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So I was admitted to both of these programs. I like both because, coming from an International Affairs background, they both seem pretty good for making the switch to econ. The SAIS program is entirely a professional program, while the IHEID program is a lot more academic in nature. The IHEID program also seems better (it's two years long yet cheaper than the one year MIEF, the cohorts are significantly smaller, both professional and academic placements are really good). My one concern is that nobody in my small Central American country knows what IHEID is, while a lot of people know Johns Hopkins. If I were to stay in Europe that wouldn't be an issue as IHEID is well known over there, but if I fail to do that I don't think my degree would help me too much back home. I think I'd like to do a PhD but at this point I'm not familiar enough with economics as a field to be certain about that (and also my 3.55 undergrad GPA might hold me back even though my GRE scores are pretty great). What do you think? Any help is appreciated!

Hello, My name is Sanjay and I am considering to join a Phd program in Marketing offered by reputed schools in USA. Below is a brief of my profile: Undergrad- Mechanical Engineering (GPA- 7.4/10) (National Institute of Technology, Calicut (India) Post Grad- MBA (Marketing and Strategy- 5.5/10) (Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow(India) How significant are the past academic records in the final selection? I am a little concerned about my past academic performance as my grades and rank don't fall in the range of top 1-2% of the class. Which colleges should i target to maximize the chances of conversion?

Hi All, Bit of a long post thanks to anyone who reads. I am seeking advice on how to spend a year between my MBA program and grad school. Before I begin here's where I am at: Undergrad school: McDaniel College (2009-2013) Undergrad program: Computer Science, minor in Mathematics Undergrad GPA: 2.99 :( Graduate School: unranked business school at University of Baltimore (2015-2020) Graduate Program: MBA Graduate GPA: 3.9 GMAT: Not within past 5 years. Research History: I am working with my advisor in my program to design a research topic in the fall. Hoping to nail down what the topic is by the end of next week. I anticipate it will be a study of how disruptive innovation has affected the landscape of a particular cloud based system, and I hope to draw conclusions about how companies are handling disruptive innovation in modern times based off my findings. This will be for academic credit, but I hope to create something that is capable of being published. Teaching experience: None. My Spiel (feel free to skip to questions below): Although it was always in the back of my mind, I never really anticipated on getting into academics. I currently serve as an assistant CTO for medium sized MSP/MSSP my family runs. Up until about a year ago I had full intention to take over the company when my dad retires. Currently, I manage a small team ,and I work directly with our clients to help them determine which technologies to implement in their businesses. After some soul searching and a few trips to an occupational therapist, I have decided some of my proudest achievements and relationships were academically based, and I am deeply interested in pursuing this further. Unfortunately, I don't feel like my academic resume matches my enthusiasm for it currently. I was very blessed to have gotten a taste of what it was like to be part of an academic cohort in my undergrad, but my GPA definitely does not reflect that because the first half of my undergrad was spent partying. After undergrad, I started working immediately for my folks. Around 3 years in to work, I started my MBA program at UBalt. I did not apply to any other programs because I could walk to that school from my house, and I was mostly pursuing the degree for a piece of paper, and I had a tremendous amount of pressure to pursue technical certifications which I have never particularly enjoyed. The MBA program was a good excuse to avoid those. Fast forward to today, and I have fallen in love with the study of digital innovation. With COVID19 having us all working from home, a lot of my daily tasks at work have been mitigated. I have used my spare time to take a deep dive into digital innovation as an academic study, and I have read 50+ academic publications since the start of COVID19 on the topic. I have been jotting down my takeaways on the ones that seem most relevant to the paper I want to write in the fall. I am gearing up to apply to PhD programs. I am graduating from UBalt in the fall, but I will not be applying for programs December 2021. I need to take a year off because my Fiancé is stuck at the hospital where she works her until then, and her presence is vital to my success in any program I am in! So until then I am stuck in Maryland. I am faced with the decision of how to spend that year. I have been transparent with my folks about my decision to leave the company. I do have the option to work part time and use the remaining time for academic pursuits. I really love technology, and I am really grateful my career gave me the option to work closely with CEOs and implement some really cool projects, but I am excited to be able to analyze how businesses use technology in a different lens. Additionally, I am excited to be part of an academic community again. My MBA program has been at night, and it has not quiet scratched my academic itch that I got a taste of in my undergrad. My Questions: Anyway, if you all had a year to kill between grad school and PhD, what would you do? I think I want to spend it doing part time research, but I am not sure if that is better than being a full time research assistant. The finances will work out to be similar on my end, as part time at my current job is comparable to full time as a research assistant. Perhaps I could do both and work as a research assistant for half the year? How would you prep for the GMAT if you had to do it again? What courses would you take on it? What programs would you recommend me look into? I really want to study the way companies handle digital innovation is evolving, but I haven't dived in quite deep enough to find what programs are a fit for me. I don't think my academic resume is that great so telling me I won't get into a top ten school won't hurt my feelings. Finally, I don't have any formal teaching experience. Is that a big deal? Is it a good use of my time to change that? I think I would love sharing ideas with students, but I have not tested that theory.

After I graduated with my bachelors, I have now worked for a few years doing research and writing outside of academia. I wrote a bestselling book on a niche industry, but most of my work has been published as white papers or in major media outlets. I'm trying to get a few journal papers published in time for PhD applications. My GRE scores are 165 V, 168 Q and I can get very positive LORs from my academic colleagues. I have a GPA of 3.8 with a psychology degree from a top-tier liberal arts college. However, I know my background is quite unconventional, and I didn't do anything remarkable during my undergraduate studies other than some volunteer RA work in psychology. What would a b-school think of this unorthodox background for a management/strategy/OB program? Is it important that I do something like an RA position with a b-school professor to improve my academic credentials?

Hi everyone, I have a query regarding the academic associate job. I just want to know whether working as an academic associate can really help to get into a Ph.D. program. I would be very thankful if someone could guide me in this matter.

This is my first attempt to write an essay on issue topic. I did it under 28 minutes but since it is my first time i know i have a done a lot of mistakes. I tried to submit my essay to essay rater and it did give me very nice result. gmatawa.com gave me 6/6 and mbacrystalball.com 5.3 but i clearly know my essay is too short for a good score and it should also have a lot of flaws so i want a human eye to point that out for me. Thanks in advance. :) My essay question: Schools should be responsible only for teaching academic skills and not for teaching ethical and social values. Answer: The presented issue is a contentious one. I believe that schools should indeed teach ethical and social values alongside academic skills because we live in a society and it is necessary for student to be aware of the fact beside academic skills we should have social skills and we do have social responsiblities. Furthermore, only excelling in academic and oblivious to ethical and moral values may lead to misuse of the knowledge. Firstly, since prehistoric era we human have been living in a society. Each individual contribute to society and benefit from it. An individual who have good social values would certainly be able to fit in and prosper from the society. He will be well known to his responsibilities and can contribute to the society using his academic knowledge which would in long term benefit himself. secondly, we have seen a number of times the atrocities resulting from unethical actions and misuse of great knowledge. For example, the chemical attack on World War 2 and also the well known atomic bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. These horrifying incidents could have been prevented if the people invloved had a good ethical scruples. It is true that schools are actually responsible for teaching academic skills and focusing on ethical and social values will definitely divide the time slots may some time result in paucity of academic skills provided to a student. However, this trade off is fair considering the negative consequences that would result in the absence of it. In conclusion, I personally believe that schools should be teaching academic, social and ethical values because a student with social, ethical, academic values will be a a great asset to the society have a higher probability of succeeding in life than the ones who simply have a great deal of academic skills but lacks the efficient way of delivering it to the society and use it for his greater well-being and prosperity.

Assuming I am Australian Chinese...attend City Uni HK PhD Marketing...can I find an academic job easily later on...say in the USA or Europe?

Hi Everyone, I have a quick question regarding Academic CV for applicants coming from engineering backgrounds. Should I include my engineering research experience and if yes, how much should I go in depth about the research work? In addition, I have completed military training during my undergraduate. What would be an appropriate section to mention this? Thanks in advance

Hey All, This might seem a little frivolous, but I've been wondering what CVs for applicants typically look like. I know that in the US one page is usually the standard, but does that still hold true for PhD applicants. Or do you try and copy the format of academic CVs that professors usually have? Instinctively I'd be leaning towards the latter option, but it seems a little absurd, since there is little academic information (no published papers, etc.) that I can provide. Do I include any work experience and extracurriculars? I'd love to get some help on the headlines according to which a typical PhD applicant structures his/her CV. Thanks so much for the help Lumpi

I'm a recent college grad ready to apply for PhD programs in the fall. I have my 3 rec letters, my GRE, and I think I have a shot at a school at least in the top 10. The one caveat is that my goal in getting a PhD was always to work eventually at the Fed, the IMF, the World Bank, or as a research economist in the private sector -- i.e., to do econ research, but not strictly as an academic. But some people I've talked to on the PhD track have told me that in order to be successful as a PhD student, I should really want to be a professor in the LR -- especially considering the 5-7 year-long commitment that is a PhD. Do any of the current PhD students on the forum have a perspective on this? Is anyone in a PhD program with similar goals in mind?

Hi Folks, I thought it would be nice to see academic economists in action. Especially the most successful ones. To see how they present their work, motivate it, defend it, etc. The only place for this is a seminar room in an economics department. But not always you get your 'favorite' economists presenting at your school. So videos should help. (And I don't mean public speeches or lectures here.) The problem is, I guess nobody is filming these presentations. If there are exceptions, I'd be happy to know. Otherwise, the thread would probably be a good place to discuss the 'art of academic presentation' in general.

Question : Some people say that physical exercise should be a required part of every school day. Other people believe that students should spend the whole school day on academic studies. Which opinion do you agree with? Give reasons to support your answer. Answer : In my opinion, schools should give physical exercise to students in addition to the academic studies they receive. I do not agree with the opinion that students should spend the whole school day on academic studies. I am of the opinion that schools should not only teach students but also educate them. As most people understand, “to educate” has wider meaning than “to teach”. “To educate” can also mean, among others, to introduce new things to students, to develop skills and all potential that all students have, and to shape students’ attitude and behavior. Meanwhile, “to teach” is usually understood to be limited to knowledge transfer from teachers to students. If learning process in schools is concentrated only on academic studies, students will not have the opportunities to learn the true meaning of education because all they learn in schools is restricted to academic matters and they do not have any opportunities to learn anything beyond academic matters. From my experience, I find that doing some physical exercise in balanced proportion regularly will benefit the students very much. Physical exercise will not only give them the opportunities to get themselves into good shape and enhance their health, but it will also instill a sense of discipline in them since good and balanced physical exercise requires strict rules and systematic methods which, if applied and carried out well, will shape students’ attitude, behavior, and minds. If learning process in schools never gives any physical exercise to students, they will never get such benefit of doing physical exercise. In the long run, students will become narrow-minded since almost all in their minds is academic matters and they will have only a little or no experience in other aspects of good living. Moreover, from our experience, we learn that not all students are talented in academic fields. Some students show limited capability in academic fields but demonstrate very good talent for sport or other physical exercise. Students of this kind will not have any opportunities to develop their talent and potential, should learning process in schools be limited only to academic studies. On the other hand, even if all students are very good at academic fields, without ever doing any physical exercise, they cannot be expected to attain a balance in their minds, bodies, and souls, because all their potential will be concentrated only on academic fields. In conclusion, I strongly promote the idea that in order to educate students thoroughly, schools should create a good balance between academic studies and physical exercise. In this way, we can expect our students to be both intelligent and healthy. :) :D