Profile Evaluation PhD Economics 2015

[Lin Alessandro]

Hi there,

It's my first time here.

I would really appreciate any advice and comments.

 

PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: B.A. Honors Economics, Italian research private university well known

Undergrad GPA: 97%

Top 5% wrt colleagues

 

Type of Grad: M.A. (1-year) same institution as above

Grad GPA: 90%

Top 10% wrt colleagues

 

GRE: 170 Q 155 V 3A:doh:

Undergrad

Math Courses: Calculus I (A+), Calculus II and Linear Algebra (A)

Econ Courses: 3 Micro (B A- A) 3 Macro (A A- A) 2 Stat/Econometrics (A+ A+) 3 Finance (A A A+)

Grad

Math Courses: 1 Math (A) - const opt, unconst opt, ode, de, bellman

Econ Courses: 2 Micro (C A+) 2 Macro (C B) Econometrics ©

 

Letters of Recommendation: 1 Princeton PhD, 1 Columbia PhD, 1 Cambridge PhD

Research Experience: Honors thesis

Teaching Experience: None but private lessons

Research Interests: Micro, Public, Growth

SOP:

Other:

 

Applying to: LSE, Stanford, Columbia, NYU, NW, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Duke, Brown, Cornell, UCLA, UCSD and many others

 

So my weak points are obviously bad writing skills, I still have trouble in writing my SOP. I really find it difficult to express myself in many words. I really prefer numbers and non open questions.

My strengths would be strong quantitative skills

 

I don't know if I am overestimating myself so that I included top 10 schools.

 

Thanks to ZYX

 

Edited November 11, 2014 by Lin Alessandro

[ZYX]

I would add your graduate courses (along with grades). Maybe also add how you have done in the degrees relative to your cohort, as well as any recent placements from your university into PhD programmes.

 

Adding this information will help forum users to comment on your profile.

[fantinity]

Do you have TOEFL? If so, what is your writing and overall score?

 

The point is GRE AWA doesn't matter as long as you can show that you can write. A close substitute for internationals is writing section of TOEFL, which is considerably simpler. Also, in your situation you absolutely must have a perfectly written SOP (at least in terms of language). Consult with every professor who studied abroad, and every native speaker you know of at your schools, and you should be fine. I know of many Russians who went to top-10 schools with pretty bad language skills (think 90 on TOEFL), so it's not necessarily a red light.

[Lin Alessandro]

I will take TOEFL next week (very late)

 

For what concerns SOP, as I said before, I am in troubles since I have this unique synthesis skill:culpable::culpable::culpable:

[Econhead]

I will take TOEFL next week (very late)

 

For what concerns SOP, as I said before, I am in troubles since I have this unique synthesis skill:culpable::culpable::culpable:

 

What about your technical writing? Except for sections where you address shortcomings of a project and future work, most sections of formal writing requires relatively little concern for "open-ended questions."

 

The point I am trying to get at is whether you have poor language skills, or whether "your brain doesn't work that way."

[Lin Alessandro]

What about your technical writing? Except for sections where you address shortcomings of a project and future work, most sections of formal writing requires relatively little concern for "open-ended questions."

 

The point I am trying to get at is whether you have poor language skills, or whether "your brain doesn't work that way."

 

I find myself comfortable in stating everything in 3/4 sentences. I believe I have really poor language skills, even in native language:yuck:

[Lin Alessandro]

Do you have TOEFL? If so, what is your writing and overall score?

 

The point is GRE AWA doesn't matter as long as you can show that you can write. A close substitute for internationals is writing section of TOEFL, which is considerably simpler. Also, in your situation you absolutely must have a perfectly written SOP (at least in terms of language). Consult with every professor who studied abroad, and every native speaker you know of at your schools, and you should be fine. I know of many Russians who went to top-10 schools with pretty bad language skills (think 90 on TOEFL), so it's not necessarily a red light.

 

 

I received TOEFL score few days ago: R29 L 29 S23 W28 total 109

[melkisedek]

Not having an analysis course and limited research experience really hurts your chances for T10 schools but LoRs might make up for this. Your TOEFL scores are nice don't worry about GRE AW, you are not native. I believe, you have a decent shot at Brown, Cornell or Michigan. With a little help from LoRs, even better schools are possible. The thing about admissions is that it always boils down to the quality of LoRs especially for the international applicants applying from institutions with unfamiliar structure.

[Lin Alessandro]

Not having an analysis course and limited research experience really hurts your chances for T10 schools but LoRs might make up for this. Your TOEFL scores are nice don't worry about GRE AW, you are not native. I believe, you have a decent shot at Brown, Cornell or Michigan. With a little help from LoRs, even better schools are possible. The thing about admissions is that it always boils down to the quality of LoRs especially for the international applicants applying from institutions with unfamiliar structure.

 

Thank you.

I actually don't know very well what analysis stands for. I mean, can someone provide me a sort of topics' list of a regular analysis course? I might have studied the topics in the mathematics courses (at my uni the courses are just named math 1 , math 2 ...)

[fake22]

Some(!) topics that maybe you should have heard from are:

Metric Spaces, Normed Spaces, Continuity, Compactness, Fixed Point Theory, Linear Spaces, Differential Equations (Exact,Separable,...)

Implicit function theorem, Some topological definitions like open and closed sets for example....

 

I believe(!) it is not that important whether you have heard each topic or not, I believe that the notion of logic and proofs are more important .

 

Wish you best luck!!

[NBZ]

Some things to consider:

1) Which schools are past applicants from your school attending?

2) Which range of schools do your professors recommend you apply to?

3) To someone unfamiliar with the Italian system, your grad grades may look a little strange (3 Cs out of 5 courses and yet top 10% of the class). I'd suggest asking one of your recommenders to explain the grading system and how you actually rank within your cohort.

4) It's hard to really gauge your chances, but my guess is that the limited research experience and math, and the somewhat spotty grad grades could make it difficult to get into the top schools. I'd strongly suggest applying to a wider range of schools, and include several schools in the 20-50 range.