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degree of importance among admission criteria


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Ok, I am not talking about those guys around at Ivy schools with 4.0 GPA in Math and Econ double major + a couple of peer reviewed journals...

 

I am talking about those ambitious undergrads at a mediocre state university struggling to get through next year's admissions into Econ PhD.

 

We got a lot of things to do but it sometimes us true that doing everything is not realistic. So I am asking you guys what is more important and what is less...

 

I believe that the major criteria are;

 

1) Differential Equations

2) Real Analysis

3) Econometrics

4) Probability Theory

5) Grad-level Microeconomics

6) Grad-level Macroeconomics

7) Grad-level Econometrics

8) Well-written SOP

9) Recommendation Letters from well-known professors

10) Good GRE Verbal (75 percentile +)

11) Good GRE Quantitative (780 +)

12) Research Experience

13) Teaching Experience

14) Undergrad Econ Field classes

15) Math GPA 3.9+

16) Math GPA 3.7+

17) Econ GPA 3.9+

18) Econ GPA 3.7+

19) Undergrad Institution's Ranking on Econphd.net

20) Anything else (please add if you come up with any)

 

I assume all serious people have good grades on Calc, Intermediate Micro and Macro.

 

Ok, does anyone please order them from the most important to the least important?

 

--- Those in the U.S., have a fun tomorrow!

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It's just my belief, but i'd say...

 

The following criteria are now the MUST not to go into the auto reject pile in top 20.

Good GRE Quantitative

Math GPA 3.7+

Econ GPA 3.7+

Real Analysis

 

The magic which puts you on "Admit" with sufficient grades and math background.

Recommendation Letters from well-known professors

 

The next importance comes here:

Undergrad Institution's Ranking on Econphd.net

 

Adcom wants to see those classes too!

Differential Equations

Econometrics

Probability Theory

 

Helps somehow if you have...

Math GPA 3.9+

Econ GPA 3.9+

 

Grad level courses show if you could be successful in quals/prelims

Grad-level Microeconomics

Grad-level Macroeconomics

Grad-level Econometrics

 

Always good to have some

Research Experience

 

Adcoms probably don't care too much...

Well-written SOP

Teaching Experience

Good GRE Verbal (75 percentile +)

 

 

Ok... do you guys have any opinion??

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I just don't think you can evaluate which criteria is more important than the other. Basically, the adcoms will looks at your whole profile, and try to judge whether you will be successful in graduate school. Some may believe that some grad courses may show that ability, some other Profs might think it is the prior research done ... while some others might just base it on the LORs... We do not know and we cannot really tell. Main thing is, try to do best in every part of your academics... and just remember while applying that the adcoms will look at all the good and bad parts in your academic life. No point trying to think how they will try and judge us... personally, I think, the process varies quite a bit, so we may not reach a conclusion any way.
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Adcoms probably don't care too much...

Well-written SOP

Teaching Experience

 

 

I think the Cornell website says specifically about teaching experience. So some schools may count on teaching experience quite a bit more than we would expect normally.

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I think the Cornell website says specifically about teaching experience. So some schools may count on teaching experience quite a bit more than we would expect normally.

 

Of course, there are some one-offs that might not follow averageaverage's post, but I do think his assessment is close to reality. I think teaching experience might be helpful when applying to departments that need lots and lots of teaching assistants (and Cornell is probably one of them). I would be surprised though if teaching experience is given more weight or consideration than the academic credentials even at Cornell.

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Not having real analysis won't put you on the 'auto reject' pile at many top-20 schools if the rest of your profile is strong. There are several of us in my class at Wisconsin (myself included) who did not have real analysis as an undergraduate, although doing well in the class sure sends a strong signal.

 

I really don't think that differential equations is that helpful for the admission process or the first year.

 

Additionally, the reputation of an undergraduate econ program may be useful for students from PhD-granting institutions, but it means nothing for the students who come from smaller schools or LACs. (And there are quite a few of us; in that case, adcoms consider the school's overall reputation or the record of past PhD students.

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Not having real analysis won't put you on the 'auto reject' pile at many top-20 schools if the rest of your profile is strong. There are several of us in my class at Wisconsin (myself included) who did not have real analysis as an undergraduate, although doing well in the class sure sends a strong signal.

 

Agreed! Moreover, having less than a 3.7 in econ or math classes does not lead to an auto-reject either. Consider me an existence proof...

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A few counter-examples to add to the wisdom of many before me:

 

The following criteria are now the MUST not to go into the auto reject pile in top 20.

Good GRE Quantitative (Can't think of anything against this.)

Math GPA 3.7+ (Not true. and if it was, I'd be pretty screwed. Courses like Mathecon, or other strong things can circumvent this. James MacKinnon told me that while it may be a slightly stricter requirement for top 5s, he expects most students, atleast from places with tough math programs, to be B/B+ math students and so won't hold that against them if they show strength in micro/metrics at the MA level.)

Econ GPA 3.7+ (Probably. Unless circumvented by other things)

Real Analysis (Definitely not. Princeton admit, Full-funding, from queen's MA on nothing more than Calc I & II)

 

The magic which puts you on "Admit" with sufficient grades and math background.

Recommendation Letters from well-known professors (Not always. A published paper in a sweet journal might be a magic key, but there is little data for that. Strong LORs I think would go in the above category as necessary, but not sufficient.)

 

The next importance comes here:

Undergrad Institution's Ranking on Econphd.net (no comments here.)

 

Adcom wants to see those classes too!

Differential Equations (Maybe? perhaps only on the "more math is better" side)

Econometrics (This goes in the necessary pile. you NEED metrics)

Probability Theory (This is nice for many things.)

 

Helps somehow if you have...

Math GPA 3.9+ (Somehow? I think it's obvious that this would help)

Econ GPA 3.9+ (ditto. unless all you took were second year field electives)

 

Grad level courses show if you could be successful in quals/prelims

(Indeed they do.)

Grad-level Microeconomics

Grad-level Macroeconomics

Grad-level Econometrics

 

Always good to have some

Research Experience (indeed.)

 

Adcoms probably don't care too much...

Well-written SOP (Can win some coin flips at the end when they have 100 perfect people for 45 admission offers)

Teaching Experience (Cornell explicitly asks reference letter writers to speak about this.)

Good GRE Verbal (75 percentile +)

 

Cheers,

 

Canuck

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I assume all serious people have good grades on Calc, Intermediate Micro and Macro.

 

I'm not 100% convinced of this for one reason: Most students take Calc I-III, intermediate macro and intermediate micro in the first 4, sometimes even 3 semesters of college, which leaves a few semesters to do better and play the whole improvement card. For example, several successful applicants got B's in calculus I and II and got into top programs, normally because they made up for it by doing well in real analysis and other advanced math classes. Likewise for economics, if you got a B in intermediate macro, I think you could easily recover from it by taking advanced macro and doing well.

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Hi! Will your overall GPA matter, particularly if you intend to apply to MA programs first? I have a middling GPA, compared to most TM forum members due to some business subjects. The odd thing is, though, my Math and Econ GPA are (relatively) higher than the overall GPA. How can I compensate for this defect?
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As has been said many times before, ultimately what ad coms. are looking for is evidence that you can (1) pass the first year (2) be a successful researcher. Generally grades and course difficulty are most important for (1) and what's said in LORs is most important for (2). Yes, you can make up for weaknesses in some areas by strengths in other areas. This is not an exact science, and yes, some schools will put you in the auto-reject pile based on certain grades or test scores, but there are no universal rules by which ad coms weight various factors. To some degree, you have flexibility in how you demonstrate (1) and (2), and one would hope that the schools that like how you chose to demonstrate (1) and (2) will be a better fit for you than the ones who do not anyway.

 

Again, I strongly disagree who thinks "school ranking on EconPhD" is a direct admissions criteria. People are confusing correlation and causation. Now fact is, people at higher ranked grad programs will generally have easier access to resources (grad courses, faculty known to other ad coms) that willl help them in the admissions process, but they need to take advantage of those resources!! Now I think general strength of the undergrad institution matters to some degree, but again, you can still control the workload difficulty within your own school, for instance, going to a state school and not taking an honors-type classes that might exist would be a wasted opportunity.

 

As for what to do if you can't do everything, I'd say do whatever feels like it's the best for your long-run professional development and curiousity. Generally I feel people on this board place too much emphasis on surviving the first year and convincing admissions committee's they can survive the first year, and not enough on engaging in practices that will enable them to ultimately become successful researchers. I'm not suggesting that first year success is irrelevant to being a successful researcher, but I am saying that making choices solely along the dimension of admissions outcomes and first year benefits might be suboptimal behavior. There's generally little be gained about trying to discern the nuances of how schools make their decisions.

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As for what to do if you can't do everything, I'd say do whatever feels like it's the best for your long-run professional development and curiousity. Generally I feel people on this board place too much emphasis on surviving the first year and convincing admissions committee's they can survive the first year, and not enough on engaging in practices that will enable them to ultimately become successful researchers. I'm not suggesting that first year success is irrelevant to being a successful researcher, but I am saying that making choices solely along the dimension of admissions outcomes and first year benefits might be suboptimal behavior. There's generally little be gained about trying to discern the nuances of how schools make their decisions.

 

 

You are my hero. I know it's been said before, but you put it so nicely. And you used the word suboptimal. Makes me melt a little.

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Thanks! I guess I was just overanalyzing things. The profiles of most applicants were so picture-perfect that when I compared theirs to mine, I felt that I wouldn't have a snowball's chance of getting admitted to even Georgetown. I guess I'll just work hard on my junior year.
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  • 3 years later...

I agree with everything Canuck said, with one exception.

 

Econometrics (This goes in the necessary pile. you NEED metrics)

 

I know many (myself included) who got into good schools without a single econometrics course. That said, every such person I know was a non-econ (math, engineering, physics, ...) major.

Edited by Zeno
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Well, now that it's brought up again, I'll have a go at it since it will be interesting to see what people think. I'd say this would be my weights distribution with the assumption GRE Quant score is 800 or 170 (because that seems to be a binary outcome value, you either have it and pass auto rejection, or don't and get your app thrown out.) and potential applicant is aiming for top 30 schools.

 

1. LOR (I think we can all agree)

2. Real Analysis (I think most of us can agree)

3. Econometrics (Yes, very important, huge red flag without it...or having anything below an A- on it for the matter.)

4. Research Experience (in various forms)

5 - 8. Econ/Math GPA

9. Cumulative GPA (Above 3.6 should get you looked at, above 3.7 even better.)

10. Undergrad Ranking (not ranking per se, but because it correlates with 1)

11. Probability Theory (I've seen one or two people get into good schools without these, but it also seems to be very common in top school admits and besides, it's more math. Can't go wrong with that.)

12 - 14. Grad classes

15. LOR writers (not to be confused with the actual LOR, but not having famous professors or only assistant/associate professors write your letters can be problematic at the top 30. Of course, quality of LOR > fame/rank of LOR writer any day.)

16. Class Rank (would have put this in the top 5, but some schools don't seem to have a ranking system so I don't think logically this could be too crucial, but still a factor)

17. Undergrad field classes (if physics or engineering majors can get in, it's pretty much safe to assume math > econ)

18. SOP (With the assumption you write a standard SOP and not something overtly ridiculous and stupid)

19. Teaching experience (unless if you want to get a teacher's assistant job, but that's after admission)

20. Research Interests (schools will probably reject on grounds for not matching their professors' fields, but I think upwards 80% of people will change their interests at least somewhat over the course of the Ph.D.)

 

Edits

ODE - Put somewhere above 19 and below 12. Usefulness moot if assuming 2 is fulfilled.

 

Thesis - There actually doesn't seem to be too big of a correlation between thesis or no thesis

 

Research Experience - Bad publication

back to haunt you.

 

cGPA - The higher the better, but 3.8 is a bit extreme in top 30. Maybe top 10, but even so, it seems to depend on a whole lot of other factors and cGPA is one of the last things to worry about as long as it is over the "Auto reject" cutoff, which is probably not anything greater than 3.5 judging by past TM admits / wait-lists.

 

Grad Classes - Somewhat useful signal (assuming you get a good LOR from it, otherwise not quite as much) but make sure you do well or else this will work against you.

 

Econ/Math GPA: 3.7, definitely. 3.9, see comment on cGPA for general idea.

 

 

Finally: LETTERS OF RECOMMENDATION. Treat these like holy scripture.

Edited by kbai
Ok, just a few changes after some more lurking around/research.
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A few of my professors said that more-and-more grad programs in econ are looking for people with good computer skills. (Specifically programming.) These were younger professors as well. I'm sure it wouldn't make up for any deficiencies, but they said it helps a lot on the margin. Thought I'd share and see what people thought. (One professor even told me to take C programming over topology.)
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Guest 8675309

My list is like this

1. GRE (If you don't get the cut off you don't get looked at period so your chance of admission goes to 0. Once the cut off is met it doesn't really matter)

2. Good Letters from connected people (does not have to be famous, but should be people who are in the profession publishing in relevant journals. Sure a famous person saying this kid is a genius will count positively every well. But you'd be surprised the number of letters sent by Nobel prize winners that are only paragraph that doesn't really say anything that will count.

3. GPA (conditioned on rigor of program) in economics courses (Intermediate Micro and Macro, Econometrics, this is looked heavily outside the top 50 and masters programs)

4. GPA (conditioned on rigor of program) in math courses.

5. Calculus III and Linear Algebra (very few grad programs will even consider you if they don't think you've had these courses in some for another. It doesn't have to be in explicit courses)

6. Graduate courses.

 

 

7. Real Analysis/Advanced Calcululs/ Intro to Analysis. Its important, but there are every year a few students at top 5 that don't have these courses.

 

8. Probality/Math Stats/ More statistics

9. Other math that can be seen as good prep (Measure theory, Probability using measure theory, Stochastic Processes, Stochastic Calculus, The calculus of variations/non-linear programming)

10. Having done a thesis/research associate. (More a signal of genuinely understanding hwat research is, not used for research ability)

 

 

My opinions are a little bit different, since I go from approach of whats important at all schools. I think the higher up you go in terms of rank more that all of these things are VERY important, In lower ranked schools there is easier to see ordinal differences.

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