SAIF turns to fintech to boost rankings
In a bid to maintain its leading position and to meet market demand, the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance will adopt fintech as a new direction of talent cultivation starting in 2019.
Around 25 of a total of 80 students enrolled at the institute’s Master of Finance program from next year will go into this professional field, which will focus on cultivating students’ technical capability in big data, machine and deep learning and computer programming, the institute said during a media briefing on June 19.
Students with outstanding backgrounds in mathematical statistics and computer programing will be preferred for the program, which was established after repeated discussions with academics and industry experts, said Jiang Zhan, faculty director of the Master of Finance program at SAIF.
“The new direction of talent cultivation was a response to requirements of the times. We’re confident that the graduates will meet the fintech industries’ particularly urgent needs after completing the course,” Jiang said.
Chang Chun, executive dean of SAIF, which was established at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in 2009, said the endeavor was also a response to the city’s mission to serve as the country’s financial center, as well as a national and international hub of innovation in science and technology. Recruitment of faculty in this particular field is already underway, Chang added.
SAIF also announced on June 19 that it was placed 10th in the global rankings for financial master’s degree prociting jects for the first time and remains the No 1 institution for such courses in Asia.
Just six schools from the region were included among the 65 schools from around the world that were ranked. The School of Economics and Management at Tsinghua University and Guanghua School of Management at Peking University were ranked in 15th and 18th place, respectively.
SAIF remained the first in Asia and ranked seventh globally in value for money and became the No 1 ranked institute in Asia and fifth globally for graduates’ salary increase within three years of graduation, according to the school, a ranking done by the Financial Times and published on June 8.
The institute also came in first in other indicators, including employment rates three months after graduation and the percentage of faculty holding doctoral degrees, as well as taking the third place in the rankings for the ratio of female students, with 47 percent.
“Our faculty are also outperforming in their levels of internationalization. Regardless of nationality, almost every one of them has been educated overseas, worked abroad, or has good industry connections, even among the top institutions on Wall Street,” Jiang said.
It was the third time that the school, which offers the twoyear master’s program for a tuition fee of 138,000 yuan ($21,300), participated in the annual ranking.
The school believed it could make further progress in some other indicators, such as international mobility of students after graduation and the percentage of international students and female faculty, which currently stand at 11 percent and 25 percent, respectively.
Chang said such achievements were based on the institution’s persistence in running the school in a way characterized by internationalization, marketization and professionalism.
“However, we are still very young,” he observed.
Jiang said: “We will endeavor to make breakthroughs and innovate international exchange programs and course design in order to develop a stronger core strength and international vision for financial industries, both at home and abroad.”