Master's program

The Master's of Mathematics (MMATH) in Computational Mathematics is an intensive, twelve-month research-based program that gives students a foundation in the theory and applications of the broad field of Computational Mathematics. 

The program is targeted to students with a Bachelor’s degree in mathematics, statistics, computer science, or any program with a strong mathematical component (including economics, engineering, the physical sciences) and will provide excellent students a fast track to PhD studies or to a top job in industry. 

An important feature of the Master’s in Computational Mathematics program is its breadth. Four of the required courses are chosen from the core areas in Computational Mathematics:

  • Discrete computational mathematics
  • Numerical methods
  • Computational statistics and machine learning
  • Scientific computing
  • Computational optimization

The two remaining courses are chosen from a large list of suggested graduate courses offered by the various departments and schools housed within the Faculty of Mathematics. For more information, please see: degree requirements and course offerings.

All Master's students also complete a full-time, four-month, supervised, research project in a research area of their choice. For more information, please visit our research project and presentation guide.

We are currently not accepting new students in the coursework stream of the CM Master's program.

Meet Kira

Kira standing in front of a whiteboard

Kira Selby began her post-secondary career studying Mathematics and Physics at McMaster University. Originally, she intended to pursue physics at a graduate level, but near the end of her undergraduate career she had a change of heart. After watching Google Deepmind’s AlphaGo defeat champion Go player Lee Sedol, she was inspired and became determined that research in machine learning and artificial intelligence would be her future path. And for that, there was only one place to go - the University of Waterloo. Kira earned a Master’s degree from Waterloo’s Computational Mathematics program under Dr. Pascal Poupart, and continues to pursue her dream through Waterloo’s school of Computer Science where she is currently working on her PhD.

Meet Xiaolu

Xiaolu Sun standing in front of a whiteboard

Xiaolu Sun started the Master’s program in Computational Mathematics after obtaining an undergraduate degree in Engineering from the University of Toronto. He selected this program to prepare for a career in Finance. Less than halfway through the program, he was hired by J.P. Morgan for their investment banking operations and technology department based in Hong Kong. He was selected after five rounds of interviews and tests, from a large pool of highly qualified applicants, many of which were enrolled in specialized finance programs. A major reason why Xiaolu was chosen is because of his advanced mathematical modeling and computing skills, which are critical for today’s finance applications and lie at the core of the University of Waterloo’s Computational Mathematics program.