Jhai

Life's going pretty well here at Georgetown. Midterms start next week (a bit late for us, considering finals are in early/mid December). We have one a week - starting with an open book for Probability & Stats, then Micro, then Macro. Probability and Stats has been really easy for a lot of the students, since most have seen the material before. Those who haven't, however, have been struggling, since we're moving pretty fast. We're using Casella and Berger as our text, which is quite clear. Micro is exactly as I expected it to be: tough, but no surprises in the material. The professor follows Mas-Colell pretty closely, so it's very easy to review the (extensive) material. We're finishing up chaper 5. Note cards, with propositions & proofs written out for quick review, have been my savior here. Macro lectures have been generally great - the professor lectures for 75 minutes without notes, and takes any question with ease. Also throws in little asides about the history of the field which helps in remembering the material. I love the class, but until recently the problem sets were kicking my ***. I think I'm getting a handle on it now, partly because the section of my brain that learned diff eq once upon a time has finally re-engaged. Our text is Barro & Sala-i-Martain's Economic Growth, with reference to Kamien and Schwartz for calculus of variations. Not looking forward to the midterm - I think last year's class scored a median of 20-something out of a hundred..

If you're willing to post the name of your school (and a link to the catalog, perhaps), I'd be willing to look through it and point out the equivalent math classes.

Having just started, I don't have any personal experience regarding grades (other than that our grades on problem sets either don't count or are strictly P/F). However, I have talked to a couple of the second-years at Georgetown. According to them, of the 19 people in the class, 3 or so students wanted to take comps, but were not allowed due to too low grades. At our program you're required to maintain a B+ average. Additionally, there isn't a comp in metrics, but you must get at least a B+ in all metrics courses to continue. So grades are slightly binding here, but not extensively so.

Offer to build it yourself (or get a computer-savvy friend to do so) - it'll only cost a few hundred dollars for a top-of-the-line model. I'd say a computer at home (with an internet connection) is very useful: 1) Reading journal articles online. 2) Communicating with classmates and professors at odd hours. 3) Looking up mathematics for problem sets. 4) Typing up problem sets (not sure if this will required by your professors). 5) Writing code for macro (I know we'll have to do this). A computer at home means that you'll have more flexibility in scheduling your work, and more face-time at home.

Today was the first day of math camp, so I suppose this is appropriate. :) 0) What school are you attending? Georgetown University 1) What fields do you plan to study? I'm about 99% confident I'll study international trade. The other is open - likely contenders are international finance, development, labor, or political economy. 2) How much time do you think you will spend studying each week? I'm thinking around 30-40 hours a week, not counting lecture time. 3) Which class do you think will be the hardest? The easiest? Really, I'm not sure. I've read Varian and some of Mas-Collel, so Micro will hopefully be fine. From all that I've heard, grad Macro is completely different from undergrad Macro, so maybe seeing new material will be tough? First semester in the Econometrics sequence (3 courses total) is Probability & Statistics at Gtown, which I already covered in depth in undergrad. But Econometrics I (in the spring), might be tough. So, I guess I'll see. 4) What do you think will be most different about the PhD program than your undergraduate program? I expect that the level of my classmates' knowledge & motivation will be higher, as will the level of mathematics required. 5) What are you most worried about in beginning the PhD? Well, today eased my worries about being mathematically outclassed by my fellow students. I guess I'm most worried about keeping up with everything, knowledge-wise, to pass comps next summer. Also really want to make a good impression on the professors, since any one of them might eventually be my thesis adviser or recommendation writer.

Next Monday for the Georgetown students as well.

I'm a fan of both the footballs - American & soccer. Growing up in the US, I understand American football better, though. With an Indian husband, I watch an awful lot of cricket too. (Going to see Beckham play DC United in a few weeks - well, hopefully he'll be fit to play. :) )

It could be Merced, I suppose...

Well, first, you should remember that California is a long, big state, so the weather in San Diego isn't the same as the weather in, say, Crescent City. And second, a lot of information about the town of Berkeley, including the weather, can be found here: Berkeley, California - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Finally, yes, you might need a warm scarf during some days in winter in the East Bay. It never snows there, but cold winds and creeping fog from across the bay can get quite chilly. I, too, get cold quite easily, and have often worn a long wool coat + scarf during the winter in California. Last winter there was a bad cold snap in December, for instance (temps in the low 30's F for over a week). Also, there's plenty of snow elsewhere in California (like Lake Tahoe, a very popular skiing area), and you might be making road trips to those areas.

Hmmmm, this isn't really what I would call mathematics proofs - this was standard fare in my Logic course taken through the philosophy department. Anyways, (a) is translated into English as "P or (not P and Q) ". I've forgotten all the names of the different laws, but you can first translate it to "(P or not P) and (P or Q)". The first part doesn't give you any information: for any statement A, "A or not A" must be true. So you can shorten the statement to "P or Q". ("not P implies Q" is also a possible simplification, but isn't quite as short as the first one.) (b) The statement implies that you must always have Q. So, "Q." © "(P if and only if Q) if and only if Q" is the same as "P if and only if (Q if and only if Q)" which is the same as "P if and only if Q". For question 2, your first two translations are fine. However, since the author of the problem set is clearly making a distinction between half and full siblings, for © you're going to have to specify two parents and two children. (d) requires five people - the shared parent of the two kids, and then two other adults - and you need to specify that they are three different adults (need to specify two different adults for part c). I don't have time to do e, but the answer you have listed is not a correct translation. Also, you never actually have to use a biconditional in predicate or sentential logic - it's just a shortcut. Similarly, you never have to use the "all" operator in predicate logic - the "there exists" operator works, but can get messy. Google "sentential logic laws" and "predicate logic laws" to get more help.

If you really want to be assured tenure, get a Ph.D in accounting. The demand for them is huge - even larger than the demand for graduating accounting majors. But, um, most people find accounting even more boring than economics.

GMU would also be a good choice if you're interested in Public or Experimental economics - they're actually pretty decent in those (and other offbeat) areas. Not a lot of funding as I recall. The university isn't actually on the Metro (although there's a convenient, free-for-students bus that goes from the campus to the Metro station), and NoVa is one huge suburb - not exactly city living. Nice area, though, and you can get to DC in about 30 minutes.

If you're non-tenure track, then, basically, you won't ever be coming up for tenure. Most non-TT jobs are temporary from one to three or four years. They often pay less than TT jobs, and there's far less security in the job. They tend to be teaching intensive, and the college is less likely to invest in you as a researcher.

If you want to use the university search service, go to this site: http://och.georgetown.edu/, and click on "guest student login" which is in yellow. It will automatically fill in the login and password for you on the next page, and then you just click the button that says "guest login", and you're taken to the search page. I didn't use the service, but mainly because I completely forgot about it.

Economics, as a field, is almost entirely published in English. If you really want to learn a useful language, learn a programming language for a popular statistical software package, like STATA. If you still want to learn a foreign language, learn one of the countries you plan to study. Since you mention East Europe, bone up on your Russian, and start learning more languages from the Slavic group.

I really think that Riverplace is overpriced. It's a little bit closer than other apartment places - but cutting four minutes out of your walk to the metro isn't worth an extra $100 or so a month (price differential I've seen between comparative apartments close to Rosslyn and Riverplace). YMMV - check it out, and maybe you'll find a deal. One thing to consder when looking at a place on a busline is whether grocery stores, etc are within walking distance. There's always something that sells food close to the metro stations, but once you get further out it gets a little more patchy.

I haven't received anything from Dr. Westbrook.... I agree with butler_blue that it's much easier to get a place if you're in the area already (or can get someone here to do the legwork for you) than if you're searching from far away. The market moves really quickly. I found rent.com (via the Post) and craigslist to be the best sources - eventually found a place through craigslist. One thing to consider in pricing is the differences in taxes and (to some extent) utilities in the different areas. From most people I've talked to, it seems that DC is significantly more expensive in these things (especially to register your car!) than Virginia. Not sure about Maryland. Gas prices in particular are outrageous here, and, of course, they fluctuate quite a bit, so if you can get a building that includes utilities, that could really decrease monthly surprises on your utility bill. If you're shopping site unseen, I'd recommend you focus on Virginia, as anything within half a mile of either the blue or orange line should be perfectly safe, even late at night. If you'd rather live in DC, then you should be very careful in what neighborhoods you consider, unless you can get someone to visit the place and tell you what it's like. Anything on the red line west of Dupont should be fine, as well as the area around Georgetown & GW. Even at relatively nice places like Eastern Market you can get hit-or-miss blocks, and neighborhoods change quickly. I've rode on a few bus lines in Virgina (specifically Metro, DASH, and Fairfax Connector) and found them rather undependable (although with AC!). Actually, both the DASH and Fairfax buses never came, and altho I had better luck with the Metro bus, I hear they can be bad as well. Something to consider if you're looking to live on a bus line rather than the metro. I imagine (hope?) that they're more dependable on the commuter-specific routes, and maybe in the District as well.

Housing update: My husband and I just got a 1-bedroom apartment in Rosslyn for $1200 (including all utilities except electricity). It's a nice place, and only 7 or 8 minutes to the metro station (and about 30 minutes to Georgetown). We move in at the end of the month, and will continue mooching off a friend's apartment until then. :) If anyone wants my impressions of living in this area, feel free to ask here or PM. So far I really like DC, although the weather isn't as nice as back in California. Also, if yyou might need a place to crash for a few days when you get to the area, send me a PM.

The livejournal communities academics_anon and gradstudents sometimes have posts on electronic note taking. Personally, I don't like to use computers for notes for lecture - while I suppose I could type up math notes in LaTeX, I couldn't make graphs easily, or quickly scribble things on the side. If you want to have electronic notes, I suggest scanning them up, or investing in a tablet PC (then use DyKnow or some other notetaking software). For taking notes about books, articles, etc, I'd suggest EndNote - it's more of a bibliography software (which is also quite useful), but it has a section where you can take short notes on the gist of the article, whether it's valuable, problems with methodology, etc.

I used Varian as my first text for an independent study course in Advanced Micro - later in the semester I also looked through MWG. I agree with the other posters that Varian is a good bridge, although too short and descriptive (rather than math-y) for serious graduate work. I like to have it to thumb through while reading MWG, though.

The prereqs for analysis at my undergrad were either discrete or linear algebra - both of which had some proofs in them, and were required for the minor anyways.

Depending on the stipend, it can be paid out throughout the year (12 months) or just during the school year (8 or 9 months). Mine's paid throughout year - just divide the total given by 12 to get the monthly amount. My award came with a letter from the graduate school detailing exactly when it would be paid (last business day of every month), where to pick up the check, etc. Stipends are taxed, but normally nothing is withheld during the year, so you can have a lot to pay in April if you aren't careful (many schools suggest you file taxes quarterly to avoid this outcome). This thread can probably give you more information about taxes: http://www.www.urch.com/forums/phd-economics/64131-how-much-stipends-taxed.html?highlight=taxes

I typically use half.com or amazon used. There are also a few website aggregators around, but I've never used them.

I'm glad I've kept my trusty copy of Stewart from Calculus. I've also kept my linear algebra, differential equations, and real analysis books (sadly, not Rudin, so I might have to get that sometime). I got Varian for free, which is nice... I'm also keeping my intermediate texts for micro & macro, as well as my international text, because I feel they explain the basic concepts clearly (good for review & for TAing). I won't be buying texts for next year until I move, so I don't have to cart the MWG brick across the country.

It's not that they want to require you to do a masters course - it's that they're not willing to accept students with less than 4 years worth of post-secondary courses. I think that's a fair enough requirement. ivar, think about what the admissions committee's goals are: they want to get students that will do well (or at least not flunk) their courses, pass qualifying exams, and then go on to do good research for their thesis. While a Ph.D in the end is about research, you have to pass your classes to get there, so the admissions committee will look for evidence that you can do this. Part of this evidence will be how intelligent you come across as - GRE, grades in difficult courses, and recommendations. Another part of the evidence will be how hard-working you come across, since intelligent people who slack won't be passing comps (most of the time, anyways). That would probably be evaluated using your grades and recommendations. I mean, isn't it fairly obvious that the best way to evaluate how well you'll do in the coursework is to look at your prior performance in coursework? That being said, the most recent evidence is the most pertinent - so if you messed up in undergrad, then did very well in a master's, the master's will likely have more weight.