The big misconception about math is that a mathematical degree only qualifies the holder for a teaching job or an actuary. On the contrary, Math prepares students for a wide variety of jobs. The career market has numerous opportunities across various fields for math graduates.

Some of the jobs that directly hire individuals with a math degree include:

Accountancy and Finance

Accountancy is a career spanning many industries and has a broad range of choices for math professionals. Accountancy jobs include working as an auditor, corporate advisor, forensic, tax, and management accountant among other roles. An undergraduate degree in mathematics is one of the requirements to become a chartered accountant also. You can start as a company trainee, and it will help you to gain experience and necessary professional certification for developing further in your role.

Actuarial Career

Your training in math qualifies you to work as an actuary. Your job will involve evaluating financial risks so as to advise and manage clients. Knowledge of economics and risk analysis skills are the centerpiece of ensuring that your customers make sound investments to achieve their commercial/business goals. At the entry level, you will most likely work within insurance and pensions which are relatively low-risk areas, but in future, you can venture to investment, healthcare or banking. Actuarial roles require you to be skillful in mastering numbers to explain complex data and analysis to the non-specialist customers.

Banking

Your math degree qualifies you to work in banking from retail to corporate investment. Banking is about economic assessment and investment for public or private clients. Specialties in baking include areas like lending, acquisitions, initial public offerings (IPO), privatization, bonds, and shares. Duties may include creating new business opportunities, market research and inventing consumer solutions. A math career in banking can be very lucrative although a professional qualification in finance is necessary for certain roles.

Statistics

The career of a statistician involves collation, analyzing, interpreting and presenting statistics and quantitative data. Statistician's skills are essential in various industries from healthcare, finance, sport and even government. As a statistician, you employer might require you to manage, collect or arrange data from surveys, contextual analysis and experiments. Your duties might require you to use your findings to create reports and advise colleagues or clients on the possible strategies such as how to make excellent financial decisions on expanding business goals. To present statistics, you need to have solid communication, analytical skills, and IT skills.

Academia and Research

Although we just saw that math careers are not only in academics and research, these are very popular sectors among the mathematics graduates. It is an appealing route for the people who are looking for a challenge to drive the nest series of theories, applications, and discoveries of the field. It also comes with the prestige of following in the footsteps of greatest math minds in the history.

Academic and research careers in math are incredibly wide-ranging and depend on the areas you intend to be your specialty. Many of the jobs in these careers are within university departments. Long-term involvement in academics may include contributing articles to journals, specialist periodicals or participation in the production of entire publications during a sabbatical or part time.

Meteorology and Engineering also require people with a math degree in addition to other qualifications. In meteorology, math helps to collect complex data on weather conditions, analyzed and interpret it for consumers. In addition to Math, skills in IT are necessary.

For engineering, you might require a dedicated degree in a field of engineering, but math is also essential. The adeptness in solving mathematical problems helps to solve real-world physical problems. An engineering internship straight after university helps math experts to gain experience and improve the employability in engineering.

Science is a systematic study of nature and manner of objects and the natural universe. Science revolves around experiment, measurement, observation and formulation of natural laws. Science has major branches with each having its concentration of subjects covering various areas of study such as physics, chemistry, math or astronomy. If your interest is to pursue sciences, it will be wise to choose a field where you have much interest and specialize in the area in order to make much more progress. The main branches of science are:

Biological Science

This branch of science deals with a study of the living things. Under biological science are four subcategories.

• Zoology

A category under biology focusing on the studies of animal life. The study includes but not limited to evolution, classification of the living and extinct species, structure and habits. Embryology is also part of zoology. It deals with the study of development for an animal’s embryo from the fertilization to the formation of the fetus.

• Botany

Another essential category of biology dealing with the scientific study of the plants and their life cycle. Study of plants includes reproduction, structure, chemical properties, relationship, and diseases.

• Ecology

Study of the environment and the relationship it has with the living organisms. It tries to establish an understanding of the vital connection between animals, plants and their surroundings. Ecology also enables researchers to determine the benefits of an ecosystem and how to use earth resources in ways that leave the environment healthy for the future generations.

• Paleontology

This is a category of biology dealing with the study of the prehistoric era. Paleontology deals with the study of fossils but is not its only concern. It can include any other subject relating to the past. Paleontology can cover any subject relating to the past life of humanity and its earthly life. It incorporates knowledge from the fields of geology, biology, ecology or archaeology and computer science to determine the processes leading to origin and destruction of various species of organisms since the beginning of life.

Social Science

Social science is a branch of science dealing with the study of society and the relationship of the man to it. Studies in social science include Anthropology: Study of human behavior and developments in cultural, physical and social aspects.

• Economics

Studies of goods and services, manufacture, distribution, and consumption.

• Sociology

Study of the human society with a bias for urban studies and group activities. It is part of the social science although the name is compound since it uses varying methods of investigation and critical analysis to draw up a conclusion.

• Geology

Study of the earth phenomena, the land, and its features. You can divide geology further into two parts namely physical and basic geography. The previous deals include human and basic geography dealing with land inhabitants.

• Psychology

Study of human behavior and mind more so the functions that affect the way we do things. It seeks to understand individuals and groups through establishing the general principles and performing research on specific cases.

• Philosophy

Pursuit of knowledge through in an intellectual, moral and self-disciplined manner. As an academic discipline, it involves studying the basic nature of knowledge, reality, and existence.

Physical Science

Physical science deals with the study of the natural objects and related subjects. It is further sub-divided into these four categories:

• Astronomy

Study of heavenly bodies including stars, comets, galaxies and planets

• Chemistry

Study of various substances, their compositions and any changes they undergo in different environments. Chemistry can be organic (contains a carbon atom) or inorganic (does not have carbon atom).

• Physics

Study of Matter

• Geology

Study of earth’s composition and physical properties

Mathematics and Logic

Math & Logic is the study of abstract concepts. They work together as both are essential in establishing how the natural and social sciences work. Both are also critical in forming theories, hypothesis, and laws. Scientists rely much on Mathematics & Logic as it will be impossible to reach a conclusion without formulation.

It is essential for you to determine the careers outlook for each branch of science and those that you like most in for you to make the right choice when picking your concentration.