2021 SOA Board Elections

This is probably not the thread for that discussion, though Bro did bring some of this up last week.

You are correct that it isn’t really the right thread, but I was specifically responding to Bro’s post.

Okay, it looks like questionaires, etc. are out there.

I will be sending candidates these two questions:

  • What do you think about the UEC program?
  • What do you think about the exam system changes recently announced?

I will share answers here, with their permission.

I emailed the three President-Elect candidates. I will email the Board candidates tomorrow.

Are there no petition candidates for any of the offices?

I haven’t heard of any. Looking at the page, today was the last day to submit a petition.

I got a response from President-Elect candidate John Robinson:

Concerning the UEC program:
My first reaction was that, unlike 2012-2013 when college credit was first discussed by the Board, members were not consulted. My grapevine tells me that none of the CAE schools were consulted in the development of the program (I hope the grapevine is wrong), and one of them has decided it will not participate. As you know, OLA has complained that the “bias” towards CAE schools will be a setback to minorities. There is a provision that extends the program to HBCUs; but very few HBCUs have Act Sci, and without a professor to support it, the program is unlikely to reach their students. Most of the comments that I get are concern that it will produce a lower quality of candidate than the exams. The lack of buy-in by important stakeholders may cause at least a re-consideration of the direction.

Concerning the thrust of the exam system changes:
There is a legitimate need to ensure that pre-ASA candidates can perform work that employers of actuaries expect of them. Currently, this includes applying tools and techniques that data scientists are trained to do. Where to draw the line between pre-ASA candidate and data scientist is a tricky question. I am confident, however, that at the Fellowship level, our multi-disciplinary (economics, finance, life and non-life contingencies, investment, risk management) analytical perspectives, combined with our code of conduct, will continue to be valued by those that use our services.

I welcome any opportunity to hear your concerns for our profession or the SOA - whatever you think an incoming SOA president should be aware of.

You have my permission to share my response on GoActuary.

I told John that I’d convey any comments from here to him. I’m all about sharing. :wink:

Sending out an email to Board Candidates may have to wait a little… there are two I don’t have contact info for, and I’m trying to get that.

Check the actuarial directory?

I did - some people do not provide their email addresses publicly. And I checked my LinkedIn connections (I’m connected to most of them). The two that are left, I sent out LinkedIn invites to, so I can at least message them even if I can’t do email.

Anyway, I want to contact all of them at the same time.

I’ve written to the SOA to see if they can share contact info with me.

I will send an email next week, to those I have contact info for. I will do only so much to try to track people down who are running for the Board.

I will see if I can organize these responses later, but here’s the first regular Board candidate I have answers from.

Roger Loomis:

Thanks Mary Pat.

My answers to your questions are below. You have my permission to share them.

What do you think about the UEC program?

If a college wants to have courses that prepare students to pass actuarial exams that is great. But we already have a system for testing whether somebody has mastered the content on an actuarial exam’s syllabus: the actuarial exam itself. Because of that, I don’t understand the need for giving students credit for SOA exams without passing them.

What do you think about the exam system changes recently announced?

I think the SOA has made an excellent case for modernizing the exam system. The trends they’ve identified (e.g. the rise of data science, the impact of artificial intelligence on the nature of work, the declining market value of basic cognitive skills) are real, and if the profession is going to maintain and enhance its value, we need an educational system that will support actuaries carving out a valuable niche in the emerging economy.

More specifically, I don’t believe SOA exams can or should educate candidates to become data scientists. However, actuaries should be capable of analyzing data using modern statistical techniques. Moreover, we should have a functional understanding of what data scientists do so that we can effectively collaborate with them. Ultimately, the unique skills that actuaries bring to the table will involve deeper domain knowledge in insurance, managing insurance risk, and financial risk modeling.

From my perspective, replacing an ASA-level course on Investments and Financial Markets with an exam on Advanced Topics in Predictive Analytics is a good tradeoff. That one course won’t help actuaries competing with trained data scientists for a data scientist job, but it just might increase the chances that the actuary will know enough about data science to be the data scientist’s manager in five years.

Just an FYI: Roger reached out to me, which is what kicked me off asking these two questions. (I had planned on asking these questions, but just hadn’t started asking yet)

I have emailed the three President-Elect candidates already, and will be emailing the other Board candidates I can get contact email addresses for. I share answers only with permission.

Sorry for the lag – I’m on vacation and am slower than usual re: emails.

Tim Rozar, one of the SOA President-Elect candidates, has responded to my email (days ago, I just got around to posting it):

Thanks so much for reaching out.

With respect to UEC, I recognize that this is a contentious issue for many. I also recognize that I may lose more votes than I gain by responding, but I think it is important to be transparent in my views. First and foremost, our primary goal should be to ensure the rigor and relevance of the FSA credential. The question is how do we achieve this goal while also responding to the evolving needs and expectations of employers, regulators, candidates, and other stakeholders? I know that there are many folks on this forum who believe that there will never be any way to satisfy this goal if university credit plays any role in the accreditation process. I respect that view, and I once held the same position - but my thinking has evolved somewhat over the past 20 years. I do now think that it is possible - and necessary - to retain quality of the credential while also retaining demand for the credential. Without prioritizing both - quality and demand - the value of the credential in the marketplace will diminish. It is easy to say “if a candidate knows the material, they should just take the exam to prove it”, but this presupposes that we have limitless demand for the credential with a pool of top quality university students queueing up around the block in the hopes of becoming actuaries. Unfortunately, this simply is no longer the case as many of the potential candidates who in the past would have gone on to be top actuaries are now taking their talents elsewhere. The number of first-time exam takers has declined for something like 7 years in a row while interest in other adjacent, high-paying fields of study have seen tremendous growth. If the current exam system itself is a primary deterrent to top talent from ever entering the actuarial pipeline in the first place, then that will water down the quality of the actuarial profession and our credential far more than incorporating UEC. As such, I support UEC as a component of a broader FSA credentialing process that also continues to incorporate many other rigorous educational components including traditional examinations, VEE, e-learning, and continuing professional development. This isn’t to say that I don’t have concerns, which I have already personally expressed to SOA staff and board leadership. First, I worry about the potential for collateral damage to non-CAE actuarial programs as the current approach could create an uneven playing field. If the UEC pathway were to reduce the number of actuarial program options available to students, this could reduce the exposure to the actuarial profession and have an unintended ripple effect on the sustainability of our candidate pipeline. Second, despite a stated intent of the program to improve the diversity of our profession, I worry that it could have the opposite effect if only CAE (or even UCAP) schools are included. I appreciate the outreach to HBCUs to try to address this, but this does not feel like a scalable solution for such an important issue.

As for the other changes to the SOA exam system, I am generally a supporter of certificate programs and micro-credentials as a way to acquire and demonstrate specific expertise beyond the ASA and FSA credential. I think this is a creative and sensible innovation that responds to the evolving needs of our stakeholders. For the broader system changes, I am not as close to the details of other syllabus changes, but I generally support the introduction of topics such as communication and business skills that may help round-out the otherwise technical syllabus. As for expanded data analytics content, it is clear that the baseline level of competence necessary for the actuary of the future has increased over the past several years, as has the demand for these skills from candidates and employers. This does not mean that actuaries should strive to become data scientists, but I do think that increasing the syllabus content in this area is a sensible evolution.

I appreciate the opportunity to connect and welcome any thoughts or feedback on these or other issues. I respect and welcome those with other ideas or opposing views on how we achieve our shared objective of delivering on our education and research mission in support of a vibrant and sustainable profession for the long-term. While we won’t always agree on every issue, I am very optimistic about the future of the SOA because of the intelligence, passion, and mutual respect that SOA members share. It is my sincere hope that each of you reviews the qualifications of each of the PE and Board candidates (Board Elections | SOA) and participates in the election process, even if you decide not to rank me as your top choice.

Warm Regards,

-Tim

Okay, NOW I’ve sent out the emails.

I still couldn’t find out how to contact one of the candidates, but at least I’ve tried to find them.

Huzzah!

I was able to get an email address for the final candidate!

I will share what answers I can, and will try to organize links earlier in this thread.

Dave Ingram:

Thanks for asking.

I would expect to concentrate my attention as a board member on making sure that the SOA supports the success of the profession through post fellowship education programs. We have had feedback from employers that they want actuaries who can think strategically, participate in effective decision making, communicate with non-actuarial colleagues and manage/lead others. I would want to get involved with and/or instigate efforts to review the effectiveness and if needed improve the existing programs that exist to promote those skills in actuaries. Ultimately, the value of the FSA is determined by the value that employers perceive that they are getting from fully qualified actuaries. The most valuable actuaries are most often people who possess these skills in addition to a rigorous technical background.

Regarding both the UES program and the changes to the ASA syllabus, there are two questions to think about. First, were these both good things to do and second, did we do them well. My thinking is that both ideas are fundamentally sound. And for both, we will need to monitor execution to see if they are actually working well. For example, we can track candidates who qualified under the UES for some subjects and see if their success on later exams is better or worse than candidates who qualified under exams. We can also investigate whether there are any other ways that candidates from the UES might be different from candidates who took all exams. And we can also track the extent to which actuaries become involved in doing work with Predictive Analytics.

But as we all think about these topics, I think that we all need to reflect on how we are currently using our actuarial education. In the past month, what part of your work is something that you can do (a)solely because you learned the subject for an exam, (b)what part was learned “on the job”, (c)what part was mixed, and (d)what part did you learn to do from some post fellowship educational effort on your part?

Regarding the addition of the Predictive Analysis materials to the ASA curriculum, I would suggest that post fellowship education on this topic is absolutely vital to successful integration of any new topic into actuarial practice. If we do not bring the managers of new actuaries into some knowledge of a new topic, then it is likely that actuarial candidates who are interested in Predictive Analytics will end up working for non-actuaries who will be much less likely to encourage them to complete their actuarial education. We will be educating people to leave the profession.

You have my permission to share this as you see fit.

Dave Ingram

I have added links to the first post in this thread to all the candidate answers I get

Mercy Yan:

Hi Mary,

Thank you for your questions. In Canada, the UEC program was implemented a number of years ago. We started with a course-by-course accredited system and moved to a program-by-program accredited system due to administrative simplicity and ease of control. There are many advantages of partnering and collaborating with a well-recognized university/college in the delivery of the required education such as:

· University/college has more employed resources dedicated to delivering the educational materials and instructions.

· University/college has a network with a broader group of employers representing many different industries.

· University/college is the first point of contact for many young talents to seek for higher education.

Broadening employment opportunities is one of the fundamental reasons for many young people to seek higher education. So it is necessary for any educational bodies to consider the employment outlook for their educational programs. Our profession has been dominating the insurance industry in the past. Unfortunately with globalization, the industry in North America, especially in Canada, has undergone consolidation in order to compete on a global scale. With consolidation, the employment opportunities for actuaries have diminished substantially, which led to membership shrinkage. This is inevitable when our profession is highly reliant on one industry rather than multiple industries. Thus, in order to maintain our influence and relevance in society, our profession needs to expand into other industry sectors to be sustainable in the long run.

The question would then become how we could effectively break into other industry sectors. This will require us to modernize our exam system to meet skill requirements in other industry sectors. Strategic decisions would be required to select the sector(s) that our current skill set could be easily accepted and value-added. I believe that the current SOA Board has selected data management (information-technology) as the top area for expansion based on the latest focus on data scientists.

Once the sector(s) is/are selected, the next question is how to complement our educational system to attract the new talents and also enhance our actuarial skills to meet the skill requirements of the new targeted industries. The decision to add a UEC system to the existing path is probably a good strategy to expand our employment opportunities for our members. I view this addition as an expansion of our career path for future actuaries. The skill requirements for this new group of actuaries could be different from our traditional examination group. SOA will need to establish a new benchmark/standard in measuring “quality” of this new group. Given the current state of our profession and the external environment, I am in principle supportive of the UEC initiative, but the success of this new venture will rely heavily on our implementation process and brand recognition.

You are welcome to share my reply with the broader community. Thank you!

David Ruiz:

Mary Pat, thanks for reaching out. My apologies for the slow response.

I noted in my Candidate Questionnaire that one of the most pressing international issues facing the SOA today is outsourcing and co-sourcing of actuarial work. This work often goes to actuaries who aren’t affiliated with the Society. In order to stay relevant in the international space, we need to make sure our education system doesn’t put us at a competitive disadvantage. I look at the University Education Credit system as a great step to ensure competitiveness. This program puts us on par with the Institute of Actuaries, which offers exemptions for preliminary exams to students in qualified classes in university settings. These exemptions make it easier for a student actuary to move through the credentialing process and get to ASA and FSA more quickly. This means that international students, when faced with the range of internationally-accepted professional bodies, will be more likely to choose the Society of Actuaries.

That said, I am concerned about the UEC program as it has been formulated when we think about barriers to entry for diverse talent. The UEC will only be available to students in Centers of Actuarial Excellence. If you look at the CAE list, it appears to me a very non-diverse set of universities. Of the 33 Centers of Actuarial Excellence, only the University of Connecticut is identified as a Hispanic Serving Institution by the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities. None of the CAE schools are considered Historically Black Colleges and Universities. We need to make it easier for Black and Latinx students to hear about and enter the Actuarial Profession. Opening the UEC program to a wider list of schools, based on educational content and quality of the specific courses rather than the CAE status of the school, would help address systemic inequity in our North American education system. As an elected board member, I would advocate for a more inclusive education system, while recognizing the benefits we get from our university accreditation program.

I am actually pretty excited about the direction the Education team is taking with the newly-announced micro-credentials and the changes to the early-career education system. Probably the most exciting changes are the introduction of the Advanced Topics in Predictive Analytics exam and the e-learning modules that will emphasize EQ/AQ topics. Understanding predictive analytics and how data science relates to the actuarial world is increasingly seen as “table stakes” for actuarial managers. We need the skills to manage and interpret data science work, and to help our senior business leaders get comfortable with the insights gleaned from advanced analytics. I don’t believe we need actuaries to become data scientists – but having a grounding in the techniques and capabilities of this adjacent profession will help us to be more relevant to company leadership.

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to answer your questions, and I welcome any and all followups. Let me earn your vote!

David Ruiz (he/him)

VP, Head Finance Actuary

Life Insurance Division

I’m endorsing John Robinson for SOA President-Elect.

Please check out his material:

Elections begin Monday, September 13.

Carlos Fuentes:

Mary Pat,

Thank you for reaching out to me. Please share my response with readers of GoActuary.

I’ll respond to your questions and then I’ll qualify my answers.

I do not support the current UEC program for the following reasons: it reduces the rigor of actuarial education; it gives an unfair advantage to some candidates; it gives the impression that minority students benefit disproportionally from this initiative. This impression has serious consequences in the professional lives of minority actuaries who, regardless of their level of achievement, will continue to be seen by a growing number of people as less qualified, recipients of undeserved favors, and undesirable. Even if the program eventually benefits a disproportionate number of minority students, the long-term cost to their professional careers would be much greater than the benefits.

I oppose the path to Associateship for international candidates practicing in the US under which, for many countries, it requires passing one exam and satisfy modest requirements. See details in International Section - International Actuarial General Information | SOA.

I agree with the changes in the education system that include micro credentials. Candidates will have the opportunity to obtain designations as they make progress with the exams, giving something to those who do not pursue an ASA and incentives to those who do. If employers see value in the micro-credentials, actuarial education system would become more relevant to the industries we serve.

To qualify my answer to the question about the UEC program I need to make two observations:

(i) The willingness of candidates to pursue actuarial credentials depends on three aspects: effort; expected rewards; comparison of the actuarial profession with other professions. Expected rewards have decreased over time as attested by unemployment and the abundance of actuaries, which ought to affect the level of pay via the supply-demand equilibrium in the labor market. On the other hand, whereas in the past actuaries had little competition from other professions, this is no longer the case

(ii) What is the ideal number of actuaries? A large pool of actuaries gives employers access to talent and reduces labor costs; it also increases the income of actuarial organizations but depresses the salaries of ASAs and FSAs. A small pool of talent produces the opposite effects and maybe additional consequences, which we must understand because some of them could be decisive. For example, if the profession becomes less visible, could it become less relevant? Could actuaries be replaced by other professionals—data analysts and accountants with training in the financial aspects of insurance? I am sure the Board has considered these questions and worked out scenarios such as the introduction of a single-payer health care system, which would transform the health care industry. The point is that we need to understand how the supply of talent affects society and credentialed actuaries.

If the number of actuaries is excessive then the UEC program is hurting the profession and the SOA should eliminate it. More broadly, the SOA should favor a stricter credentialing system. On the other hand, if society and actuaries can benefit from membership growth, then shortening the traveling time to associateship and fellowship is the path to follow, however unfair it might be to those who made great sacrifices in an attempt to pass the exams when the education system was stricter. But even if we concede that the profession must grow—an assumption that requires justification—the UEC program should be redesigned so that all candidates are treated fairly and are seen as equally capable.

Best,

Carlos