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5003 Posts
On April 20 2011 13:39 theonemephisto wrote:Show nested quote +On April 20 2011 13:32 Milkis wrote:
Maybe I should reveal my ultimate build order for people interested in Econ Academia/Serious Econ :O :O :O I'm guessing: Math 160s IBL Math 203-205 (analysis), honors (207-209 I think?) if possible A topology course Differential Equations Maybe algebra Econ 200-203 (intensive) Honors Metrics Metrics B Time Series Metrics Stat 251 Stat 244-245 At least as a base. Add in various electives, maybe another stat class or two. Get some grad classes in there, especially the base math methods for econ one.
Quite close. I would not recommend Honors analysis -- it's quite overkill and it'll screw you over for the other classes you need to do. Secondly, it doesn't actually teach you anything relevant for econ.
For Math 203-205 -- the accelerated section, of course, as Rudin >>> Wade forever and ever.
Wouldn't recommend Algebra. You do need Complex Analysis in there, however, just in case you want to do Time Series.
I would honestly say the order matters a lot too especially when it comes to metrics related classes.
But first, let me announce that I am not responsible for your GPA or your mental health after following my Build Order >:D
Secondly, I don't know enough about Macro to really recommend Macro courses, since my year was really fucked in terms of that since we didn't have any Macro courses our 3rd years.
Basically:
First Year:
IBL math 160
Hume
Civ
[Core Classes]/Intensive Econ at the last quarter (This is actually quite new, so I don't know what the difference exactly is, but the idea is that you're fine going Lima -> Bondarenko)
Second Year:
Accelerated Analysis (203-205 section 33 I believe)
Sosc: Power
Stat 244 -> 245 -> Honors Metrics (Spring)
Rest of Intensive Econ
Sosc Power is the best Sosc if you are thinking about Econ, period -- especially the first quarter of it when you read Smith/Marx/Durkheim.
Stat 245 makes Honors Metrics a lot easier and doable. Honors Metrics is annoying otherwise. I took 245 after Honors Metrics and I really really wished I took 245 before Honors Metrics.
Third Year:
Fall:
Time Series
Game Theory
Complex Analysis
Winter:
Economics of Crime
ODE
Spring:
Econometrics B
Human Capital
STAT 251
Human Capital cause Becker is quite old now so you want to get him before he switches over :O It's also the most accessible grad course -- BUT, the problem is that the class is just a midterm/final and they're all Price Theory style T/F questions and as an undergrad frankly they're really hard to do 
Economics of Crime is an "interesting" choice, mostly because it is taught by Levitt. He talks a lot and sounds quite cocky, and honestly people think of it as "Story Time by Levitt". The important thing to learn is to learn how Levitt thinks -- just learn to think like him and you'll see how useful the course is. It'll also help you with Metrics B -- think of Economics of Crime as more verbal/informal introduction to the stuff you will learn in Metrics B.
You can move off your Complex -> ODE to your 4th year if you want.
Game Theory -- honestly, I'm mixed. I don't remember a single great lecture by Sonnenchein other than this one class where he did a proof of the existence of Mixed Nash Equilibria. But it's far better than Myerson's course and it's more math heavy.
Fourth Year
Fall:
Price Theory
Price Theory is death. Expect 25+ hours a week alone on one problem set. Kiss your Thursdays goodbye.
Basically if you can pull off this build you're pretty set for any micro empirical work, and it gives you a strong foundation to chase anything else. I do think that solid micro and empirical foundations are necessary for like, anything.
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All I can say is dream big, so even if you miss you'll still get into a great school like UChicago. Oh and study for your PSATs
So should I restudy? Should I study with PSAT specific books/mindset, or are SAT questions literally the same? :/
Go for it! BC calc isn't that much more difficult than AB, and credit wise it works better.
However if you struggled during pre-calc, you might start to find it hard. On the other hand if you find BC to be easy/notdifficult college math is something to look to! (of course, make adjustments for senioritis).
I ask this because at my school, there are extremely intelligent people who may or may not be "good at math" (most of them are definitely very adept), who are literally struggling with AB... Are we just somewhat incompetent around here, or something? Our calc teacher is also one of the best at our school (which is saying something). haha I feel so...uninitiated and ignorant writing about high school trifles while reading these engrossing descriptions and details about college life/schedules/courses.
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On April 20 2011 13:36 LSB wrote:Show nested quote +On April 20 2011 13:26 Z3kk wrote:
Hmm I see...I'm sort of an overzealous perfectionist, so whenever I smell anything remotely like college applications, I ask a ton of questions hehe I'm actually a sophomore right now and partially thinking I have time, while at the same time feeling as if time is running out (impending doom, etc.)... ._. Thanks LSB! All I can say is dream big, so even if you miss you'll still get into a great school like UChicago. Oh and study for your PSATs Show nested quote +I'm planning on taking BC junior year (skipping AB--is this a wise choice w/ or w/o x sort of preparation?) and linear algebra/multivar senior year (both at a community college probably), and I'm starting to get a bit scared... mephisto, how were those classes? I honestly do not think I am that good at mathematics (above average for sure, otherwise I would be blatantly delusional to consider this), but am willing to put in the work for once, as I do have an interest in it. [/quore]
Go for it! BC calc isn't that much more difficult than AB, and credit wise it works better.
However if you struggled during pre-calc, you might start to find it hard. On the other hand if you find BC to be easy/notdifficult college math is something to look to! (of course, make adjustments for senioritis).
Maybe all of you guys are brilliant or something, but I know some really really really smart people, who after taking AB have struggled with BC at my school. I mean, all of them got 5s, but getting a good grade in the class was very very difficult.
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On April 20 2011 11:52 Milkis wrote:Show nested quote +On April 20 2011 11:49 Kaal wrote:
Caller goes to UChic if I remember right.
Stay away.
Far, far away. Caller actually is never around cause iirc he just holes himself up in wherever he lives. I've only ran into him on some random econ elective class actually and he didn't seem to like talking to others very much. So he won't really affect you :O
Lies, damned lies, and more lies, I'm around, just in different places. Although I only ran into you for one econ elective, true. But he's totally lying you should see me around on campus. Although probably not in the Econ building, I tend to avoid that building like the plague.
In all honesty though I haven't been to any micro club meetings in a long time though.
If you don't want to do econ grad school and you're a total pussy like me but if you want to still do Econ without taking legit courses and dodging lots of math then you can do the following cheese build order-it'll be easier on your soul but will not get you into grad school:
First Year
Humanities/Social Sciences Core
Hard Science Core (if you don't have AP credit for it) or Language
Math 153-195-196
Second Year
Econ 200-201-202
Statistics 234 (hurray for not tryhard stats)
Civilization/Art Core
Computer Science/Econ Elective of Some Kind (there are many electives but yeah, Economics of Crime is a good one, I didn't get into it though tt)-Comp Sci counts as an econ elective though.
Third Year
Econ 203
Econometrics A (aka, bitch Econometrics, but still hard if you're bad at math like me)
Game Theory with Myerson (the other game theory class is in the fall and is much more legit but is very math heavy)
Experimental was also pretty fun I guess, Milkis iirc thought it was easy mode though so meh
Also stick some electives in around this time, I took a bunch of History and Poli Sci Classes.
Also, Economics of Sports, just because Sanderson is hilarious
Fourth Year
Some other Econ elective + whatever you want. If you wanted to do grad school you'd try to get into grad classes like Milkis did, and maybe take math 199, 203-204/207-208, Stat 244, Time Series Econometrics, anything that has the word "formal" in the course description, etc. Although to be fair if you want to do grad school immediately out of college you should start in third year at the latest.
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On April 20 2011 14:07 Milkis wrote:Quite close. I would not recommend Honors analysis -- it's quite overkill and it'll screw you over for the other classes you need to do. Secondly, it doesn't actually teach you anything relevant for econ. For Math 203-205 -- the accelerated section, of course, as Rudin >>> Wade forever and ever. Wouldn't recommend Algebra. You do need Complex Analysis in there, however, just in case you want to do Time Series. I would honestly say the order matters a lot too especially when it comes to metrics related classes. But first, let me announce that I am not responsible for your GPA or your mental health after following my Build Order >:D Secondly, I don't know enough about Macro to really recommend Macro courses, since my year was really fucked in terms of that since we didn't have any Macro courses our 3rd years. Basically: First Year: IBL math 160 Hume Civ [Core Classes]/Intensive Econ at the last quarter (This is actually quite new, so I don't know what the difference exactly is, but the idea is that you're fine going Lima -> Bondarenko) Second Year: Accelerated Analysis (203-205 section 33 I believe) Sosc: Power Stat 244 -> 245 -> Honors Metrics (Spring) Rest of Intensive Econ Sosc Power is the best Sosc if you are thinking about Econ, period -- especially the first quarter of it when you read Smith/Marx/Durkheim. Stat 245 makes Honors Metrics a lot easier and doable. Honors Metrics is annoying otherwise. I took 245 after Honors Metrics and I really really wished I took 245 before Honors Metrics. Third Year: Fall: Time Series Game Theory Complex Analysis Winter: Economics of Crime ODE Spring: Econometrics B Human Capital STAT 251 Human Capital cause Becker is quite old now so you want to get him before he switches over :O It's also the most accessible grad course -- BUT, the problem is that the class is just a midterm/final and they're all Price Theory style T/F questions and as an undergrad frankly they're really hard to do Economics of Crime is an "interesting" choice, mostly because it is taught by Levitt. He talks a lot and sounds quite cocky, and honestly people think of it as "Story Time by Levitt". The important thing to learn is to learn how Levitt thinks -- just learn to think like him and you'll see how useful the course is. It'll also help you with Metrics B -- think of Economics of Crime as more verbal/informal introduction to the stuff you will learn in Metrics B. You can move off your Complex -> ODE to your 4th year if you want. Game Theory -- honestly, I'm mixed. I don't remember a single great lecture by Sonnenchein other than this one class where he did a proof of the existence of Mixed Nash Equilibria. But it's far better than Myerson's course and it's more math heavy. Fourth Year Fall: Price Theory Price Theory is death. Expect 25+ hours a week alone on one problem set. Kiss your Thursdays goodbye. Basically if you can pull off this build you're pretty set for any micro empirical work, and it gives you a strong foundation to chase anything else. I do think that solid micro and empirical foundations are necessary for like, anything.
I really wish I had taken accelerated analysis. I took the regular section after worrying about workload, and then just ended up getting easy A's and being bored. Hopefully I'll have time this summer to work through Rudin on my own.
Also, the intensive courses are quite new, they're actually rolling them out with my year I believe. The basic idea is that micro is just the same as Lima's course, but they added a new version of Macro taught (at least 202) by Braun. I'm in it right now, and I obviously don't have much to compare it to, but it's pretty cool. By the end of the sequence we should be getting to some basic DSGE models.
And do you really recommend taking 245 before metrics? I'm not sure I can actually pull that off anymore, I'm in 251 and was planning on taking 244 in the fall then metrics in the winter. I've never actually heard much about honors metrics, mostly because no one actually takes the class.
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5003 Posts
And do you really recommend taking 245 before metrics? I'm not sure I can actually pull that off anymore, I'm in 251 and was planning on taking 244 in the fall then metrics in the winter. I've never actually heard much about honors metrics, mostly because no one actually takes the class.
Taking Honors Metrics in Spring is fine, unless you really want to get a head start on getting an RA job -- then yeah, Winter is good.
You don't need 245 before metrics. You'll be able to understand everything that is taught in Honors Metrics without, the only thing is that it'll be a lot harder. Furthermore, you will not really know where and how a lot of things are derived and 245 really helps you with that. 244 doesn't even get to regressions nor does it really derive t-test and f-test (with respect to regressions) and all of that, while 245 will get to that. Basically, 245 gives you a more formal introduction to regressions than honors metrics -- honors metrics just tries to throw you in there and expect that you are smart enough to catch up with everything.
This is, IMO, the only reason why honors metrics is seen as "difficult". In reality it's not that much of a difficult course and I don't really care what anyone else at the school says about it -- it's not a bad course. The problem sets only take long because you literally have no idea how to do anything nor do you even have an idea what they're talking about and you'll just spend shifting through Greene (great textbook, btw) and you'll know what the "joy of discovery" is all about (ask Lima about it ^^ ). 245 will really help you down with a lot of this.
EDIT: Also, who are you >:O
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On April 21 2011 00:01 Milkis wrote:Show nested quote +And do you really recommend taking 245 before metrics? I'm not sure I can actually pull that off anymore, I'm in 251 and was planning on taking 244 in the fall then metrics in the winter. I've never actually heard much about honors metrics, mostly because no one actually takes the class. Taking Honors Metrics in Spring is fine, unless you really want to get a head start on getting an RA job -- then yeah, Winter is good. You don't need 245 before metrics. You'll be able to understand everything that is taught in Honors Metrics without, the only thing is that it'll be a lot harder. Furthermore, you will not really know where and how a lot of things are derived and 245 really helps you with that. 244 doesn't even get to regressions nor does it really derive t-test and f-test (with respect to regressions) and all of that, while 245 will get to that. Basically, 245 gives you a more formal introduction to regressions than honors metrics -- honors metrics just tries to throw you in there and expect that you are smart enough to catch up with everything. This is, IMO, the only reason why honors metrics is seen as "difficult". In reality it's not that much of a difficult course and I don't really care what anyone else at the school says about it -- it's not a bad course. The problem sets only take long because you literally have no idea how to do anything nor do you even have an idea what they're talking about and you'll just spend shifting through Greene (great textbook, btw) and you'll know what the "joy of discovery" is all about (ask Lima about it ^^ ). 245 will really help you down with a lot of this. EDIT: Also, who are you >:O
Second year, econ major. We should meet up sometime, I'm assuming you're still on campus.
At this point I'm planning on taking 245 and Metrics concurrently, I presume that metrics doesn't really get into 245 material into the latter half of the quarter? Also, I suspect that Lima has stopped teaching Honors Metrics, which would be extremely sad if true. He's just such a great teacher.
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5003 Posts
Lima did stop teaching Metrics, yeah. But the good thing is that a certain not to be named grad student isn't teaching metrics either, so it's kind of okay.
245 doesn't go into Metrics material until the last ~35% or so of the class (it does other stuff like a lot of transformations and other types of distributions and deriving tests from it, and it also does ANOVA which I think is quite helpful especially when thinking about panel regressions later, but that's just how I put it together)
My experience with Metrics (I took it with Lima) could be quite different from yours, of course -- but the coursework was spent proving basic things about regressions (how it's unbiased consistent etc) and what happens when you break assumptions. My stance is just that 244 isn't enough to transition you into Honors Metrics smoothly, and 245 will make that transition a lot easier -- but it is doable without, it'll just be more annoying. I honestly didn't understand some of the stuff related to regressions intuitively until I took 245, but that could be based on how I learn.
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On April 20 2011 11:43 Milkis wrote:Show nested quote +On April 20 2011 11:41 LSB wrote:On April 20 2011 11:38 Milkis wrote:
Get out while you still can.
(welcome to the level of hell Dante forgot) I'm fully prepared to hate the place every waking moment once I actually get there. However I'm hanging on this the small hope that I'll be able to live through it. Haha, well it's actually not as bad as people make it out to be. But then, that also depends on your concentration and what you want to do with what you learn out of this place. If you were here over the weekend please don't take as a natural part of Chicago weather. It will be grey. Very very grey all year round :O
Odd, I would describe Chicago weather as being very extreme. You'll hit your over one hundreds, and you'll hit your below 0's - but always with horrible wind and precipitation ;D :D.
Well, good luck to you. I hope your personality retains itself over the years - i've had friends who could not make that claim when they finished UChicago :D. + Show Spoiler +Definitely better than uiuc though,  .
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This thread made me glad I graduated from uni a long time ago.
I have no idea why I'm a PhD student though 
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On April 20 2011 11:36 LSB wrote:
It was all very... pleasant. Sure the work will be hard, but I've already tasted that with summer camp at PROMYS. College doesn't seem that far away anymore.
Woah, first time I've seen someone mention this on TL.
LSB, how was it? I'm a junior in hs applying to it and while I've heard mostly good things about it, I'm curious about somebody from tl's opinion on it.
Oh, and congrats on UChicago.
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EPT
