Nonacademic career information for graduate students in mathematics
Information on internships in industry/government
- What?
- Internships can apply all areas of mathematics.
Internships are problem-solving applications of any/all
areas of mathematics, not just in what has
traditionally been called "applied
mathematics".
- Many also involve software implementation
of mathematical solutions to problems.
- Internships are often full time work during part or
all of the summer.
- Why?
- For those interested in considering a nonacademic
career after completing your degree, an internship can be
an important part of your resumé for your job search.
- For those interested in considering an academic career,
an internship can be valuable experience for advising your
own students.
- An internship at an institution may lead to a job offer
from the same business/lab when you get your degree.
- Who/where?
- National:
- General internships listings (for grads and undergrads):
- SIAM (Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics) internship page:
link
- AMS (American Mathematical Society) page:
link
- NSF Mathematical Sciences Graduate Internship program:
link
Internships at federal national laboratories, industry and other "approved facilities"
- All National Laboratories:
link
Page includes links to internship programs at each national lab;
also apply via an advisor. More links at SIAM site above
- NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology):
link
- Intelligence Community/NSA (National Security Agency) (including Graduate Mathematics Program):
link
- NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration): link .
- DOE (Department of Energy):
link .
- The AMS-AAAS Mass Media Fellowship:
link.
Includes practical experience in media organizations across the US.
- Google: link
- Microsoft Research: link
- Bell Labs, Mitre Corp., IBM, Rand Corp., Northrop Grumman,
General Dynamics, IDA, SAIC, Census Bureau, ...
- Academic institutes to industry programs:
- IMA (Institute for Mathematics and its Applications) Math to Industry Boot Camp:
link
- IPAM (Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics) G-RIPS (Graduate-level Research in Industrial Projects for Students):
link .
- Local:
- Ocuvera link
at Nebraska Global
link :
Ocuvera / Nebraska Global provides
internship opportunities for
grads in our department, working in teams or individually;
applications are due each spring.
- NuTech Ventures:
link .
- HUDL, Speedway Motors, ...
- When?
- Most internships have application deadlines in
December-February. (A few of them are earlier.)
- For some internships you may need to organize
letters of recommendation or transcripts, which can be
difficult to do in late December/early January, so it's
a good idea to start working on an application sooner.
- How?
- Surf the web for information and application sites.
- Make contacts through your advisor and other networking.
- Resumé: (National labs) Academic CV, but highlight skills:
programming and scientific computing experience and
languages/software packages, advanced math courses,
any publications, prior work.
Nonacademic job search resources
- General math / applied math job listings (not comprehensive!)
- AMS link includes nonacademic job ads
- SIAM (Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics) Careers and Jobs page,
link
- National Laboratories. Follow links from
link to
individual national labs.
- U. S. federal government link
- National Security Agency
link
- Google link
- Microsoft Research link
- Daniel H. Wagner Associates link,
applying mathematics and computer science to industry.
- Rand Corporation link
- Bell Labs, IBM, Texas Instruments,
Hewlett-Packard, Xerox, Epic, Sony, Boston Fusion, Tenable,
Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics, IDA, Mitre Corp., Hughes Aircraft,
Aerospace Corp., Army, Navy, Air Force, NASA,
NIST,
FBI, CIA, DOE,
Census Bureau, IPAM,
SAMSI, ...
- Data science and cyber security job information
(Two of the fastest growing nonacademic (and academic)
job sectors for mathematicians)
- Insight Data Science postdoctoral fellows program
link.
This is a 7 week program to transition from the PhD to
data science, that can lead to a job offer (businesses recruit
from this program).
- The Data Incubator fellowship program
link,
an 8 week program to transition from a variety of degrees
to data science.
- Indeed job listing for cyber security
link
- Actuarial math job information
- Society of Actuaries jobs list
link.
This society also administers a series of exams to
show your qualifications as an actuary. Take the
first exam (calculus and probability)
before applying for jobs.
- Casualty Actuarial Society career page
link
- Financial math job information
- International Association for Quantitative Finance
link. For job board and
other professional development materials
see link.
- Excerpt from Courant web site:
Mathematical finance draws from the disciplines of probability
theory, statistics, scientific computing and partial differential
equations to provide models and derive relationships between
fundamental variables such as asset prices, market movements and
interest rates.
- Catherine O'Neil, A view on the transition from academia to finance,
link
- Wall Street investment firms (JP Morgan, Citigroup, ...)
- Information on other potential mathematical career paths
- Medical, pharmaceutical research
- Bio-informatics, genomics
- Systems analysis
- Resume building (in addition to internships)
- Obtain certification of your computer skills, eg take python courses at Coursera link
- Further resources
- The BIG (Business, Industry, Government) Math Network link, and in particular their
Student
Resources page link, provides a wealth of information.
- The TPSE (Transforming Post-Secondary Education)
link
also contains links to many resources.
- AMS Careers in BEGIN (Business, Entrepreneurship, Government, Industry, and Nonprofit)
link includes a Career Center at the JMM, videos (and live) interviews with mathematicians working in BEGIN, etc.
Compiled by Susan Hermiller