Welcome to Financial Modeler's Corner (FMC) where we discuss the art and science of financial modeling with your host Paul Barnhurst. Financial Modeler's Corner is sponsored by Financial Modeling Institute (FMI) the most respected accreditation in Financial Modeling globally.

In this episode, we have a special treat for you with multiple guests who attended the Microsoft Excel Collegiate Challenge (MECC). At the beginning of November, Paul had the opportunity to spend a day at the University of Arizona campus and watch these students compete and talk to commentators, spectators, competitors, and faculty, and we have brought you a few of those interviews.

Listen to this episode as:

Excel MVPs, Oz Du Soleil and Jon Acampora share why they attended the show, what they love about the competition, and the magic of Power Query
The host of this competition, Prof David Brown talks about MECC.
The winner, Patrick Chatain and 3^rd-place finisher Benjamin Weber share their experiences.
Missy and Teresa from Salve Regina University, talk about why they started with Excel as they were building out a data analytics business program.
Craig Hatmaker shares everything about LAMBDA's and 5G modeling components.

Quotes:

“[How does MECC benefit students in the real world] Sometimes we get sponsors to actually write cases that are based on what they do . S o it gives them real-world experience of what they would be doing, which is invaluable w hen you're interviewing for a job . ....... ” - Professor David Brown

“ [Do you feel like you're better in Excel today for having competed] When I started competing, I didn't even know what Lambda, let alone dynamic arrays and all of that was. Now I know most of them and I think those are pretty good functions with pretty good use cases. So I think that made me a much better user in Excel. ” - 3rd Place Finisher Benjamin Weber