The future

So, I am at an impasse... a year ago I had very set plans to sit for two years of college, complete a degree, and find work in the insurance or consulting industries as an actuary. The longer I have to think about it, the less likely I think this will be the best fit for me.

Firstly, I fail to find statistics fascinating... I imagine many people aren't as excited about it as the newspapers might make you believe. Some of it is very straightforward (probability), some of it is more technical than many people can intuitively grasp (statistics, estimators, convergence, significance tests, obscure distribution functions). Secondly, I don't think a desk job with low stress and clean fingernails is really in my nature. I prefer to stand an walk and talk too much.

I started wondering about atmospheric modelling as an application for numerical computing (lots of data, lots of pde's, a little physics and chemistry, and a wealth of feedback from the real world). I have always been intrigued by high-frequency trading software and options pricing/arbitrage.

I worry about graduate school, largely because it seems like a large commitment, and I am overall a fairly unambitious and laissez-passe type. Alternately, I'm concerned that the short two years I have at UIC will be insufficient groundwork for access to better programs (UChicago and Northwestern are shining stars in nerdland). I anticipate taking the GRE this August, and applying to applied math programs at Northwestern, UChicago, and UIC. I expect I can at least be accepted to UIC, and will have met the required courses in the applied mathematics track (ODE/PDE/Complex Analysis) and may be able to talk my way out of retaking them. It's one of the first times in my life when I have looked about me for opportunities and been unable to relocate freely to pursue them. Thankfully, being beached in Chicago is a wonderful curse.

At times I worry that I lack sufficient focus to gain admission into a great program. My current pursuit of math, statistics, and computer science nearly evenly reflects what I hope to learn, and what I hope to find a place to apply in life. Information is everywhere. Statistics is a great way to extract and abstract it, and to test the importance of hypotheses with real data. Computer Programming is an obvious requirement for applying these statistical methods to real data, and a decent amount of exposure to theory will prevent sloppy mistakes. Mathematics underpins it all. But in following this balanced path, I may be missing on the niceties of deeper pure math. I don't intend to take Topology this year, and will sit through a single abstract algebra course, missing out on mathematical logic, and perhaps it will be possible to take graph theory in spring. At the end of two years, I may be merely a very clever calculator. Wouldn't that be disappointing?