Dear student,

Thanks for posting your query on CareerGuide.com.

An actuary is a person who is involved in financial risk estimation and management. He or she will be involved in planning financial affairs depending on assessment of present and future risks. Thus major work will be related to insurance.

In order to become an actuary after 12th Std you need to go through two stages.

Stage 1:-

The first stage involves securing qualifications that make you eligible for appearing for the qualification exams conducted by various bodies (will explain in stage 2) which are compulsory if you want to practice as an actuary.

This includes any one requitement from the following:

1. You should have passed 12th standard with Maths or Statistics with 85% or more marks.

2. You should be a graduate or post graduate with atleast 55% marks in any area related toMaths or allied subjects like Stats, Econometrics, Computer science, any engineering discipline or pure sciences like Physics.

3. You could have any one of the following - CA/ CS/ CWA / MBA or PGDBA in Finance.

These qualifications form the basis for giving the certification exam. So, while you can attempt the exam after 12th itself (if you have more than 85% marks), having any of the other degrees will provide you the basic knowledge which will be necessary for clearing the exam.

A number of institutes in India and abroad have programmes in acturial sciences. As mentioned before, taking these courses will not qualify you to practice as an actuary as you need to be certified for that, however these course prepare you for the certification process.

Amity has a BSc and Msc in Actuarial Sciences, NMIMS offers an MBA in the same. Some of the best programmes are also provided by Bishop Herber College, Trichi; CMD School of Insurance and Acturial Science, Modinagar, UP.

So I would suggest any one of these programmes before you move on to stage two (in my next post).

Dr. Nandini Narayanan

Dear student,

Here I will explain stage 2 to you.

To practice as a certified actuary you need to have a certification from the respective governing body of that country. As I explained in the previous post, haveing any other qualifications are a requirement for taking this certification exam. They alone will not suffice if you want to practice as a registered actuary in any country.

For example in India it is the Actuarial Society of India (ASI). Similarly there is the Institute of Actuaries, London, Faculty of Actuaries, Scotland; Inst of Actuaries, Australia, etc.

For the Indian certification you need to first appear for an entrance exam which is conducted in May and November. It comprises two papers, Maths and English. In case you have the qualifications from stage 1, you are exempted from the entrance exam.

Once it is cleared, you have to clear 15 subjects to get your certification. Depending on the subjects and level you clear you can either be a registered actuary or Associate Member r you can be a registered fellow with the title FASI or Fellow of the Actuarial Society of India.

There is no time limit for completing this certification. Alsoyou can choose how many and which subjectsyou wish to take in a single exam. THis can be in any order accoding to your convenience. Therefor you will have freedom how you want to go aboutto crack 15 subjects. These exams are also conducted in May and November in severalcentres across the country.

Once you gain such a certification you will be working in areas such as assessing risks,design and maintain insurance products of companies, financial reporting of companies' assets and liabilities, etc.

Some empolyers in this area are ICICI, Bajaj Alliance, Tata AIG, AVIVA life, etc.

Other than this there are several internationaluniversities that have programmes in actuarial sciences. In the UK there are programmes in Oxfoord, Cambridge, Imperial College of London, Univ of Manchester, Univ of Southampton, etc. Generally they are 4 yrs BSc programmes.



In US, some of the best programmes are in the IVY league colleges and some others are UCLA, Univ of Michigan, Boston Univ and Wisconsin School of Business.



Univ of Waterloo in Canada has a largest programme in this field. Univs of Alberta, Tronto and West Ontario also have such programmes.



Hope this info suffices.



Good Luck!

Dr. Nandini Narayanan