tutonic

There aren't many candidates from European programmes here. On top of speaking to your letter writers, you can also check with your programme admin on where past graduates from your MSc ended up at (if the info isn't readily available). Alternatively, you can browse through the past Profiles & Results page to see where others have gone on to in the past.

You'll be hard pressed to get good letters from the faculty there for PhD applications.

The best people that can answer that are your letter writers. Alternatively, you can visit the Old Profiles & Results stickied post to get a sense of where people with a similar profile got into in the past.

Given that you are Spanish, is there any reason why you're not applying to Barcelona GSE or CEMFI? Those are one of the top programmes for students looking to continue on to a PhD since they offer PhD-level coursework. There are quite a number of schools that have mid-Jan deadlines for PhD applications, so you should check those out, if you wish to apply to some programmes this cycle.

Given the shift to the new forum system, the old links are dead. Here are the updated links for the past couple years of Profiles and Results: Profiles and Results 2021 Profiles and Results 2020 Profiles and Results 2019 Profiles and Results 2018 Profiles and Results 2017 Profiles and Results 2016 Profiles and Results 2015 Profiles and Results 2014 If you want to go further back, you can just search for "Profiles and Results XXXX" in this forum and it should pop up.

You should provide this list to your letter writers and get their opinion on it. Check out old Profiles & Results Threads from past years to see how others performed in the past. There are a couple students from the past 5 years that came from a comparable school, if I'm not mistaken. These are the 2 most recent ones (2020 and 2021). The stickied thread for Old Profiles & Results have dead links given the forum switched platforms a couple months ago. I'll update that thread some time in the coming few days, but you can just search for "Profiles & Results" in the PhD Econ sub-forum.

1) Your CV should only be 1-2 pages max. I included my degrees (+GPAs), research experience, TA experience and awards/honors/scholarships (since those aren't immediately obvious from the transcripts). 2) The SoP is there for you to provide pertinent information that isn't cannot be obtained from your transcripts. So use this opportunity to talk about your research experience. The consensus is split on tailoring the SoP for different schools, but the way I did it a couple years back was simply have one paragraph at the end that is tailored to different schools (to show that I have read up on the faculty and the fields the school is traditionally strong in). 3) I didn't submit any Personal Statement, if I recall correctly. For those that explicitly require you to submit one, they usually have some guidance on what should be included. The general idea is that SoP/PS don't really make or break your application. Your prose (how you write) is arguably more important than the actual content (what you write), since that's also one opportunity for them to assess your ability to communicate well.

The Quant section is the only important one. A 162 on Verbal is also quite high in and of itself. Just report the latest one.

Coming from an undergrad in hard sciences will definitely help signal some degree of mathematical competence. That being said, the lack of real analysis is a bit problematic since PhD coursework is very different from what one encounters as an undergrad or even in most masters programmes. Communicate with your letter writers about the list of schools you intend to apply, and get their opinion on which schools to omit and what other schools you should add to the list. That'll give you a sense of how strong of a letter you can expect from them, as well as a first check of how competitive your profile is, relative to others in the past. Do note that this is mostly relevant if said faculty member regularly writes letters for people applying to grad school (so they have a large and credible information set to draw upon when making such a comparison). Strong letters speak to your ability to do research, and very rarely about your academic abilities (since that can be inferred from your transcripts).

If you are applying to PhD programmes in the US, the USNEWS Ranking might be more informative than the QS one, since that is the ranking that we typically refer to.

Departments receive hundreds of applications each cycle. They don't have the time to review all of them. If the GRE is required by a school, your application package will be marked incomplete until it arrives. Incomplete applications won't be reviewed by the committee. You are right that the GRE is not a rigorous test, but it seems a bit problematic if you've retaken it thrice and still can't cross the 90th percentile. If the department screens out scores below the 90th percentile, then there's a nonzero chance that yours might get tossed.

Given that you have very little math, it would be wise to temper your expectations of how you will perform in a rigorous masters programme. Graduate economics is very different from what you learn during your undergrad. The first year coursework is more applied math than economics - in my opinion -, which is why there's an emphasis on mathematical preparation. If you are adequately prepared, you can spend your time trying to understand the economics/intuition of what you're taught in class, instead of having to divide your time between that and trying to also comprehend the mathematical arguments.

The lack of math classes will definitely hurt you, if you are applying to rigorous masters programmes. Your GRE is slightly under the threshold. I think 166 or 167 Q is the 90th percentile when I took it 3 years ago. The pass/fail won't hurt you as badly as your B- since the former happened during covid. If it's for a masters application, I think a strong letter from your employer would be better than a lukewarm one from faculty since it's only a masters programme. You should also consider PSE's MAPE (M1) as well as BGSE and Bocconi's masters programmes if your eventual goal is a PhD in Economics. The PSE option is a two year programme that also has a research component (which would be beneficial for you).

Echoing what startz said, a course in mathematical statistics will make taking the metrics class a lot less painful. Without it, unless you are really solid in linear algebra and matrix notation, you'll suffer quite a bit.

You say that you are applying to a couple top 20 and a few top 100 US programmes, as well as Oxbridge? Why is there such a huge range of schools that you're applying to? If you really want to get into Oxbridge, get into their MSc/MRes programme and then achieve a Distinction (70% or higher) overall, to get into the PhD programme. That's the easiest way to get into the PhD programme. Note that the programme, itself, is going to be quite tough since you're essentially required to get a Distinction (i.e. all As) in the first year PhD classes. The UK schools don't curve grades as aggressively as they do in the US, so getting a 70% or higher is already quite a feat. Plus, virtually everyone in the masters programme at Oxbridge are there to try to get into the PhD programme, so the competition will be quite intense. Also, after a quick look at the JHU page you linked, it seems that you can only take 2 electives, so I have no idea how you are going to fit in 4 classes (Micro I&II, Macro I&II) as electives since those are all full 3/4 credit classes. If they are listed as half-credit classes, then they clearly won't be sufficiently rigorous to pass off as a graduate class. It would be additionally informative if you can list your profile thus far using the standard template. If you already have good grades, you're almost always better off doing a pre-doc as opposed to a masters, especially given that your undergrad is from Cambridge.