undergrad ranking of school

[marc2]

Hi everyone,

 

I am in an undergrad in a top 25 uni with 50 in both math and econ but a quite reputable cs department.

I have finished doing intermediate micro/macro and econometrics

My initial plan is taking master and phd econ courses as well as p&s and analysis but I am worried that the low math/econ ranking would hurt my chances and cs seems a better choice in terms of career without doing graduate studies (in case I cannot get into good phd programs).

Personally I prefer econ>>>>>math~cs but I have not taken phd sequences so I am not sure about it right now.

Also I am worried that doing a cs degree would pull down my gpa which would also hurt my chances.

 

My question is which one would be a more competitive profile if we assume the grades are the same (or 0.1-0.2 lower for cs route). Does uni care a lot more about overall ranking than subject ranking?

option 1: master micro and macro, phd micro i ii

option 2: a cs major with master micro

both option includes math the typical required math (calc iii, la, de, analysis, p&s)

I think I will go for a master in econ from cemfi/duke/oxford/lse first instead of doing phd directly if I can make it.

 

Thank you so much for your help:notworthy

[Food4Thought]

I doubt that adcoms reviewing your profile will really know that your school has a reputable CS program. So, I think hurting your GPA for the CS major will not do you much benefit at all.

[Econhead]

^1-I agree with food.

 

If you want to go to grad school for Econ, you should do Econ now and try to take PhD micro before you graduate.

 

Any more specific recommendations cannot be made without knowing your full profile. Also, it would be good to know whether you are aiming for a T10 T20 T30 or T40. All of this will help us make recomendations about how much a Masters will help you or whether you are fine applying to a PhD straight away.

[marc2]

Thank you so much!

 

I am a first year student in my uni (transferred calc i, intro micro macro through british exams). I am now taking calc ii, intro to econometrics and intermediate macro. I am doing quite well in my courses (A in major courses, but bad grades in distribution courses like writing). I am aiming top 25 but I see a lot of people with As in math and econ from state uni with 50 in math and econ ended up in 30ish department and I am worried about that... I may just quit my university and return to study in my home country or transfer to cs if my chances are small. My parents are spending a lot and I really want to give up and stop wasting their money...

[PhDPlease]

I am a bit confused about why you think you are wasting money. If you are in a top 25 overall program even if it is top 50 for econ, I think you have a reasonable chance to get into a good econ phd program if the rest of your profile is very strong. While I understand that you'd like to be at a better university, yours doesn't sound terrible at all. And if you end up not doing a PhD, an undergrad major in econ and math should prepare you for a lot of private-sector jobs.

 

I don't think you need to decide whether to do a masters at this point if you're only a first year. If you take PhD micro and the other classes you listed and get As and maybe do some research, I think you could get into a decent program straight away. You could always also apply to PhD and masters programs at the same time and have the masters as a fall-back.

Edited April 23, 2014 by PhDPlease