Financial computing literacy: 10 steps.

It is often the case that in a financial engineering/mathematics master's curriculum, computer programming if taught, is before the start of an important course typically titled ‘Numerical analysis of financial derivatives’. Typically in this computer programming course, C++ is taught, and the material spans from basic constructs to an introduction to advanced programming such as design patterns. A major reason for its early introduction is that students would subsequently be able to use the skills to computationally solve problems occurring in numerics. We believe this curriculum strategy to be an element of ‘computer literacy’ which has been criticized in our context as one that discourages students with lower programming abilities who otherwise may have predisposed mathematical abilities. We aim to make fundamental financial computing inclusive via a series of 10 steps thereby leading to what we refer to as financial computing literacy.