Page 159 - Gonzaga at 60
P. 159
FROM PHYSICS AND MATHS TO FINANCIAL PROBLEM SOLVING
I sat my Leaving Ceriicate in Gonzaga in 1990, achieving income securiies, trying to protect people’s pensions as the
enough points for Science in UCD. We also sat the Matric that markets tumble around our ears.
year, I remember, although I must admit to leaving my Matric The two teachers I think who inluenced me the most in
English exam early to see Packie Bonner save that penalty Gonzaga were Denis Cusack and Tom Slevin. Ironically the two
against Romania. are very diferent in their approach to teaching, I guess they
I had received a great introducion to maths, chemistry and complemented each other very well! Tom Slevin was superbly
physics in Gonzaga, and found First Year Science in UCD very organised, with a highly opimised approach to teaching
easy; probably too easy really, but it did my social life no harm chemistry which was very efecive. However, it wasn’t all about
at all! This approach got me through unil third year, when I geing high marks in the Leaving Cert; we also did all of the
discovered one had to actually do some work in order to get an laboratory experiments on the course. Only later did I learn that
honours Physics degree. Luckily I managed, graduaing in 1995. this was very rare; most students had much less exposure to
At that stage I very much enjoyed Physics and the idea laboratory work. So we got an excellent introducion to rigorous
of doing research, so I started a PhD with a research group in scieniic methods, a great foundaion in later years. To this day
UCD in Astrophysics. That course brought me to the USA for a I remember to ‘add the acid to the water’ and ‘shake to ensure a
year, where I worked at the Smithsonian Observatory in Tucson homogenous mixture’, advice which has served me well in many
Arizona. I graduated in 2000, having studied ‘TeV Gamma-ray facets of life!
emission from the Galacic Plane’. I then worked as a research Denis Cusack taught me Applied Maths and had a
scienist at the IN2P3 in Paris for two years. Fr Moylan may be completely diferent approach. He was always very relaxed and
surprised to hear that I learnt to speak excellent French, based friendly, to the point of being somewhat scatered. He was the
on the excellent foundaion in the language he had given us in one who let me with a real love of mathemaics and physics
Gonzaga, despite my complete lack of interest in languages in His Applied Maths classes were inspiring, I sill live by his
my early years! advice that it is beter to take the seemingly more conceptually
Ater two years I moved on to the Max Planck Insitute for challenging approach to solving a problem, as it usually leads
Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, Germany for a further ive years. to a more elegant soluion, while the easier approach to a
I learnt German quite well too, discovering for the irst ime brute-force soluion never works as well. This was true of the
that it was the rigorous knowledge of grammar I got from Lain Leaving Ceriicate Maths paper and is true of many problems
classes with Mr O’Sullivan that made learning other languages in Science, and in life. He told us to stand back from a problem
much easier. I met many, especially English, people who had no like a cowboy in a western, to size it up carefully, pick the
idea what the ‘accusaive case’ was, not to menion the ‘daive’, right weapon (be it an integral or a diferenial equaion), take
which plays a big role in German. aim carefully and shoot! I sill take that approach to problem
On returning to Dublin in 2006 I worked as a project solving. It works equally well in Finance, where the culture
scienist for the Cosmogrid computaional research cluster at could really beneit from a cool head and a clear approach to
Dublin Insitute for Advanced Studies in Merrion Square, before complex issues someimes.
moving into industry to work for Pioneer Investments in 2007. Conor Masterson
I now work as a Quanitaive Analyst, esimaing risk for ixed Class of 1990
I sat my Leaving Ceriicate in Gonzaga in 1990, achieving income securiies, trying to protect people’s pensions as the
enough points for Science in UCD. We also sat the Matric that markets tumble around our ears.
year, I remember, although I must admit to leaving my Matric The two teachers I think who inluenced me the most in
English exam early to see Packie Bonner save that penalty Gonzaga were Denis Cusack and Tom Slevin. Ironically the two
against Romania. are very diferent in their approach to teaching, I guess they
I had received a great introducion to maths, chemistry and complemented each other very well! Tom Slevin was superbly
physics in Gonzaga, and found First Year Science in UCD very organised, with a highly opimised approach to teaching
easy; probably too easy really, but it did my social life no harm chemistry which was very efecive. However, it wasn’t all about
at all! This approach got me through unil third year, when I geing high marks in the Leaving Cert; we also did all of the
discovered one had to actually do some work in order to get an laboratory experiments on the course. Only later did I learn that
honours Physics degree. Luckily I managed, graduaing in 1995. this was very rare; most students had much less exposure to
At that stage I very much enjoyed Physics and the idea laboratory work. So we got an excellent introducion to rigorous
of doing research, so I started a PhD with a research group in scieniic methods, a great foundaion in later years. To this day
UCD in Astrophysics. That course brought me to the USA for a I remember to ‘add the acid to the water’ and ‘shake to ensure a
year, where I worked at the Smithsonian Observatory in Tucson homogenous mixture’, advice which has served me well in many
Arizona. I graduated in 2000, having studied ‘TeV Gamma-ray facets of life!
emission from the Galacic Plane’. I then worked as a research Denis Cusack taught me Applied Maths and had a
scienist at the IN2P3 in Paris for two years. Fr Moylan may be completely diferent approach. He was always very relaxed and
surprised to hear that I learnt to speak excellent French, based friendly, to the point of being somewhat scatered. He was the
on the excellent foundaion in the language he had given us in one who let me with a real love of mathemaics and physics
Gonzaga, despite my complete lack of interest in languages in His Applied Maths classes were inspiring, I sill live by his
my early years! advice that it is beter to take the seemingly more conceptually
Ater two years I moved on to the Max Planck Insitute for challenging approach to solving a problem, as it usually leads
Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, Germany for a further ive years. to a more elegant soluion, while the easier approach to a
I learnt German quite well too, discovering for the irst ime brute-force soluion never works as well. This was true of the
that it was the rigorous knowledge of grammar I got from Lain Leaving Ceriicate Maths paper and is true of many problems
classes with Mr O’Sullivan that made learning other languages in Science, and in life. He told us to stand back from a problem
much easier. I met many, especially English, people who had no like a cowboy in a western, to size it up carefully, pick the
idea what the ‘accusaive case’ was, not to menion the ‘daive’, right weapon (be it an integral or a diferenial equaion), take
which plays a big role in German. aim carefully and shoot! I sill take that approach to problem
On returning to Dublin in 2006 I worked as a project solving. It works equally well in Finance, where the culture
scienist for the Cosmogrid computaional research cluster at could really beneit from a cool head and a clear approach to
Dublin Insitute for Advanced Studies in Merrion Square, before complex issues someimes.
moving into industry to work for Pioneer Investments in 2007. Conor Masterson
I now work as a Quanitaive Analyst, esimaing risk for ixed Class of 1990
