1. Purpose
  2. Contents
  3. Timing
  4. Further information
ActEd's induction courses have been designed by our experienced team of tutors to give new actuarial students:
  • a flying start to the early subjects
  • the basic actuarial skills that new students will use in the office
  • an understanding of the need for accuracy and speed when answering exam questions - helping to prevent students from developing any complacency in their approach to their actuarial studies.

Students who have attended ActEd induction courses in the past have reported that they went away with the foundations of their knowledge of the early subjects firmly laid, and with a clear idea of how their studying pattern needed to develop over the forthcoming year.

Contents

A standard induction course typically covers the following areas:
  • Introduction to the exam system, how much study is needed, exam preparation and study hints
  • Assumed knowledge (1) - pure mathematics - including: integration, differentiation, solving equations, summation of series
  • Assumed knowledge (2) - probability and statistics - including: probability, random variables, expectation, variance
  • Introduction to CS1 - statistics - distributions (binomial, Poisson, normal, lognormal), demonstration of R
  • Introduction to CM1 (1) - financial mathematics - including: interest rates & functions, present & accumulated values, annuities, loans with demonstration of Excel
  • Introduction to CM1 (2) - survival models and contingencies - including: mortality (probabilities, notation, tables), probabilities, annuities & assurance functions, calculating premiums, pension calculations, cashflows with demonstration of Excel.

The course finishes with a short mock exam, containing a wide range of exam-style questions. Employers sending students on this course will receive feedback on their students' performance and an interpretation of the marks obtained in the mock exam.

Induction courses can be tailored to the needs of an individual employer and can be incorporated into the employer's current induction programme. For example, sessions on the subject material can be interspersed with other internal training sessions.

For employers with a larger number of new actuarial students, we run in-house induction courses in September and October.

Please contact ActEd Tutorials if you would like to discuss in-house induction courses in more detail.