Ucsc

[gogol02]

I have accepted the offer and will be going to UCSC.

Question about housing...does most of it come with furniture? For my undergrad, when I rented it was furnished, but my MA I had to buy all my new stuff. I realize that it will depend on the situation but pretty much all places that rented where I did undergrad were furnished, while where I did my MA, that was not the norm.

Time to try and secure a fall TA or RA position...

[gogol02]

Does anyone have any input on the Chestnut area? It's kinda pricey but I will definitely have to pay more to have my dog with me, and it says its pet friendly. Most other ads I looked at have a limit of 30 lbs for a pet

5 min walk to downtown and Boardwalk

[teflon_johnny]

Originally Posted by gogol02

Does anyone have any input on the Chestnut area? It's kinda pricey but I will definitely have to pay more to have my dog with me, and it says its pet friendly. Most other ads I looked at have a limit of 30 lbs for a pet

5 min walk to downtown and Boardwalk

It's 5 mins (or less) to downtown, but definitely more than that to the boardwalk (although I don't know why you'd want to go there). Very nice houses in the area, although depending on the specific part, could be kind of close to the downtown rowdiness/seediness.

[TheBrothersKaramazov]

Originally Posted by gogol02

Does anyone have any input on the Chestnut area? It's kinda pricey but I will definitely have to pay more to have my dog with me, and it says its pet friendly. Most other ads I looked at have a limit of 30 lbs for a pet

5 min walk to downtown and Boardwalk

Not quite sure about the area. From their photos, it looks quite nice. You are right on a bus line and very close to downtown.

It's unlikely you'll find a furnished place - unless the ad specifically says so. Craigstlist is the best way to find used furniture. Also, you wouldn't believe how much you can find through the grad mailing list. (Once Sandra adds you to the grad-econ mailing list, you get a ton of inter-grad student spam mail regarding renting apartments and moving-out sales - especially at FSH). I managed to score a huge desk and dresser from a couple moving out of FSH for free.
Obviously, more is available in the early summer than late summer.

[gogol02]

It's not that I want to live in Chestnut, if anything I would love a more apartment type place, in a building, but it seems that what craigslist has, in terms of apartments, and not mini houses or whatever they are, is limited for pet owners.

I wont be taking anything until I see it, and I plan on coming out few weeks early to get a place. I just need it to be sunny. And hopefully come with a dishwasher.

[encore]

What do you guys know about UCSC's placement record. I understand that last year's candidates did not do very well. But what about previous years? Is there any public record about this?
Many thanks!

[TheBrothersKaramazov]

There isn't much of a public record. Remember that the program started in the 90s. It takes time to develop a reputation.
Strongest placements are at major organizations - Fed/Board of Governors/central banks/ WB/ IMF etc.
What you see up there is the placements.

Latest figures for your incoming class (as of yesterday) is 23.

[mysorelboots]

Originally Posted by TheBrothersKaramazov

Latest figures for your incoming class (as of yesterday) is 23.

TBZ, compared to your incoming class.... what pros/cons do you see with this size of class?

PS - And I sure hope this list doesn't include that dude who is using the UCSC PhD program to get into ANOTHER PhD program...

[encore]

Originally Posted by TheBrothersKaramazov

What you see up there is the placements.

What do you mean by this? Sorry I could not follow.

[TheBrothersKaramazov]

Oh, my apologies, Encore... What I mean is that what is posted on the department website
UC Santa Cruz - Economics - Students - Job Market Candidates - Job Market Candidates

is the current list of placements (with the exception of one person who got an offer at Pittsburgh or Purdue and turned it down for USF).

MSB: In my humble opinion here are the pros and cons:
PROS
-You will have a much wider course selection to choose from. They plan to start offering more courses in applied micro, monetary, IO, etc. They haven't offered a wide variety of courses in the past because there simply was no student interest (and small class sizes)
-More classmates with diverse interests to coauthor with/ hang out with
-Not really to do with class size, but in comparison to previous incoming classes: you won't have to take mandatory fields in international finance and trade (SO I HEAR... note that this is still in the decision process, but likely to be passed. I learned this the other day).
-More diverse workshops. With more varying interests, we might finally be able to get a micro workshop together.
-You may actually get a TA for some courses (This is what the upper years are hoping. Alot of us would happily TA a graduate class), which would be especially helpful in the game theory class.
-With more grad students, the department can get more financial support from the university... having "some" balancing effect.

CONS:
1. From all the broken gossip in the department in the last couple of days, I hear that your coursework, prelims, and TA evals (if you TA) will matter in getting second year TAships. Eg. You can't go around failing 1/3 of your classes and expect to get full funding in second year. (This was the case earlier). I do not know how difficult it will become now.
2. You are likely sharing one office.
3. Our class is especially close knit (more so than in any other years). We socialize alot together as an entire class. Much of this is that almost all of us lived on campus in first year, and those that are married (including their wives) were very eager to socialize with the rest of the class. Also, all of us are international students so we were all going through the same transition. While ethnically diverse, we were mostly similar in our "socializing"-style.. which made for lots of fun.
-I wonder how close knit your class will be with so many people. (Then again, our class is pretty unusual on so many levels).
4. Larger class size MAY mean less one-on-one contact with the faculty in first year. (On the other hand, you will now get more exposure to faculty in the applied micro areas).

One prof said to us yesterday that "Sure, 23 may say that they're coming, but 23 won't show up", implying that it might be smaller. They are certainly making April 15th a firm deadline. And there certainly will be people who drop out of the program because of poor fit or other reasons.
Also - econ departments in general have always had trouble competing with business and law schools to get grad students. The reason so many have accepted this year is because the economy has tanked, and it'll be horrible looking for a job right now. Trust me when I say people get restless in graduate school and will give up on their dissertation if their heart is not in it. If the market starts to rebound, the opportunity cost of being in graduate school increases.