kazooie

Congratulations to everyone accepted at Stanford!! I'm a current first year there, and I'm happy to answer any questions to the best of my ability that people might have about the program. I would ask that you please PM me any questions that you have rather than post in this thread to keep things here on track. Congrats again, and best of luck to everyone in the rest of the admissions cycle!

The most recent paper that I am aware of that examines this is the following Athey et al. one: http://pricetheory.uchicago.edu/levitt/Papers/graduate%20schol.pdf Table 3 shows a significant correlation between performance in first year micro and macro and job placements. Note that the coefficients are negative because they are regressing on placement ranks where a value of 1 is the best. So they do in fact find a relationship suggesting that those who do best in the first year courses also do best in placement outcomes. Now of course there are issues with this regression, notably that this is not an experimental design. I would also be interested in seeing and update with the data for the past decade, where it seems to me at least that applied microeconomics---which is least related to the first year core---has become a larger share of placements. But signs point to performance in the first year core matter on average for placement, if not directly then at the very least proxying for important unobserved characteristics.

I think it's pretty clear that PhD metrics will be more applicable to being an RA in applied micro. A good foundation in probability and statistical inference is really useful in understanding how to implement the right tool for a given application. Beyond having a good foundation, there are several methods themselves that might be used in your work, which would be useful to go over if you have not yet seen them (e.g., bootstrapping, delta method, maximum likelihood). However, whether you should take PhD Metrics or Micro next has an additional concern. Micro is a much better grade to have on your application. So if you're going to be a junior next year, I would recommend taking micro to have the full sequence of grades on your transcript for your application (as opposed to only being able to send the first semester's results were you to take it senior year). If you're going to be a sophomore, I would recommend taking metrics, as it will likely be a smoother transition to the workload in a PhD course.

PROFILE: Type of Undergrad: Top 25 USNWR research university; Mathematics and Economics Undergrad GPA: 3.95 Type of Grad: N/A Grad GPA: N/A GRE: 165V; 170Q; 5.5W Math Courses (undergrad): Calc IV (A); Intro to Proofs (A+); Differential Equations (A); Probability and Statistics (A); Linear Algebra (A-); Real Analysis (A); Numerical Analysis I/II (A/A-); Computational Linear Algebra (A); Mathematical Finance (A); Partial Differential Equations (A) Econ Courses (undergrad): Introductory Micro/Macro (A/A); Intermediate Micro/Macro (B/A+); Advanced Micro (A); Econometrics I/II (A+/A+); Financial Economics (A+); Innovation (A+) Econ Courses (grad): Micro Theory II (A); Econometrics I (A, at top 5 during RA) Other Courses: A handful of computer science courses including object-oriented programming; algorithms; and machine learning/data mining. Letters of Recommendation: 1) an economics professor from undergrad who taught me in a couple of theory-oriented courses, I went to their office hours frequently to discuss research but did not RA for them; 2) a supervisor from my summer policy research internship, has a PhD in economics and still publishes in economics journals; and 3) my supervisor from my current RA job at a top 5. Research Experience: A summer at a policy institute working for a couple of economics PhDs; and at the time of application 1.5 years of RA-ing full time at a top 5 after undergrad. Teaching Experience: TA for 3 semesters in non-economics courses. Research Interests: Applied work in innovation, will need to winnow down soon :) SOP: I spent a long time researching faculty to write a unique paragraph for each school in my SOPs, part of which included listing several faculty whose work I admire and at this point would be interested in having as my advisor(s). I'm not sure how valuable it was for getting into places, but it was extremely helpful in deciding my list of schools. Knowing every researcher in my interests' work back to front was also helpful during fly-outs and my final decision. Other: Audited some field courses while RA-ing. RESULTS: Acceptances: Columbia (33K); Cornell (32K); Princeton (38K); Stanford (41K); UC Berkeley (effectively 0 first year, 21K afterwards); UC San Diego (20K) Wait lists: Brown; Northwestern; Yale (would have been 39K) Rejections: Harvard Business Economics; Harvard Economics; Michigan; MIT Attending: Stanford! Comments: I am extremely happy with my results. They are more than I could have hoped for. What would you have done differently? I would have applied to 2-3 more schools, probably including Wharton Applied Econ and NYU Stern Econ. In general I think 15 is a good target to aim for (I did 13), and looking back my distribution was missing some weight towards the lower part of the top 10. I don't think I made any real mistakes once I figured out that I wanted to do a PhD in economics during my second semester junior year of undergrad, after thinking I was going to do comp sci or quant finance before then. My `B' in intermediate micro came early in undergrad while I was still exploring options. I took and worked hard in advanced micro and one course of the graduate micro sequence to compensate for that, and it appears to have been enough. In general, if you don't perform as well as you would have liked in a course it's definitely good practice to take and excel in the more advanced version(s) if at all possible. Taking a full time RA job after undergrad is absolutely what got me where I am now with my results, and I am so grateful to my PI for all of the help and guidance that they have given me over this process. Most importantly I developed a deep understanding of what it takes to be a successful researcher in applied microeconomics, and I feel ready to pose and answer my own research questions going into graduate school. Also, I'm not sure how valuable my handful of computer science courses were directly for getting into graduate school, but they definitely helped me get my current job. From an application perspective I got a really strong letter of recommendation and had the ability to take a graduate econometrics course to act as a further signal to admissions committees. It might not make sense for everyone, but I can't recommend RA-ing full time enough if you are interested in applied topics like I am. You get some time to figure out whether research in economics is right for you, all the while getting paid!

Hey, I take offense to that :) I'm not in a program yet and I have recommended taking it easy!

To be blunt, it's going to be really hard for you to get to the point where you are going to be competitive for economics PhD programs. Could you expand a little bit more on why you think economics is right for you? From your profile it looks like you do not have a lot of exposure to the sort of work that is done at the graduate level, either through coursework or research. Maybe spend some time going to seminars at your school and honestly ask yourself if that is what you could see yourself doing -- both on the presenting and attending sides -- for a career. At the expense of detouring a little from the OP's questions, I wanted to address this for anyone who might be reading. I agree with the advice that spending time outside of academic economics does not help with admissions to PhD programs, but I disagree with the sentiment about it being unjustifiable on the part of the admissions committees. Admissions committees have two primary missions as far as I see it: 1) ensure that any admitted student has the ability to survive the coursework stage of a PhD; and 2) identify the potential of the candidate to advance our knowledge of economics through academic research. It's not clear to me that spending time in industry, even if it is economics related as you say, signals positively towards either 1) or 2) on its own. That said, I know of many people who spent time in industry -- generally economic consulting, management consulting, or quantitative finance -- who had success in their graduate applications with to top 10-20 programs. These people had very strong coursework and research credentials from undergrad, though. Even if time in industry contributes to 1) or 2), I think the more relevant consideration when considering a position in industry before a PhD is the opportunity cost of doing so. Slots for PhDs are extremely competitive, as I am sure anyone on here for even a short time is aware. When comparing the experience of someone who spent time in industry versus that of a candidate who either complete a master's -- speaking definitely to 1) above and maybe also 2) -- or worked as an RA -- which speaks directly to 2) above -- it's not surprising that an admissions committee would generally prefer the latter two to the industry candidate. Any perceived lack of weight admissions committees put on industry options prior to a PhD has to be put in context with the competition from other applicants.

Having gone through the process of being an RA at a reputable institution, hopefully I can help with the decision process on selecting. All of those positions you mention have the potential to set you up very well for graduate school. I would also consider positions with some of the more high-profile federal reserve banks (notably New York and D.C.) despite those not necessarily being directly related to microeconomics as they are known to place well into top graduate programs (more on that later). With the above options you are really getting into the territory of epsilon differences. Given that, your primary concern in my opinion should be selecting the RA-ship in which you will be most happy. Being content in your job will encourage better work, which will do a host of things. Better work leads to more and better responsibilities; it leads to a deeper understanding of what it takes to publish in economics; and it leads to a stronger letter of recommendation. There are a bunch of factors that lead to being happy in your position that you should consider. On the position’s sponsor: do your best to make sure that the sponsor (or sponsors) of the program is (or are) good to work with. They do not need to be the nicest people on earth, but ascertaining whether they respect their RAs’ time will be important in maintaining a healthy work/life balance. Some professors/labs have reputations as sweatshops for RAs (that said, those positions still place very well into PhD programs). I would not refrain from applying based on reputation, though. I think that mathenomics’ suggestion of applying to all of the positions on the NBER website is a good start. If you are particularly interested, you can also look at the internal job listings for top universities like MIT, Harvard, Chicago, etc. for RA positions with economists. The marginal application is pretty low-cost, so it’s good to cast a wide net. This also relates to underg2121’s question on GPA: let them decide for you whether or not you are a strong candidate. Make the decision on whether or not to take the offer only after you have been offered it and have the best chance to learn about the role. Yes, while a weaker GPA will not help you, the application process is remarkably holistic in my experience. You need to compensate for weaknesses with strengths elsewhere, but people getting great RA jobs are not literally perfect on paper all the time. Back to talking about the sponsor, outside of rumors it is tough to get an idea about the sponsor’s placement record and work style without speaking directly to past RAs. If you are offered a position you should definitely request to be put in contact with at least current RAs, and preferably past RAs. Even the fact that a couple of previous RAs from my current position were enthusiastic about speaking with me about my current role was a great signal, for example. Current and former RAs can have a lot of insight about the role and what you can get out of it. If you have the opportunity be sure to ask specific questions and then make the judgments yourself, rather than asking subjective, feel-based questions. For example, asking how many hours a week they work versus "do you feel like you work a reasonable amount of hours". Related to the above, try to get an idea of how often and for how long you will be meeting with the professor(s). A weekly call? Meetings on demand? Only through email? Direct contact with the person(s) for whom you will work is the avenue through which you will both learn the most and develop the best relationship(s). On research interests: it depends completely on you as to whether or not it will matter to have your interests align with the professor(s) for whom you work. I placed great weight on that as I have been interested in the broad field in which I am working for a long time. My NSF proposal and other research ideas/interests have come about in large part due to my exposure to the field in my RA position. Still, other RAs who I know (past and present) are not working in their area of interest and have enjoyed their time as RAs -- even so far as some being interested in macroeconomics working in education/health. They appreciated the different slant on empirics that applied microeconomics gave, while knowing that they were not going to follow that thread in graduate school. On taking classes: as jjrouseau and mathenomics mentioned the ability to take classes can be really important. In addition to allowing you to fill gaps in your profile through taking missing math or economics classes, you can also audit field courses to get a better feel about what frontier research is like in economics. To be honest, it also just breaks up the day and makes it easier for me to be productive. When I was deciding between opportunities one professor would not allow me to take courses, and that was a non-trivial factor in selecting a different position. On the tenured vs. untenured dimension: I do not think that this is as important as some people might make it out to be. The sort of people who have enough grant money to hire pre-doctoral RA’s are the people who are expected to make big contributions to the field, and who are widely respected by their peers. Undoubtedly a larger share of the "best" positions are sponsored by tenured faculty, but I definitely know of cases where junior faculty place (or placed in the case of my professor when they were junior) their RAs into graduate school consistently well. All else equal take the position with senior faculty, but the margin is likely small. On miscellaneous things: striving for diversity in the job could be important, as I learned during the job. This can come from many different sources, from working on a variety of the professor’s projects; from working on all stages of one project; from working with other RAs; or from working with multiple professors and/or co-authors. It’s just more fun to work with many people on different projects. To sum up everything, I think the best outlook that one can possibly take on being an RA before graduate school is to view the time as contributing to their development as an economist rather than just a way to get a better letter. If you are learning and enjoying your work a good letter of recommendation will surely follow. Even a year of your life is a non-trivial amount to devote to something, so try and get the most out of it! If anyone has more specific questions I’m also happy to talk via private message.

Again, not a current graduate student or faculty, but it seems like the advice for the usual candidate is to do things that will be complementary but not explicitly taught in the first year of classes/math camp with any free time that you have. Like has been mentioned in this thread, that could be reading papers that you find interesting or the Angrist/Pischke textbooks. At visit days and at the institution I am currently working graduate students have told me to spend some time learning the statistical software that is used in the first year econometrics course, as well as get really good with LaTeX or some other typesetting software for writing up problem sets. Keeping with the complementary theme but outside of coursework, a common piece of advice has been to develop healthy eating and exercise habits before classes start.

I honestly believe that you should just read some research that you find interesting. If your interests are in theory and that entails learning some more advanced mathematics then maybe that involves "teching up" a bit. But if your goal is to prepare yourself for the first year course sequences, then I'm skeptical of the amount of value you'll get from your plan. You'll be slogging through material without any sort of support system in terms of peers and teachers to help you through any problems. That might work for some, but I doubt it works for most. I'm also going to be starting next year so this opinion does not come fro my own experiences, but rather through asking current graduate students for their views on what to do over the summer, as well as listening to the general sentiment of senior members of this forum. You're going to graduate school to hopefully produce good research, not just excel in coursework. Use your precious pre-PhD time to prepare for the former, not the latter :)

Same, and I declined the wait list spot as well. Good luck to those on the wait list!

It's only one data point, but the DGS at Yale told me that they accept off the wait list on a "probability of accepting" basis. This makes sense considering almost all wait list offers are made starting a couple of days before the April 15th deadline, and the department doesn't want to have a smaller class size than their target. Keep in touch with the programs where you are wait listed, and definitely tell them if you would immediately accept an offer were one to be made.

In my opinion you have a sufficient enough math background to do the thesis especially given that you say you have no research experience.

They did not send me anything with more details, but: 1) Information about a travel reimbursement was in my funding letter attached to the initial notification. 2) When you RSVP you can ask to be put up with a graduate student the 10th and/or the 11th.

Looking up the last ten years suggests late March/early April. But maybe last year is the start of a new trend . . . 2017: March 17th 2016: March 29th 2015: March 31st 2014: April 1st 2013: April 5th 2012: April 10th 2011: April 5th 2010: April 9th 2009: April 10th 2008: April 15th

I also have not heard from Northwestern. I checked the portal and something new appeared: Please click the 'View Checklist' button below to review next steps. Nothing about deferring enrollment or anything like that in the message, and when I click the checklist nothing about next steps shows up.

To expand on this, when talking with the professor for whom I currently work they said that my reference from my summer internship was really good, and I inferred from that my summer experience was crucial in ultimately getting offered the RA position. I've helped with screening candidates for the next crop of RAs in my position, and a necessary condition to getting the job is demonstrated research experience. A summer position with well-known academic economists more than fulfills that criterion. If you are aiming for an NBER/SIEPR/etc RA job after graduation, then developing a good relationship this summer with some economists would be really helpful in achieving that.

Still no news on Northwestern for me. No news on Brown and Michigan as well.

Yep, the same for me (literally point for point). Oh well, not sure at this point whether it's worth going for the fly out.

Thank you for updating. I responded but have not heard back yet. If you don't mind answering, what was your bargaining position? Did you inform them of any other offers?

Send an email asking for their placement record. That's not unusual, and I would be skeptical of any program that would not give you that information.

I'm very disappointed things did not work out for you on your applications, but best of luck in industry!

Yeah, I'm going to contact the graduate secretary to get the full details next week. Whether it's subject to change before April 15th, whether it can be bumped to full starting the second year, and so on. In all likelihood I will decline given I was fortunate with other great options, and hopefully the funding they set aside for me will go to another partially funded student :) Probably not how it works but hopefully. . .

Yeah same for me, 8k first year so I will not accept if that does not change.

Just got into Berkeley!!! Good luck to everyone!

Congratulations!!!