@capitalmarketsgeek, let me make my contribution to this in the language I understand. If you went to Michigan, we were both in the Big 10 as I was a U of Iowa (Hawkeyes) fanatic. We even played in the Rose Bowl once.

Scooby...
Making it hard for mainstreet? This might be offensive to some people but I think this world is for the survival for the fittest..... Everyone will always come up with ways to beat the next person and take advantage of him/her, and the next person will find way to outpay the next person and the circle goes on and on and on... its a war and the winner rules...!

what i belive is that some undergrads may put emphasis on the stock market( a general overview of the finance function) say for example if i graduate from Egerton university(EU) with first class honors in finance and i compare with a person who graduated from university of nairobi(UON) with second class honours upper division in finance the one from UON will be better placed even if the one from EU was much brighter but if one looks at the course content between the two universities one finds that EU covers additional units( 4 to be precise) and has a more holisic approach towards each units syllabus.

CMG, People in kenya do to collge to learn cfa its neither of the above 2 points in the last sentence, its because many of the cfa units like derivatives,some aspects of equity analysis and portfilio management are not practiced in kenya options and swaps strategies dont occur in kenya. so it become difficult for people to relate and practice the principles and skills acquired in our small capital market.

not all people can pocess a failing education quality, its that the practical environment does not exist....put yourself in a situation say for example you read in a school that didnt have the recomended books to enable you to pass,and the external environment was harsh (arid/semi arid you had to travel long distances to and from school etc) and compare with one who went to alliance high or starehe boys center, definately the one with no books would find it difficult to excel.

this explains why we need to visualise scenarios practised abroad by going to class

CMG, That economy is bigger and more developed than ours and our system of education is different.US has had over 250 years of independence surely one cannot compare with 38 years? (apples and oranges?)

CMG

whats your advice for someone who wants to transition into quant finance yet said person doesnt have an undergrad in a hard science

@Kizee

CMG is right, generally. I've done considerable research on this as I had, (note the past tense), ambitions of my own. Allow me to share some of what I found out here.

First, forget all that KEMU & KU shit. The best LOCAL alternative for a career as a Quant would be - BSc. Financial Engineering offered at JKUAT.

Peep the course content at this link:

http://www.jkuat.ac.ke/programme.php?id=74

You mentioned that your undergrad wasn't in a hard science: Find below the class profile for the 2010 MFE Program at Berkeley:

MAJORS
Engineering 40%
Mathematics 17%
Business 9%
Natural Sciences 8%
Computer Science 6%
Humanities 3%
Economics 5%
Finance 3%
MBA 3%
Other 3%

Undergraduate isn't as important; just demonstrate that you're good at math & can program.

As Regards JKUAT, I'm guessing Kizee, that you're not planning to go back to undergrad (& full-time at that) so your best option would be an MFE of MSc - Financial Mathematics. My question to you is, do you plan to work locally or "abroad"?

Why that matters is because if you're planning to work locally, you can, I believe, "get away with much less" i.e might as well go for CQF which would be rare & highly regarded here or elsewhere on the continent versus "abroad".

If you're intent on doing a Masters program "abroad", I'd advice you to consider Europe and not the U.S.... (e.g UK - Manchester, ICMA Cass [quite popular in Kenya] etc, Italy - Bocconi, Switzerland - EHT etc as the courses are less competitive, pocket friendlier, take a much shorter duration (even 9 months Full Time) and most institutions have in the past been more generous w/financial aid.

Prerequisites:
The fact that you don't have solid math credentials might complicate things for you. Most of these Quantitative Finance programs do give a refresher/ Math primer the first week or 2 of study but if that's all you're depending on, you're likely to fail.

At the very minimum, you do need to be very familiar with Matrices, Vectors, Linear Algebra 1, 2 ; Calculus 1,2,3; Probability & Statistics, Numerical Analysis ...as these will form the core of your study ...(I might have left some out) .

Here is a sample math test offered at the end of a CQF Math primer, if this doesn't intimidate you, (ignore numbers 18 - 20 ) you're good to go.

http://www.7city.com/pdf/cqf/maths_test.pdf

You also need to be more than familiar with object oriented programing specifically "MATLAB" , "R", "C++", "Java" ... no one will touch you if u can't program.

Good Luck!

@drake- why did u give up your ambitions
@cmg- cud u recomend a gud online math programme i cud take, netmath looked decent

@Kizee
CQF is a first (can't find any indigenous black African names among Alumni) & a bold step ... what would be even more impressive is if you somehow managed to get your employer to pay for it !

Also, to echo what CMG said, it's true that MSc.Physics/MFE/MSc. > CQF for face value recognition of the designation & also the coursework is deemed to be more rigorous. The great thing about the latter though is you get to cover 1-2yrs work in 6months & part time at that.

As far as the math, I'm not sure if this helps...

http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/

It's a great resource but sadly, you can't earn credits for the courses also some videos have low sound quality (e.g. Linear Algebra)

I gave up my ambitions because (1) I felt career-wise, I would be a better fit in PE ....and that it would be a better fit for me! (2) I didn't like the risk/return distribution .....I didn't feel I had an "edge" venturing into quantitative finance; you're either a giant or a dwarf (quoting Taleb) and the giants make off with the biggest piece of the pie leaving the rest for the dwarfs to fight over.

@CMG
I've always wondered what it's like to work at a HF and I wonder if you would indulge me?

+ How big is your firm (AUM)?
+ What strategies do you run? Stat Arb, Long/short, Activist, Distressed?
+ What's role do you play and what are the hours like?
+ Layoffs at D.E Shaw...... being replicated/contemplated elsewhere? Job security on a 1-10 scale?

Much appreciated!

Drake...
I am going to try to answer as much as I can, I work in a team of 19 pple we manager $4.5 billion of a wholly owned subsi' of a bank, meaning in-house fund, we basically have four team of four pple and the leadership of the fund; we have strategy team, sales, programming and trading teams. Its a closed fund, compensations is perfomance based, 2% of the fund covers our operation cost annually which include base pay for all of us and the operating expense, 10% of the annual profit is our bonus, 70% goes to the bank and 20% goes to the investor.All othe capital investment e.g IT is handle by the bank. I work in strategy team

I work late most of the time 12 to 14 hrs a day but no one forces me to and of course entire team does that coz we really believe in what we do and we're very much attach to some of the stuff, yea!I do get up sometimes in the middle of the night just to make sure europe and asian markets are stable( its not a requirement since our systems are programmed to run themselve and respond to any unusually decline in markets appropriately).
My social life, the last time I was in a night club was in 2006 but I am in my late 20s so its understandble. I am not married and probably never will, it is easy to pick up women these day beleive me.
Strategies we use are a range of them and include all you listed, our systems scan the markets every fraction of a second looking for anything to reap, 70% is highfreq and 30% of tradin is human.