This is a guest blog by Tyrell Catumba. Tyrell studied his undergraduate degree in Economics at BU and continued to study his Master’s in Finance.  

I started at BU in 2016 studying Economics, after visiting all my choices I found that BU was the most well-rounded university, it ticked all my boxes. BU is also situated near Bournemouth town and beach, it’s a vibrant area with lots of bars and restaurants and leisure activities.  

Bournemouth University was modern, welcoming, and informative when I attended my Open Day, it also had many clubs and societies that they promoted which I had an interest in. 

I chose to study Economics at BU because I really enjoyed it in college and decided I wanted to make a career out of it. I find Economics fascinating and a subject that is very practical in everyday life. I saw BU had offered this course combined with a number of different subjects alongside it and it had my interest. 

The economics units I enjoyed the most were the maths and econometrics units. Despite Economics being a social science and somewhat theoretical based, there is a lot of statistics involved that can quantify what you learn. Of course, it can be extremely challenging, but when you apply these techniques to real life scenarios you can draw some really interesting conclusions. 

Once I graduated in 2019, I enrolled for my postgraduate course in Finance.  

The main reason I decided to continue to study at BU was because I was familiar with the area, and I really enjoyed my previous years here. BU provided a great offer on postgraduate fees for current BU students, which helped me in the long run. Also, they allowed me to continue playing for the varsity basketball team, making postgraduate students feel just as welcome as undergraduate students.  

In addition, I enjoyed how specific and advanced the MSc Finance degree was. The undergraduate degree covered the fundamentals of all aspects of economics. The master’s degree was more niche and went into a lot more depth of a select few of my previous units. I was learning new theories and more complex maths which not everyone may understand. My favourite unit was risk management. MSc Finance taught me a lot about money management, however Risk management taught me that there are ways to mitigate some of the risk when investing money. It was extremely technical yet so interesting how many ways you protect the money you invest. 

BU has helped shape me into a very dynamic individual. I had great tutors who provided great support and I was able to gain an abundance of knowledge that has prepared me for my future career. Not only this, but the people I met along my journey have provided me with essential interpersonal skills which will forever be of use to me. 

Since graduating I have secured a role at global investment bank JPMorgan, based here in Bournemouth.