Honors Thesis at the SS&C Financial Accelerator

Josh relates his experience finishing his honor's thesis at the Financial Accelerator:

I was accepted into the SS&C Financial Accelerator program for the summer of 2006 as an Undergraduate student pursuing degrees in Finance and Philosophy. I was a member of the UConn Honors Society and was affiliated with minor organization up until this point.

The initial project I was selected to work on was developing an ERM solution for a Pitney Bowes subsidiary software company in Maryland. After this project met with outstanding success, Pitney Bowes wanted the process expanded to the entire business – I stayed on as a member of the Financial Accelerator to accomplish this task, which culminated in a final tollgate presentation to Pitney Bowes CEO Michael Critelli.

During my final undergraduate semester, I was once again selected to work as a member of the Accelerator, working on a project for ING Asia Pacific Real Estate division. Again, our team met with great success as the stochastic real estate duration model we built for them is now being deployed and utilized for real estate investment in Europe.

These achievements were also recognized by the School of Business, as I was selected as an Outstanding Undergraduate in the Finance Department two years in a row, as well as inducted into the UConn School of Business Undergraduate Hall of Fame.

After three tours of duty and [finally] graduation, I was picked up by General Electric to work at GE Money as a member of the Quantitative Analytics Team. I build, customize, and analyze the results of a suite of stochastic risk assessment and decisioning models for use by the CEO of the business.

I consider my time working for the Financial Accelerator the most rewarding academic experience of my undergraduate career. The Accelerator provided a hands-on real life experience not found anywhere else at UConn – not even SMF offers the real world experience that the Accelerator does. No board regulates your actions – you work directly with corporate contacts to solve real problems in real time for real money. You are the consultant directing the actions of vice presidents of Fortune 500 companies.

If that wasn’t enough, as an undergraduate, you will be working with MBA and PhD students from different disciplines. No other class or experience can offer that interaction.

The Accelerator helped me to break my mind out of the hum-drum academic mindset that classroom learning creates. After all, members of the School of Business are not looking for academic jobs – we want to graduate, get jobs, and make money. If your experience is anything like mine, the Accelerator will prove to be your fast track to success.

Dr. Rich Dino definitely hits the nail on the head when he issues his trademark slogan: “Change the conversation at the recruiting table.” In my case, the knowledge I gained as a member of the SS&C Financial Accelerator gave me the leverage necessary to change that conversation in my favor.