Profile Evaluation and Advice

[Sumaiya Rahman]

Hi,

 

I am an economics student and I want to apply for a PhD in Economics. However, my profile feels rather weak:

 

Undergrad GPA: 3.68 (in a developing country, so university not ranked)

Masters GPA: 3.31 (also not a good ranking university)

GRE: 160 in Verbal, 161 in Quantitative

 

I would ideally like to study more of behavioral economics and work on designing better policies. I was considering PhD in Public Policy, but without going to a top school, I'm sure I will be skipped over for most jobs. I want to work in a research institute or academia.

 

Any advice? Should I apply to a higher ranked MA school and would they be willing to take me? Or, should I try working on research?

 

Thanks

[publicaffairsny]

Is your masters from a school in the same developing country? Do you have any research experience? Why do you want a PhD?

[publicaffairsny]

My immediate impression is that you have not yet demonstrated the level of performance required for admission to a doctoral program. However, you have accomplished a great deal. You have good GRE scores, not by econ phd standards, but by general standards. You have a 3.5+ UG GPA and and 3.25 plus grad GPA in a tough discipline. This is worth something.

 

If you are committed to doctoral study, and have time and money to throw at that goal I have some possible courses of action for you. I think you could get into a top policy phd program if you do an MPA or MPP. I think policy phds would better fit your research interests than econ. I think as you stand right now you could get into a good MPA/MPP program such as UMD College Park, American U, SUNY Albany, etc, provided you have 1-2 years of solid work experience in public service. However, the work experience is not necessarily a deal breaker if you don't have it.

 

Of course if you are interested in doctoral study you are going to have to demonstrate competence in your masters. That means 3.8+ GPA and research assistantship. You need to speak up for yourself and let your professors know from day 1 that you are interested in phd's. If you do this, and increase your GRE quant to 165, you will be in good shape for a strong policy phd. If you continue your math prep and squeeze in some advanced math courses you might potentially be in better shape for econ admissions too, but I'm not sure about that. Hope this gets you started. Either way, when you graduate with an MPA/MPP and ma in econ you will be more than qualified to work on research at a think tank, for a non-profit or public sector or as a policy analyst, or in consulting. You will also be qualified for management positions after you have developed some related work experience. Hope this helps.

[chateauheart]

Ignore above posts.

[publicaffairsny]

Ignore above posts.

 

Glad to see you've found it in your heart to offer something constructive to OP.

[chrishacker]

Wow, I never had such an experience here:

I return to the forum after one week, only to find that the topics are still so familiar...

[Sumaiya Rahman]

Thank you for the advice.

 

My UG was from Bangadesh, and I had applied to 2 canadian schools and 1 dutch, with no success. My grad school is in Hungary, which is also not that popular, but a vast improvement from my UG. I have 3 years of work experience in a swiss development project, and about 6 months as RA. One of the more policy oriented papers will be available online, not a journal but in the EC project site. I hope that will count.

 

I'm interested to do my PhD because I love reading and writing papers. It gives me the most joy. I could do it all the time. My GPA weakness stems from a rough personal time and I am determined to overcome it.

[publicaffairsny]

I think you are going to need an american degree to get into an american doctoral program, given your profile. I really do think an american mpa/mpp will be a great choice for you and would encourage you to look into it. Not everyone here trusts my advice, but I think you would get an opportunity to read and write a lot of policy papers while gaining a valuable credential that will be recognized globally.

[chateauheart]

Absolutely ignore above advice. MPAs are valueless for doctoral admissions in economics, for doctoral admissions in most social science disciplines, and for research careers in general. The reason the above poster refuses to believe this transparent fact has something to do with his own background, and for the last few months he's been trying to sell unwitting victims the same fantasy notion about the value of MPAs for an academic career that he's been deluding himself into believing.

 

Here's a good post from another forum, from somebody actually in an academic career in political science, has done an MPP (which is still a magnitude more relevant than MPAs), and heavily recommends against it even for political science (which makes it certainly not useful for economics). Keep in mind that gradcafe is pretty loosely structured (this forum is in general superior) so the advice there tends to be pretty soft and cuddly by nature; strongly worded advice like the following is rare and should be taken seriously.

 

http://forum.thegradcafe.com/topic/32587-mppmpa-as-prep-for-political-science-phd/?p=1057857007

[publicaffairsny]

MPA or MPP are equally valuable for policy analysis and other research oriented jobs in think tanks or governmental organizations. And don't let people with extremely narrow worldviews tell you what you can or can't do with any particular background. Some peope believe that because they have had success by being excellent sheep, theirs is the only way to success. Anyone with even a basic grasp on the human condition knows this is not the case.

[Deekdeekerson]

MPA or MPP are equally valuable for policy analysis and other research oriented jobs in think tanks or governmental organizations. And don't let people with extremely narrow worldviews tell you what you can or can't do with any particular background. Some peope believe that because they have had success by being excellent sheep, theirs is the only way to success. Anyone with even a basic grasp on the human condition knows this is not the case.

 

Source for the first statement, or is that conjecture?

 

Also, calling him a "sheep" because he's advising someone have an economics-oriented background if they want to pursue a PhD or career in economics is...uhh...weird, to say the least.

[publicaffairsny]

Source for the first statement, or is that conjecture?

 

Also, calling him a "sheep" because he's advising someone have an economics-oriented background if they want to pursue a PhD or career in economics is...uhh...weird, to say the least.

 

Excellent sheep is a buzzword in the contemporary discourse about elite education. Judging by information about the poster that he has personally shared with me, I feel it is a relevent description of him. Either way, I was advising OP to pursue an MPA/MPP in preparation for a policy phd not economics. So yes, if someone is so locked into admissions formulas that they can't see the MPA as a path to a policy phd because they consider it to be an inferior or less conventionally accepted foundation in the social sciences they are being a sheep.

 

However, I am interested in what his advice would be for the OP. I would be surprised if it was anything beyond "give up now."

[Blanket]

Excellent sheep is a buzzword in the contemporary discourse about elite education. Judging by information about the poster that he has personally shared with me, I feel it is a relevent description of him. Either way, I was advising OP to pursue an MPA/MPP in preparation for a policy phd not economics. So yes, if someone is so locked into admissions formulas that they can't see the MPA as a path to a policy phd because they consider it to be an inferior or less conventionally accepted foundation in the social sciences they are being a sheep.

 

However, I am interested in what his advice would be for the OP. I would be surprised if it was anything beyond "give up now."

 

It's not a buzzword, it's a word being thrown around by a guy who was denied tenure at Yale and who has since gone on a crusade against the Ivy League.

[publicaffairsny]

That may be your opinion of it, but the mainstream media including the new york times is giving the idea high billing and a lot of smart people agree. So it is not a fringe idea.

[behavingmyself]

My immediate impression is that you have not yet demonstrated the level of performance required for admission to a doctoral program. However, you have accomplished a great deal. You have good GRE scores, not by econ phd standards, but by general standards. You have a 3.5+ UG GPA and and 3.25 plus grad GPA in a tough discipline. This is worth something.

 

If you are committed to doctoral study, and have time and money to throw at that goal I have some possible courses of action for you. I think you could get into a top policy phd program if you do an MPA or MPP. I think policy phds would better fit your research interests than econ. I think as you stand right now you could get into a good MPA/MPP program such as UMD College Park, American U, SUNY Albany, etc, provided you have 1-2 years of solid work experience in public service. However, the work experience is not necessarily a deal breaker if you don't have it.

 

Of course if you are interested in doctoral study you are going to have to demonstrate competence in your masters. That means 3.8+ GPA and research assistantship. You need to speak up for yourself and let your professors know from day 1 that you are interested in phd's. If you do this, and increase your GRE quant to 165, you will be in good shape for a strong policy phd. If you continue your math prep and squeeze in some advanced math courses you might potentially be in better shape for econ admissions too, but I'm not sure about that. Hope this gets you started. Either way, when you graduate with an MPA/MPP and ma in econ you will be more than qualified to work on research at a think tank, for a non-profit or public sector or as a policy analyst, or in consulting. You will also be qualified for management positions after you have developed some related work experience. Hope this helps.

This is (a) mostly terrible advice, and (b) delivered without any disclaimer indicating that you have no meaningful background in economics and no interactions with economics PhD programs. You have been virtually begged not to do this. Are you trying to sabotage applicants, or just trying to annoy the rest of us?

[publicaffairsny]

This is (a) mostly terrible advice, and (b) delivered without any disclaimer indicating that you have no meaningful background in economics and no interactions with economics PhD programs. You have been virtually begged not to do this. Are you trying to sabotage applicants, or just trying to annoy the rest of us?

 

The advice didn't pertain to economics!

[behavingmyself]

I am an economics student and I want to apply for a PhD in Economics.

 

The advice didn't pertain to economics!

 

Dude...

[publicaffairsny]

Read further. OP said they were more interested in policy but didn't feel they could get into a good enough policy program.

[pch]

OP, don't do MPA or MPP. While I don't think these degrees are useless for admission, especially if you do want to do policy related research, it is just not worth the money and time if your goal is phd admission, especially if you're leaning more toward econ. While I am not so familiar with phd application to public policy, i wouldn';t say there is a rule that one is more difficult to get into than the other, coming from econ background. An econ ma is something that might be regarded well in the admission process because most programs in policy are quantitative in nature these days. Students at policy programs usually take micro and metrics phd sequence that is on par with what econ phds do. And you have some demonstrated interest in policy, so you will not appear like one of those for whom public policy is a backup in case they don't get into econ phd. Writing sample might matter more for policy. Question is, can you get good rec letters?

[yankeefan]

Read further. OP said they were more interested in policy but didn't feel they could get into a good enough policy program.

 

Why don't you take your MPA and apply to a couple policy programs and tell us how that works out for you?

[behavingmyself]

No, publicaffairsny, you were writing about economics.

 

I think policy phds would better fit your research interests than econ.

This statement requires an understanding of what economists research. You do not know enough about economics research to make this statement.

 

You also make a number of blanket statements about doctoral programs. These statements, when made to someone who has expressed an interest in an economics PhD, would usually be taken to mean something about doctoral programs in economics.

 

Even your advice about public policy PhDs is massively uninformed. I don't know how to interpret GPAs from Bangladesh; how exactly do you? Where the heck is your advice about programs and likely admissions coming from?

 

I am sick of having this discussion with you. Please stop giving advice which you are not qualified to give. Seriously. You are being extraordinarily selfish.

[publicaffairsny]

I have a very unconventional and blemished background and I've been told by someone on the adcomm at a top policy school that I have a strong profile and am now collaborating with someone at that school. If I can do that with my background, I believe anyone can do that with any background in any field provided they are committed, smart and motivated. I'm trying to spread that message to applicants who no one else bothers to respond to. Sorry, but I am a public servant and that's what I do.

[NBZ]

Look, no one doubts that it is possible (while harder) for people with unconventional backgrounds to do well in PhD admissions. But you are essentially advising the OP to deliberately become an unconventional applicant, and then try to overcome the odds when trying to get admitted. The OP's stated objective is to get admitted into an Economics PhD program; why exactly would an MPA/MPP program, compared to say an MA in economics, help them in achieving this goal?

 

I have a very unconventional and blemished background and I've been told by someone on the adcomm at a top policy school that I have a strong profile and am now collaborating with someone at that school. If I can do that with my background, I believe anyone can do that with any background in any field provided they are committed, smart and motivated. I'm trying to spread that message to applicants who no one else bothers to respond to. Sorry, but I am a public servant and that's what I do.

 

You may feel it is your mission to inspire applicants from any background in any field to apply for doctoral programs in economics. Unfortunately most people who post questions here are looking for solid empirically-grounded advice.

[publicaffairsny]

I may have read too much into their policy interest, but I thought they said most of their papers were in policy and they wanted to apply to a policy program but didn't feel they could get into a good enough one. I think most international applicants from non-western countries, or top Asian schools, are well served by getting an American degree if they want to get into an American doctoral program. If OP is interested in publishing policy based research, and getting into a top policy program, they can do it by following the path I prescribed.

[NBZ]

Thank you for the advice.

 

My UG was from Bangadesh, and I had applied to 2 canadian schools and 1 dutch, with no success. My grad school is in Hungary, which is also not that popular, but a vast improvement from my UG. I have 3 years of work experience in a swiss development project, and about 6 months as RA. One of the more policy oriented papers will be available online, not a journal but in the EC project site. I hope that will count.

 

I'm interested to do my PhD because I love reading and writing papers. It gives me the most joy. I could do it all the time. My GPA weakness stems from a rough personal time and I am determined to overcome it.

 

Here are my 2 cents:

 

1. At your schools, do you have some idea of where you rank in the class?

2. Do talk to your professors, particularly from your current graduate school, and get their input. Have they sent students to PhD programs in the past? If so, how do you compare to them? Are they likely to write you strong letters of recommendation where they can attest to your academic/research abilities?

3. What kind of coursework have you already done? Most PhD programs are a significant step up from undergrad/MA programs. If you are not doing well in MA courses, it will be that much harder to survive the first year of a PhD program. Do take that into account when deciding what to do.

4. If you are committed to getting a PhD in Economics, then your best bet at this stage will be to get into a good MA program in economics, ace the courses there, and then see where you can go from there. However good MA programs may also be tough to get into given your GPA: again, it might be a good idea to find out where past students from your program have gone.

5. Feel free to browse through this forum, particularly the Past Profiles and Results thread. It will give you an idea of the type of background and preparation applicants to economics PhD programs typically have. Have a look, and then decide for yourself whether you are prepared to undertake the effort and work necessary to make you a competitive applicant.