NEWS & EVENTS

By Shawn Hutchins

Rice University undergrad Jiaqi Lu is a natural problem solver and an eager learner who finds adventure in new challenges and uncertainty. 

After earning her dual bachelor’s degrees in computer science and statistics with a minor in financial computation and modeling this spring, she will begin her life as a quantitative trading analyst at the Chicago Trading Company’s (CTC) corporate headquarters in Chicago, IL.

The third largest city in the U.S., Chicago is also a melting pot of arts, culture and diversity. The city is also among the foremost financial services locations. Lu is excited to be in the midst of it all with CTC’s location being across the street from the Chicago Board of Trade and three blocks from the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. 

This past summer Lu interned at CTC for 10 weeks. She grew her knowledge about options trading and practiced her skills through a series of mock trading simulations. Her internship project included developing a new user interface for use by CTC traders to test various factor models. She also designed and implemented a delta hedging strategy to price options trading risk using a clustering algorithm and Bayesian analysis. 

The primary workspace at CTC is a former trading floor where traders, quants, technologists and operations professionals work as a team in a circular arena with towering computer monitors charting international markets. The environment will draw from all her skill sets in statistics, mathematical analysis and modeling, and computer science. 

The financial services and technology spaces have been historically dominated by men. Today, with the movement toward diversity, equity and inclusion, many companies are focused on recruiting and promoting women. 

Although there is progress, there’s still a lot of work to do.

Lu says that over the course of her studies, there is a lot of energy being applied to increase the number of women in science, technology, engineering or mathematics (STEM) degree programs.

Lu decided to major in computer science after participating in her first HackRice, a competition where student teams of up to four people work on a project for 36 hours. The hackathon projects are typically software and sometimes hardware focused, but mostly they are problems or innovative ideas to explore.

“I did not know much about computer science at the time. I signed up just to have fun and make friends,” Lu said. 

After participating in two hackathons, Lu wanted to try her hand at leading an event. She was co-chair of the 2021 and 2022 HackRice events, with over 550 people from across the world participating. Students have also connected with industry leaders who serve as judges and event sponsors.

When asked why there are so few women who choose STEM degrees, she said she thinks some women have anxiety about being qualified or they feel that computer science and technology are masculinized. 

“I believe women need to be more confident and where there is opportunity go ahead and take it. There is nothing lost in trying.” 

There are many areas of support through professional organizations and women’s conferences. 

Lu attended the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, a series of conferences designed to bring the research and career interests of women in computing to the forefront. It was through this conference that she found her summer internship opportunity at CTC. 

Over the next six months, Lu will be completing her college journey. After graduation, she plans to travel before jumping into her full-time career.