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The Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science is pleased to congratulate the University of Waterloo team on their success at the 2026 Munich Re Cup. The Munich Re Cup is the premier actuarial science student case competition in North America, with a total of $20,000 of prize money handed out each year. The University of Waterloo team delivered an impressive performance, winning second place and $6,000 of prize money.

Out of 22 initial teams, the University of Waterloo team – consisting of actuarial science students Joanna Li, Adrian Lock, and Michelle Ng, and faculty advisors Emily Kozlowski and James Adcock – was one of six finalist teams that competed against teams coming from top-tier actuarial programs across North America at the two-day, in-person final round of the case competition in Toronto.

This year’s case topic was GenAI, and teams were tasked with creating a comprehensive AI-driven technology solution to transform the underwriting and claims processes at a medium-sized life insurer. The depth of the Waterloo team’s technical knowledge, cost-benefit analysis, and understanding of different stakeholders’ perspectives – along with their excellent handling of questions during the Q&A portion – were all praised by the judges at Munich Re. Congratulations to the team on this well-earned achievement!

The event was aimed at girls and students from underrepresented groups, but welcomed any students from Grades 10-12 across the Waterloo Region who were interested in exploring statistics and data science. 

“I expect my main role will be to help build up our reputation in AI-related research for the Math Faculty,” Zhu says. 

Full story on the Faculty of Mathematics site.