles and Then from Cambridge. I really enjoyed they did a series called Silicon Valley Meets Cambridge or Cambridge goes to Silicon Valley or something like that and it was just a series of interviews where the interview people in the app industry and the university and Well, you know, I love making my apps. So it was a real treat for me and So, yeah, basically what I'm saying is these resources are available online and they are for free So if you're studying go and get them. They are well worth it I would not however recommend that you go to any of these universities and for two main reasons The first reason is that they are very expensive. So unless you have some golden scholarship I don't think you're gonna have enough finance to get into it and the second reason is they're not South African and Why that's important or why why it's important to go to South African University is when it comes to actual science South Africans are They're kind of like the best in the world when it comes to act trees I mean, we've made a lot of progress We've made a lot of discoveries and the reason being is South Africa is a country that has got quite a high Inequality rate, you know, we have a lot of rich people and we also have a lot of poor people and as Actress we develop products for both markets, you know, you need micro insurance and Funeral cover for the poor people and then you need these, you know, life insurance and House and yacht insurance and all that stuff for the rich people. So as an act tree in South Africa You're exposed to both of these markets. So you're getting a much better overview of the entire industry and also, I mean South Africa is the best country in the world So let's take a further look at the actuarial Universities in this beautiful nation So you have six universities that offer actuarial courses from Northwest Free State Tucks, which is Pretoria, which is which is Johannesburg UCT, which is Cape Town and Steleys, which is still in Bosch and The the point of university In actuarial science is to get as many exemptions as possible That's why you're going there You're going in there to get as many of the exemptions done so that after university you don't have to write as many exams You could do a pure mathematical degree and then write all 15 actuarial exams afterwards or you could be a little bit smarter and do an actuarial course and Knock a few of them out of the way by getting the exemptions now various universities offer various Exemptions so you can see Northwest they offer well They all basically offer the basic core technical exams in the core applications Some of them offer two and there's one one Remember there's a third one that you'll have to do outside and then with the STs This is very important for the small post-grad you can see the various ones that they offer So just by looking at this table. We can eliminate tucks free state and Northwest. I Remember in my honors year. We actually had some people from these universities come join us in honors and So you can do your Undergraduate and then come to your post-grad summer here, but better to do it just all in one place I mean it's it's less admin Okay, so let's look at bits UCT and Steleys They both say they both got eight core technicals two core applications and five specialist technicals But not really because while they both say that they have all those Exemptions it's actually not true. Well, it's not true for UCT and Salon Bosch So it fits you can do all five of the specialist technicals Or what I mean by that is you have a choice because you only really need to do two Some people I know have done three, but you just need to do two of these in order to qualify as an act tree And it fits you can see they had five so every day There was a different lecture on a different topic and so Monday to be life insurance Tuesday would be health Wednesday general and so forth and it was at vits the lectures were all there With UCT and Salon Bosch It's not like that what they do is UCT will offer either two or three and Stelembosch will offer the other two or three Which means if you want to do Let's say general insurance and you're at UCT you have to travel all the way to Salon Bosch once a week to go to the lecture and do the course and I went on to Google Maps and as you can see It's like 38 minute drive there and then another 38 minute drive back and this is without traffic And bear in mind that this is the infamous end to where I mean I was dropping a friend off at the airport the other day protestors had Taken tires set them up on fire and have blockaded the highway Which caused delays so you don't really want to be doing that road there are alternative routes, but it it takes longer You know, I'd rather recommend the N1, but anyway, that's not the point of the thing The idea is that you actually have to do a lot of traveling Depending on which STs you do whereas vits, they're all centralized at one university. So that's that's very good But the big thing is is that UCT is an extra year of University then vits so at vits you have your three-year undergrad where you do your eight core technicals and then Or you do eight core technicals and one CA and then you have your honors year where you do CA one and two STs of your choice Whereas with UCT the they have a structured slightly difference They also call it a three-year plus honors year, but you have to do it all in one year or all in one go And then they have this other thing called a masters where you do the ST subjects So it's not a whole year more Because they do do some extra stuff. So it's actually they've only delayed it by half a year And I guess it is kind of cool because you can say oh, I'm a masters of actuarial science but if Your goal is to qualify as an actuary as quick as possible then vits is much better So it's one less year which also makes it to a little bit cheaper But also very very important when it comes to choosing your university is this okay This is what Cape Town looks like as you can see it is stunning I live in the city because it is amazing. There is mountains to hike You can go, okay, you can't swim in the sea because it's cold But you can do yachts and you can do skiing and you can do all those various water activities. It's just beautiful There's wine tasting it is, you know, I mean, it's no wonder. It's a popular tourist destination But that's the problem is when you're going to university your goal is to study That that's it. That's your goal. It's not to go there and have fun and do all these various activities These are a distraction and I know a lot of people who who haven't started university yet They think this is university, you know people come. Yeah, big parties. Whoo, you know, because I see the movies and all that type of stuff That that's not true as an actuarial science student if that your actuarial science student That's you in the red. That's the actual science student Everybody else that's everybody else That's the actual science student. So bearing that in mind Look at this picture of Johannesburg and this is a nice picture of Johannesburg You can see there's not there's there's just buildings, which is good because it means you go to university You study you go home. You sleep, you know, you eat study sleep repeat or something like that whereas UCT in My opinion, there's just too many distractions. You'll have too much fun and that's gonna increase your chances of failure Because it's really gonna be hard to discipline yourself to say, okay. No, I'm not gonna go to all these awesome fun events I'm gonna study. We're at Johannesburg. It was a little bit easier to do that There are parties in Joberg, but it's easier to say no to them But job taking all that into consideration. You also want to just consider where you're living I mean, you don't want to be too far from home. I don't know. Maybe some of you guys want to do that but definitely definitely definitely Consider vits as one of your main options If you want to study actual science, I mean the lecturing stuff there are superb I mean, they've got some really great minds behind it They've got some awesome corporate experience and they're very very smart and job Look, maybe I'm being a little bit biased because I went to vits And while I'm doing this talk now, I'm busy wearing a vits hoodie So I'm feeling very very proud of the university, but I would highly recommend it for Yeah, for the reasons mentioned above and just because it's an awesome place But job think about your university that you go to it is a big Decision it is a big choice. So make sure you make the right one. But job I'm MJ the student actually and thanks for watching. Cheers guys You