Majoring in the mathematical sciences opens the door for many internships, research experiences, and career opportunities. Math majors tend to have well-developed skills in pattern recognition, logical thinking, problem-solving, analyzing data, and creating math models that can be used to arrive at meaningful conclusions. These math skills are essential in the in-demand fields of science, technology, and engineering.
If you are interested in learning more, read the information presented below, and be sure to let your advisor know! They may have more information as well.
Internships and Summer Research Opportunities
Math majors are increasingly participating in internships, cooperative education, and summer programs. These programs, often paid positions, in the mathematical sciences are advertised in a variety of locations. Business and industry employers may post on the usual job boards, such as indeed.com and ziprecruiter.com. Several professional societies and government offices post lists:
- Coming in January 2024: REU Opportunities for Summer 2024.
- American Mathematical Society's list of internship opportunities
- Mathematical Association of America's list of semester and summer programs
- American Statistical Association's StatTrak list of internships
- Career Development's resource: Handshake website on Math Internships
- LinkedIn's Math Internship page
- The National Science Foundation's list of funded Summer "Research Experiences for Undergraduates" (REU).
- Many federal agencies support STEM undergraduates. For information on internships, scholarships, and other opportunities, see http://stemundergrads.science.gov
Career Information
There are many sources of good information about careers in the mathematical sciences:
- The MAA Career Resource Center.
- According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, education pays! People with more education earn more and are less likely to be unemployed.
- A summary of NSF reports [pdf] about recent graduates with bachelor and master's degrees in the mathematical sciences.
- Selecting and applying to graduate programs.
- STEM discipline programs and fellowships from Pathwaystoscience.org
- https://techguide.org/ is a website that provides information on tech-oriented careers.
- What do mathematicians do? is a site that describes career options outside of academia for mathematicians.
- http://www.ams.org/programs/students/students#careers is an AMS site with links to information about the mathematical sciences.
- http://www.ams.org/careers/ is maintained by the AMS and contains career profiles, resume writing tips, job search links, and lots of other information.
- http://www.maa.org/students/career.html is maintained by the Mathematics Association of America and contains autobiographical career profiles written by many mathematics graduates.
- https://bigmathnetwork.org provides information about math careers in Business, Industry, and Government.
- http://www.beanactuary.com is maintained by the Society of Actuaries and the Casualty Actuarial Society and contains information about opportunities in actuarial science.
- https://www.discoverdatascience.org contains information about degrees and careers in data science.
- https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/grads/ lists reports on employment of science and engineering graduates compiled by the National Science Foundation. These reports are the sources for the summaries listed at the top of the page.
- A book titled "101 Careers in Mathematics" (QA10.5 .A15 1996) is available in the library.
- http://www.amstat.org/careers is the American Statistical Association's page on career opportunities for statistics majors.
- Information from the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction on opportunities for lateral entry, an alternative path to licensure for public school teaching.
- Carney, Sandoe and Associates recruits teachers for independent schools across the nation. (Teacher certification is not required.)