An Open Letter to SOAS Director and Principal Paul Webley

23 March 2007

School of Oriental and African Studies
Thornhaugh Street
Russell Square
London WC1H 0XG
United Kingdom

Re: CeFiMS: Postgraduate Programme in Finance and Financial Law

Dear Mr. Paul Webley,

I am writing to you as a student in the Finance and Financial Law Programme at the School of Oriental and African Studies. I would like to express my disappointment with the programme as it has added little to no value in our future career prospects in the financial services sector. I know you held a meeting with some students a while back regarding out concerns a while back, but we have yet to hear anything back from you with regards to any comments or recommendations in addressing these concerns of ours.

In looking for jobs and internships, we lack the knowledge in being able to do the simple things, such as corporate financial accounting or how to value various types of bonds. These are a couple of the credentials that banks and financial institutions look for in prospective employees. Other schools with similar programmes offer student optional internships or coordinated industrial placements as part of the curriculum so that they can experience and practice what they are learning. They offer networking seminars with bank directors and law partners, where students have a chance to introduce themselves and find out more about the industry. Networking is essential. We have a weekly elective lecture series called the "Business Networking Seminar," but the name is quite misleading. We do not have the opportunity to network, nor are the issues discussed particularly fruitful.

As a student from Africa, I applied to this programme because the detials in the brochure and on the website indicated that we would be covering certain practical topics and issues relevant to finance. Unfortunately, this has not been the case. One such instance is in a course entitled, "Banking and Capital Markets." This course is entirely concerned about the econometrics of information. Most of us do not have an economics background, and it is extremely difficult to follow and comprehend the materials provided in lecture and in the readings, as admissions to the programme required no prereuisite knowledge in this field. The pre-sessional course over the summer to get us acquainted with the material was a complete and utter joke. Mr. Joachim Kolb did not have the ability to teach the material in an informative way. According to the information provided in the information pamphlet, I thought we would be studying the different kinds of markets, the different financial instruments in those markets, and how they operate in the financial economy.

I have been applying to jobs and internships, but I have come to find out that we do not have the credentials to successfully get an interview at the very least. We were told that we should not worry about finding a job from the beginning by our Academic Director Richard Alexander. All our lectures were in the evening, and this made us unable to atend any of the open houses in the City. Hence, we were unable to make contacts within the industry, and were at a competitive disadvantage to other students from such schools as the London School of Economics and Political Science and Imperial College. The department says that we have a global network of alumni with regards to our programme, but it is useless if these details is kept under lock and key.

I am not writing to you solely on my behalf. My peers are also very frustrated, and I do not want the same situation to confront the students enrolled in the programme the following academic year. I hope no one applies for fear that they will too will experience disappointment with this programme. To let these frustrations go unaddressed would reflect badly upon the reputation of the School of Oriental and African Studies as a premier global acadmic institution.

Thank you for taking the time to read this letter and I hope you will get in touch with us soon.

Sincerely,

One of Many