The chart will appear within this DIV. This text will be replaced by the chart.
Most Recently Selected profile:

The data below comes from testmagic forums and shows accepted, waitlisted, and rejected applicants for 2007-2009 for economics graduate school. Clicking on the graph above will make the most recent profile appear to the right of the graph.

All profiles:

Acceptances:
commodore 2007:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: top 20 private research university with an average econ department
Undergrad GPA: 4.0
Type of Grad: none

Grad GPA: n/a
GRE: 800 Q/750 V/ 6.0 AW
Math Courses: calc I & II (A), linear algebra (A), diff eq (A), advanced calc (A), stats (A), applied stats (in progress)
Econ Courses: everything, all A's

Letters of Recommendation: three good ones, two from people who are somewhat known. It turns out that one of my recommenders is a friend of Truman Bewley, Yale's DGS. I didn't know that until last week. I certainly hope that's not the reason I got in, but in looking at the results, I have to wonder.
Research Experience: undergraduate honors thesis (to be submitted for publication:luck2:)
Teaching Experience: 2 semesters as a TA for intro micro & macro
Research Interests: development, labor, economics of education, IO, trade

SOP: I really don't think it matters much. I talked about wanting to do development. I hid my love of teaching and played up my love of research.

RESULTS:
Acceptances:
Yale ($)
Northwestern (no funding)
Michigan (no funding)
Kennedy School ($)

Duke PubPol ($)
Waitlists:
Brown
Rejections:
Princeton
Berkeley
Stanford
Cornell


Attending: Yale
What would you have done differently? I'm not really sure what was wrong with my application, but I'm very glad to have gotten into Yale, and I'm sure I'll be happy there. I guess that if I had it to do over again, I'd apply to even more good schools, because admissions really are random sometimes. Cast a wide net and don't take anything for granted. I really thought Cornell and Brown were my fallbacks, and I didn't even get in. Doing it over again, I'd probably pick 3 or 4 more schools to apply to. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
hockeytime 2007:
Hey hockeytime, I'm gonna copy your profile from the other thread and put it here for the sake of completeness. Let me know if you mind, I'll delete it.

Profile:


Gre: 800 Q, 700 V, 6.0 A
GPA: Overall: 3.97 (Undergrad). 4.0 in all econ/math/quant courses. Ranked 2nd in my graduating class.
Classes:
Math: Lin Alg, Calc, Diff Eqs, Vector Calc, Real Analysis
Econ: Intro to Micro and Macro, Intermediate Micro

Graduate: Probability and Micro at the PhD level at a top US school
Type of Undergrad: top Canadian undergrad school, major in Business, minor in Math.
Research Experience: Full time RA at a top US school for the year prior to starting my PhD.
Teaching Experience: None
LORs: Three strong econ profs in my field at a top US school.
SoP & Interests: Empirical IO. Energy/Telecom/High Tech sectors.

Other: Worked in consulting after my undergrad (first in Management Consulting, then Economic Consulting). Somewhat atypical applicant because my undergrad was in business/math. Strong comp sci background, and very strong technical skills (several programming languages, STATA, etc).


Admissions Decision Results

Rejected: Berkeley
MIT
Princeton


waitlisted: Harvard Econ (Declined)

Accepted: UCSD
UCLA
Duke
Stanford
Stanford GSB
Chicago Econ

Chicago GSB
Northwestern
Yale
Harvard Business Economics Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
ockam 2007:
hey, I just heard about this forum a couple weeks ago. wish I had know about it earlier, but I hope somebody else might find my info useful

PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: large "top-ten" public research university w/ top 15ish econ dept

Undergrad GPA: 3.95 overall, 3.97 math
GRE: 800Q/610V/5.0
Math Courses: majored in math, with rigorous year-long sequences in analysis, stats, and abstract algebra. upper div electives included applied linear algebra and mathematical modeling. note to future applicants: the admissions director at princeton seemed to take very seriously the fact that i had taken the more rigorous math courses
Econ Courses: very few: intro to micro, mathematical econ, grad-level micro. After applying, some macro and behavioral (and said I would do so on application)
Other Courses: lots of philosophy including grad-level coursework in philosophy of science.

Letters of Recommendation: These were probably the strongest part of my application. One from a full professor each of: econ, math, phil departments. Math letter came from my real analysis prof who is also a college provost. Phil letter was from my honors thesis advisor. I took a grad course with the econ prof. I know all my letter writers quite well, so there were lots of very specific things they could say about me.
Research Experience: none in economics. Assisted research in epidemiology (with a sociologist) and genomics. Independent research in philosophy of science and sabermetrics.
Teaching Experience: tutor/TA for the computer science dept (java)
Research Interests: very broad. mostly micro and metrics, both theory and applied

SOP: 700 words, nothing fancy. described how my background in math and phil led me to economics. said my interests in econ were broad and described a couple specific topics that interest me. Used mostly the same statement at every school, changing just the last two sentences for each application
Other: Residential advisor, phil club president, and undergrad phil journal editor.

RESULTS:
Acceptances:
full funding:
Princeton, Stanford, Chicago, UPenn, Columbia, Northwestern Wisc-Madison, UBC

no $: UCSD
Waitlists:
Yale, MIT
Rejections:
Harvard, Berkeley
What would you have done differently?
absolutely nothing. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Skipper 2007:
Top 20 private undergrad (with top 40 econ dept)
3.90 GPA, double-major in math and econ.

Selected Math courses:

Multivariable Calc: A-
Probability: A-
Mathematical stats: A
Matrix Algebra (not proof-based): A+
Intro to proofs: A
Intro to analysis (taken at a local public school): A

GRE: 690 V, 800 Q, 5.0 AWA


Results: Accepted with funding
WUSTL
Texas-Austin

without funding
Northwestern (off w*itlist)
Wisconsin-Madison
Duke (tuition waiver)


Rejected
Harvard
MIT
Michigan

Waitlisted
Chicago


What I would do differently: I would have taken a rigorous 2-semester analysis sequence and written a senior thesis. I wouldn't have wasted money applying to Harvard and MIT. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
P=NP 2007:
Gre: 800 Q, 660 V, 6.0 A
GPA: Overall: 3.95. Math: 4.00, Econ: 3.98
Classes (all A+'s):
UGrad Math: Abstract Algebra, Logic, Analysis

Grad Econ: Micro I, Micro II, Macro, Econometrics I, Business Cycles, Monetary, Economic History, Regulation
Grad Math: Measure Theory, Topology, Group Theory

Type of Undergrad: International, top in country

Research Experience: macro project, summer intern at Central Bank (econometrics), micro thesis, summer project in maths


Teaching Experience: 6 semesters of tutoring economics (micro, macro, international)

LORs: I hope they're good :). My letter writers have PhDs from Minnesota, Stanford (x2) and Yale.

Interests: micro theory, macro theory, non-parametrics


Results Admits (with full funding)
Chicago
Stanford
Northwestern
Princeton
Yale
UPenn
NYU
Columbia

Brown

Waitlist
Harvard

Rejects
MIT
Cornell


What would you have done differently? Spent time writing and polishing a great research paper. I only submitted a writing sample to Chicago.

--Going to Yale Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
dorothy 2007:
Profile:

Gre: 790 Q, 700 V, 5.0 A
GPA: Overall: 4.0 Double Major: Econ and Math (BA's)
Classes: (all undergrad)
Math: Calc I through III, Linear Algebra, Modern Algebra, Real Analysis, Intro Probability & Statistics, two semester sequence in Probability and Statistics (current). Econ: Int Micro, Int Macro, Math Econ, Labor Econ, Public Finance, Welfare Econ, and a really cool economic history class all about Adam Smith

Type of Undergrad: big public university in the midwest
Research Experience: departmental honors thesis...unfinished as of application time. so not much.
Teaching Experience: taught college algebra for 1 yr, this year TA'ing for introductory economics (the kind for basketball and piano majors). Head TA for the spring semester.
LORs: One math prof that has known me since I was a freshman (Phd Yale) Two econ profs, one who has been my mentor but isn't publishing much anymore (Phd Minnesota) and one who is definitely publishing and is advising me for my honors thesis (Phd UW-Madison). They should all be very strong.
SoP & Interests: my SOP was nothing special. i'm interested in labor and public finance right now, but i want options.

Other: Female american. Numerous deparmental scholarships and honors over the years from both the math and econ departments. Graduating with college and departmental honors. National Merit back in the day, not that it probably matters anymore. Applying as a senior in college.


Admissions Decision Results
Admitted w/funding: Wisconsin, Maryland
Admitted w/o funding: Northwestern (w*itlisted for funding but I turned them down before I found out), Michigan
Rejected: Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Berkeley, Yale

I'm going to Wisconsin.


What would I have done differently? Well...I couldn't have gotten better grades. I really think the weakness of my profile was my undergrad university. If I was starting over, I would have gone somewhere else. I could have taken an extra year and taken the PhD sequence here, or worked for a couple years, but I'm not even sure how much those would have mattered. Undergrads don't get to RA (I tried...) Who knows? I'm learning the UW drinking songs :) Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Econ07 2007:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: International, Top in the country
Undergrad GPA: 9.3/10.0
Type of Grad: MSc

GRE: Q800, V550, A4.5
Math Courses:Undergrad: Calculus I-III, 2 semester Lin Algebra, Probability, Statistics, Real Analysis
Grad: Real Analysis II, Measure Theory, Statistics
Econ Courses: Lots of undergrad, core grad sequence in Micro, Macro and Econometrics
Electives: Contract Theory, Finance, Advanced Theory
Letters of Recommendation: All domestic based. Two tenured, two junior. All had PhDs from top 7.

Research Experience: MSc thesis in progress, Undergrad thesis
Research Interests: Theory, Public Finance
SOP: Discussed my background and interests

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Chicago(Ext fund), Columbia($), MIT($, not immediately), Northwestern (waiver, Ext fund), NYU($), Princeton($), Penn($), Yale (lots of $)

Rejections: Chicago GSB-Econ, Stanford GSB-Econ, Harvard, Berkeley, Stanford


What would you have done differently?
Not have applied for the Fulbright. Focused more on the GSBs, emphasizing theory or not have applied to those.

Advice: Relax. Focus on every aspect of the app (LORs, courses, research exp). Now, I believe this forum overemphasizes math (but, still, you should have Real Analysis). Having recomendants that are known by the Adcom seems to be important. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
tina4gre 2007:
Profile:


Gre: 800 Q, 680 V, 4.5 A

GPA: Overall: 3.98, Math: 3.98 (one A-), Econ: 3.98 (one A-).

Classes:
Math: Calculus sequence, Probability, Statistics, Real analysis, Measure Theory, PDE, complex analysis, opeartion research, fourier analysis.

Econ: the usual undergrad courses, grad micro (A-) and grad trade seminar (A)

Type of Undergrad: top 50 in the US with top 25 econ department

Research Experience: nothing really

Teaching Experience: one semester TA for econometrics, one semester TA for Calculus, and one of tutoring in math.


LORs: from 4 professor at my school. all econ.

SoP & Interests: said I was interested in game theory.

Other: female with green card. Applying as a senior in college.



Admissions Decision Results
Accepted
Princeton
Stanford
Northwestern (waitlisted for $)
UPenn
NYU

Minnesota (no $)
Michigan (no $)
Rochester

Rejected
MIT
Berkeley
Yale
Columbia Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Chicunomics 2008:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Honours bachelor's degree at a big international university (econphd.net top 100)
Undergrad GPA: 89/100-ish, 1st of 149
Type of Grad: N/A

Grad GPA: N/A
GRE: 800Q 700V 5.5AWA
Math Courses: Advanced streams of first year linear algebra, calculus, also core undergrad probability, statistics subjects (As in subjects completed so far). For semester before I start: vector analysis, real & complex analysis.
Econ Courses: up to grad level micro, macro, econometrics, auction theory, search theory, industrial organization (all As)

Other Courses: Nothing any adcom would care about.
Letters of Recommendation: 2 full professors, quite senior and relatively well known, 1 junior academic (honours thesis advisor) -- all economics.
Research Experience: Thesis prize; theoretical IO paper (to be submitted to Information Economics and Policy soon co-authored with advisor), co-author on another paper to be submitted to Journal of Labour Economics soon. RA since 2004 - both empirical and theoretical stuff.
Teaching Experience: TA in intro Micro and Macro, advanced undergrad IO and micro.
Research Interests: IO and micro theory.

SOP: Nothing special, just discussed my interests and research.

RESULTS:
Attending: Northwestern University
Acceptances: Northwestern ($$), NYU ($$), Wisconsin ($$), MIT (No $), UCLA (No $)
Waitlists: Yale ($$), Pennsylvania (No $), Princeton ($$)

Rejections: Stanford GSB (EAP), Columbia, Maryland, Harvard, Stanford Economics, Berkeley

What would you have done differently? Nothing really. I did the best I could. I can't help but feel that with another year's math preparation, I would have gotten admits to a better selection of schools. However, NWU was a really high personal preference, so it was worth cutting the math short a year! Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Big Tuna 2008:
PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: Highly ranked US public university with top 25 econ phd program. Majors in economics/philosophy, minor in math.
Undergrad GPA: 4.0
Type of Grad: No masters program; just 1 course while in undergrad.
Grad GPA: 4.0
GRE: 800V/800Q/4.5AW
Math Courses: Calculus I, I, III, linear algebra, real analysis, mathematical modeling, ordinary differential equations, currently enrolled in numerical methods and complex variables.

Econ Courses: intro/intermediate micro/macro, stat for economists, undergrad econometrics, 3 thesis/independent study courses, a bunch of undergrad field courses, and PhD econometrics I.
Other Courses: Mostly a lot of philosophy.
Letters of Recommendation: Three from good people, all of whom have supervised an independent project I've done.
Research Experience: The aforementioned thesis projects, plus 2 years as a research assistant and one empirical paper submitted to a decent (though not top tier) journal. I received an undergraduate research grant from my school to do this paper.
Teaching Experience: Just tutoring.
Research Interests: Applied micro, public finance, maybe econometrics

SOP: I guess it was fine.
Other: I had one withdrawal (W) on my transcript because I dropped abstract algebra; the professor was more boring than anyone else I'd ever had.

RESULTS:
Acceptances: MIT, Stanford, Yale, UChicago, Northwestern, NYU, Columbia, Duke, UMaryland.
Waitlists: Harvard.
Rejections: None.

Pending: None.

What would you have done differently? Probably nothing. I guess Harvard might have let me in instead of waitlisting me if I'd taken more advanced math or gone to an Ivy, but that's hard to tell and I wouldn't have wanted to do too much more work as an undergrad than I actually did; you have to leave time to have some fun. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
gregobad 2008:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Research university w/ top 5 econ program

Undergrad GPA: 4.9/5
Type of Grad: none.
GRE: 770V/800Q/5.5AW
Math Courses: calc I & II, differential equations, linear algebra, probability, linear programming / optimization
Econ Courses: intermediate micro and macro, econometrics, game theory, various field courses

Other Courses: Minor in physics
Letters of Recommendation: Two from econ profs, neither of whom are well-known but both know me well (one was my thesis advisor, another my undergrad advisor). One from a manager at my job (econ consulting firm). Pretty sure all three are very strong recs, but the third probably doesn't count for much because it's non-academic.
Research Experience: Was an RA for a summer in a physics lab. Did an undergrad thesis. Worked for 1.5 years doing semi-relevant stuff at an economic consulting firm - I have a lot of experience with Stata, Matlab, other programming languages
Teaching Experience: tutored undergrads in physics and econ
Research Interests: Game theory, political economy, behavioral economics
SOP: talked about possible research interests and what I had worked on



RESULTS:
Acceptances: MIT, Stanford GSB (political economy), Princeton, Caltech, Berkeley, Northwestern, Chicago
Waitlists: Harvard
Rejections: Stanford economics


What would you have done differently? Not much, really. Maybe taken an academic RA job instead of working in economic consulting, and applied for last year instead of this year. Although, there's nothing like having a boring job to motivate you to get back to school.;) Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
nergal 2008:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: BA in Econ and BS in Math, Double Major in top university in my country
Undergrad GPA: 3.77/4.00 (at the time of application)

Type of Grad: na
Grad GPA: na
GRE: 700V 800Q 5.0AW
Math Courses: Too many :P Highlights: Real Analysis I&II (BA&pending), Complex Analysis I (BB), Calculus of Variations (BA), Mathematics of Finance (graduate math course, AA), Number Theory (CC), Algebra I&II (CB&AA), Differential Equations (AA), Linear Algebra (AA)

Econ Courses: Graduate level Econometrics (AA), Advanced Micro (AA), Public Finance (AA), (Undergrad) Econometrics I&II (AA), Mathematical Statistics I&II (AA), Intermediate Micro and Macro (AA), Game Theory (AA) among other things ...
Other Courses:
Letters of Recommendation: Four LoRs, three from econ professors with whom I studied as RA, and one from a senior math professor. Two of the econ professors are senior and one of them is pretty famous. Submitted three LoRs in each application.
Research Experience: RA for two years in two different projects.

Teaching Experience: TA for Intermediate Micro for one term.
Research Interests: Micro Theory, Game Theory, Political Economy
SOP: Delineated my research interests, talked about my motivation for a phd degree in economics, detailed my research experience

RESULTS:

Acceptances: Caltech ($$), Michigan-Ann Arbor (??), Northwestern ($$), UPenn ($$), Yale ($$)
Waitlists: none
Rejections: Duke, MIT, Stanford
Pending: Princeton, Harvard (most likely r*jected)

What would you have done differently?

I would not have taken the elective Number Theory :yuck: Maybe would have taken the graduate level Topology course.

One problem with our Math department is that the faculty is really stingy with grades! For instance, I was the second ranked student out of some 100+ people in the Complex Analysis I course and I still got BB. The first guy got BA. No AA to no one, no sirrie. The mean of the cumulative grades was 35 (out of 100). This is just one case among many. I hope one of my professors managed to communicate this issue. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Sammy6 2008:
Type of Undergrad: Top 25 Econ
Undergrad GPA: 4.0/4.0

Type of Grad: MA, Top 25 Econ
Grad GPA: 4.0/4.0
GRE: 800Q, 650V, 5.0 AW
Math Courses: calc 1-3, diff eq, linear algebra, stochastic processes, optimization theory, adv. prob/stat (all A's), audit topology, self-study real analysis

Econ Courses: Micro, Macro and Metrics (Intermed, Master's and 1st semester PhD), Health (MA), Trade(MA and PhD), Internat'l Finance (MA), Game Theory (MA)
Letters of Recommendation: 5 very strong (1 Harvard, 1 Chicago, 2 MIT, 1 Michigan). 4 of the professors are very well known. 4 I took classes from, and 2 I worked with.
Research Experience: RA for one year, about to submit co-authored paper with supervisor
Teaching Experience: private tutoring

Research Interests: no f***'in clue
SOP: pretty good, my adviser took a look
Other: female, 21 years old, transfer

RESULTS:

Acceptances: Harvard($$), MIT(money dep*nds on NSF), Stanford($$), Yale($$), UPenn($$, declined), Northwestern($$), Chicago($$)
Waitlists: NYU, Berkeley (declined)
Rejections: Princeton
Pending: NSF/Javits
What would you have done differently? Relaxed during the waiting game :) Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Antonio 2008:
PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: Good Italian University (not Bocconi, but good)
Undergrad GPA: 28/30
Type of Grad: Italian School of Excellence (oooooh)
Ggrad GPA: 30/30
GRE: 800Q 540V 2.5AWA

TOEFL: 107/120
Math Courses (undergrad and grad): Mathematical Methods, Mathematics for Economics I&II, Statistics I&II, Advanced Statistics, Generalised Linear Models.
Econ Courses(undergrad and grad): Advanced Micro/Macro, Game Theory, IO, Advanced Econometrics I&II, Public Finance, Corporate Finance, Applied Econometrics, Financial Economics, Experimental Economics, Advanced Topics in Macro (PhD Course).
Letters of Recommendation: 2 from Economics professors, my graduate academic tutor and a guy from LSE (summer school). The others changed with respect to the target. However they were all economists but one (math).

Research Experience: Undergrad Thesis, one Working Paper and visiting researhcer at ENS-PSE for my grad thesis.
Teaching Experience: Undergraduate Micro.
Research Interests: Applied Micro, IO and Applied Econometrics.
SOP: Pretty good...I think.

Other: GMAT; LSE Summer school (A+); Visiting for 6 months at University of Southampton in UK. Italian, 22 (almost 23).

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Berkeley ($$), Northwestern ($$), BC ($), Toulouse (M2).
Waitlists: NYU.
Rejections: MIT, Harvard, UChicago, Yale, Stanford, Princeton, UCSD, Brown, Duke, UPenn.

Pending: BU.
What would you have done differently?
I really have not understood almost anything!
My results show a lot of randomness (i.e. MIT was wrong in rejecting me) and/or luck (i.e. Berkeley was wrong in accepting me).
On one hand I think that waiting another year, with another master from a well reputed European University and with two more well known LORs I could have had some better shots for Cambridge MA or Princeton.
On the other hand, I could say that I have been very lucky and that I must take this opportunity as soon as possible.
Just some advices for European and, more in dept, Italian guys since this forum is too American-oriented: there is always a trade off between time (apply just during my last year of school) and odds (wait one year in order to improve my chances). And only you can decide upon this. You can speak with your profs and they will suggest you. But in the end it is just a matter of your own preferences.
However I have learnt two things:

1) Getting accepted in a very good US School (Berkeley or Northwestern) is less difficult than I used to think.
2) Getting accepted in a TOP US School (MIT or Princeton) is more difficult than I used to think. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
VGC 2008:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Good Latin American university
Undergrad GPA: 5.9/7

Type of Grad: Same Latin American university as undergrad.
Ggrad GPA: 6.4/7
GRE: 790Q 510V 3.0AWA
TOEFL: 108/120

Math Courses (undergrad and grad): Calculus I & II, Algebra I & II, Probability, Mathematical Statistics, Analysis, Mathematical Economics (dynamic systems and optimal control)
Econ Courses(grad): Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, Game Theory, Industrial Organization, Econometrics, Aplied Econometrics, Financial Econometrics, Financial Economics, Enviorenmental Economics.
Letters of Recommendation: Strong LOR from economics professor who know me well.

Research Experience: Master's Thesis, Working Paper, and several research assistanships. Mostly theoretical.
Teaching Experience: Undergraduate Principles of finance.
Research Interests: finance, auction theory.

SOP: I invested a lot of time in it.

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Stanford GSB (finance)($$), MIT Sloan (Financial Economics)($$), Harvard (Business Economics)($$), Northwestern Kellogg (Finance)($$), NYU Stern(Finance)($$), Princeton (Economics)($$), Chicago (Economics)($$).
Waitlists: Berkeley Haas (Finance).

Rejections: Harvard (Economics), Wharton (Finance), Columbia GSB (Finance), Duke Fuqua (Finance).
Pending: MIT (Economics), Chicago GSB (Finance).
What would you have done differently?
I really have applied to fewer places. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
eqtisadi 2008:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Econ,Philosophy,Politics from an Israeli university
Undergrad GPA: 94%
Type of Grad: Econ in the same university

Grad GPA: 96%
GRE: Q800, V450, A5.0
Math Courses: Calculus, (simple and calculus-based) Statistics, Linear algebra and advanced calculus, as well as two advanced logic courses by the department of philosophy (all 90+). I took Real Analysis too but I am not going to do the test. It was much more fun doing it without the pressure.
Econ Courses: All around: undergrad: intro to econ I & II, price theory I & II, macro I & II, development, econ history, intro to econometrics, honors students seminar. MA: micro, macro I & II, industrial organization, econometrics I-III, econ history. All 90+

Letters of Recommendation: 1 from a very known professor, 2 from professors who are pretty known in their respective fields and 1 from a pretty young professor
Research Experience: RA for the first professor mentioned above
Teaching Experience: quite a few econ courses for BA, but I don't think it mattered.
Research Interests: Too many. I have to narrow them down.
SOP: 500 words (or whatever was the limitation) about why I want to do research in economics and how I decided that.
Other: Nice set of teeth.


RESULTS:
Admitted: Berkeley, NYU, Yale, Columbia, Northwestern, Chicago, Stanford, Princeton
Waitlisted: Harvard
Rejected: MIT

What would I have done differently? Nothing. Maybe get an American citizenship and apply for the NSF, but seriously, I'm very very happy with the choices I have. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
crutchboy3 2008:
PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: Top 20 Private University
Undergrad GPA: 3.81
Type of Grad: None
Grad GPA: N/A
GRE: 800Q/600V/5 A

Math Courses: Honors Calculus I-IV (A's), Honors Linear Algebra I,II (B+,A-), Intro to Probability (A), Honors Algebra III (A), Honors Analysis I (A-), Graduate Topology (A-), Graduate Optimization (A), Measure Theory (B), Functional Analysis (B+), Galois Theory (B+), Number Theory (A)
Econ Courses: Intermediate Micro/Macro (A), Game Theory (A), Econometrics (A), Graduate Econ Prob and Stats (A), Grad Micro I (A),
Letters of Recommendation: Two professors that had taken several classes from and had done research with, One that had just taken classes from, all econ
Research Experience: Math REU, Summer REU to begin work on thesis project, Honors thesis, 2 years of RA
Teaching Experience: Some tutoring

Research Interests: Micro theory, game theory
SOP: Nothing Special

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Northwestern ($)(Attending), NYU ($), Duke ($), UIUC ($), Caltech($), Chicago (Tuition Waiver + Health), Wisconsin (No $), Penn (No $)
Waitlists: Penn (Eventually Accepted, no $)

Rejections: Harvard, MIT, Yale, Columbia, Stanford, Princeton Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
touchwood08 2008:
PROFILE
Type of Undergrad: Good European university (Political Science)

Undergrad GPA: 4.00/4.00
Type of Grad (3 years program): Good European University (Economics)
Ggrad GPA: 4.00/4.00
GRE: 780Q 610V 4.5AWA
TOEFL: 102/100

Math Courses (grad): Probability, Statistics, Mathematical Economics (calculus and static optimization), Dynamic Optimization
Econ Courses (grad): Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, Econometrics, Various Fields.
Letters of Recommendation: 4 strong letters. One letter from a very well known professor.
Research Experience: Undergraduate honor thesis (applied econometrics. awarded a national price) + working paper on more theoretical stuff (not so polished at the time of applications). Research assistant for the very well known professor.
Teaching Experience: TA in Introduction to Economics (undergraduate) and in Econometrics I (graduate)

Research Interests: Macro-Finance; Corporate Finance; Applied Econometrics.
SOP: ...not enough time to write a good one.
Other info: male, 25 y/o

RESULTS:
Acceptances (w*itlist): UPenn ($$ attending), Northwestern ($$, declined), LSE Mrs./track 2 ($$, declined), BU (no $$, declined), NYU (w*itlisted, declined).

Rejections: Harvard, MIT, Chicago, Yale, UCLA, LBS,
What would you have done differently?
My greatest regret is to not have applied to Princeton. I was informed I ended up at the border at Chicago so I could have taken a chance there. Maybe I would have spent more time polishing my research paper and writing a good SOP. Anyway, I am very pleased with my outcomes and I believe Penn is a very good match with my interests. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
econphilomath 2008:
Type of Undergrad: B.A. in Economics from top institution in my country.

Type of Grad: M.A. in Economics from the same institution
GPA: Graduated 1st in my class, both programs.
GRE: 800Q, 730V, 4.5AWA
TOFEL: 118/120
Courses: Tons of econ, some math, no formal real analysis.

TA: Lots of undergrad macro courses and some graduate macro courses.
Teaching: I teach undergrad macro.
Research: Several published papers. All applied. (average to low/mediocre national and international journals)
RA: Current job is as an RA at Central Bank and lecturer at my university.
LORS: One senior, one semi-senior and one junior. I know them all really well (for over two years) and with all I have co-authored different research.


Interests: Macroeconomics, Labor and Development.

SOP: Tried to be serious, signal I know what I'm getting into. No BS, no talking about whats in my CV, no naming professors and not very long.

Schools: Shooting for the top 10 schools.

Other: Male, 27


RESULTS:
Attending: Yale ($$)
Acceptances: NorthWestern ($$), Columbia ($$), UMinn ($$), UPenn (:2cents:), UChicago (:2cents:)
Waitlists: Harvard and MIT. Later rejected.
Rejections: Princeton, Berkeley, Stanford, NYU.


What would you have done differently?
Applied earlier. Would not have stressed so much and spent less time on TM!:) The extra stuff on your CV doesn't make all that much of a difference. Past decent grades and GRE, basic math requirements, its all LORs. Its how you get the LORS that differs among applicants. Randomness that I was worried about was confirmed but its not that big once you know the underlying decision making structure.
Also I would have gone with more famous professors LORs who didn't know me as well, but who were willing to write beaming letters, instead of my junior professor/coauthor.

ALSO wait-lists suck. They do move around (not for me) but the wait is terrible.

Last Recommendation: Try as hard as you can to go to fly-outs. It can make a huge difference when you have to choose on the margin. Talk with professors and students as much as you can. It helped me a lot.

EDIT: See my buddy asianecon's next post. To avoid confusion, I recommend visiting (something usually done at fly-outs). However as asianecon suggests, it might be more informative to go on a regular day and sit in at classes talk with people etc as he has done and skip the marketing. Either way try and go get a feel for the program in person.



Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
asianecon 2008:
I'll just be following my friend econphilomath...

Type of Undergrad: B.A. in Economics from a top institution in Southeast Asia.

Type of Grad: M.A. in Economic Theory and Metrics from France
GPA: Graduated 1st in my class for undergrad and 2nd for masters
GRE: 800Q, 610V, 4.5AWA
TOFEL: 114/120
Courses: Tons of econ, some math, no formal real analysis (only audited)

TA: None
Teaching: None
Research: 1 published in IJIO; Honours and MA thesis
RA: RA during undergrad; RA right now for profs in a top 5 program
LORS: 1 really senior (Econometric Society Fellow), 2 junior but quite famous, 1 from undergrad (co-author)


Interests: Microeconometrics + (Statistical) Decision Theory + (a little bit of) Mechanism Design/Game Theory --> IO applications

SOP: Not so good I guess. Not focused enough and all over the place. Kinda sounded like I didn't know what I wanted to do.

Schools: Shooting for the top 10 schools.

Other: Male, 25


RESULTS:
Attending: Northwestern ($$$$)
Acceptances: Yale ($$$$$$$....), Chicago GSB ($$$), Stanford ($$), UChicago ($)
Waitlists: None
Rejections: Harvard, HBS (interviewed) MIT, Princeton, UCSD

Never heard anything: Berkeley
What would you have done differently?
Made my SOP tighter. Maybe tried to impress my current RA bosses more, but I'm not really an applied/Stata guy so that won't be fun. An adcom head told me that they would've accepted me even without the current RA job so I don't know if it really helped (a friend of mine even speculates that it might have hurt me since it's not aligned w/ my interests).

Contrary to econphilomath, don't put too much weight on the flyout. Try to visit the school on an ordinary day and see what goes on. I didn't go to a real flyout at NWU (not even the special TM day) but I decided to go there nonetheless, after visiting thrice and attending classes and seminars.

Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
mysherona 2008:
My turn!

Type of Undergrad: Economics from Philippine university

Type of Grad: Mathematics from the same university (will not complete degree)
GPA: I can't convert it so it's useless
GRE: 800Q, 760V, 6.0AWA
TOEFL: 118/120
Courses: Typical in the programs I took; nothing special

Teaching: A year of intro calculus
Research: First prize for undergrad paper
RA: Small jobs here and there
LORS: Former econ profs
Interests: International, Monetary

SOP: Used the same thing for all the schools
Others: Male, 22

RESULTS:
Attending: Columbia ($)
Other acceptances: Northwestern ($), Duke ($), Georgetown ($), master's programs at Oxbridge, LSE and Toulouse ($)

Waitlists: Berkeley, Penn, Brown---all rejected me in the end
Rejections: the rest of the top 10 econ programs, UCLA, UCSD
Comments: I was very lucky so I'm happy with the way it turned out. If I could start over again I'd probably do my BA abroad.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
99luftballoons 2009:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Large Private University, Top 10 Econ/Top 5 Math
Undergrad GPA: 3.82 (4.0 Econ, 3.9 Math)
Type of Grad:

Grad GPA:
GRE: 790Q, 640V, 6.0AWA
Math Courses: Calc Sequence, Linear Algebra, Number Theory, Real Analysis I, Real Analysis II, Algebra I, Combinatorics, Topology, Math Stats, Grad. Linear
Econ Courses: Intros, Micro Theory, Macro Theory, Econometrics, Senior Seminar, International Econ (1 yr), Organizational Analysis, Finance, Math Econ
Other Courses: Ind. study in Game Theory and Math Econ, Intro Operations Research

Letters of Recommendation: 2 really good ones, 1 fairly good one
Research Experience: Spent a summer RAing and trying to write a paper
Teaching Experience: Grading
Research Interests: Micro theory, decision theory, game theory, mech. design, experimental... list keeps growing actually

SOP: Wrote about what I liked, what I'd done, I got comments on being "very specific" in my SOP from schools that I've gotten in to

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Harvard, Caltech, Rochester, Cornell, PSU, Northwestern, UMinn
Waitlists: UPenn

Rejections: Princeton, Stanford GSB, Stanford Econ, Berkeley
Pending: NYU, BU
What would you have done differently? I would have applied to less safeties, but that's really an ex-post judgment. I think I had a good year, though Stanford GSB was my dream school, but oh well, life goes on.

Comments: I think italos is right, LOR is everything! Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
scrobles 2009:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: BA Econ and Math, MIT
Undergrad GPA: 4.7/5.0 (equivalent to 3.7)

Type of Grad: none
GRE: 800Q/740V/5.5W
Math Courses: Calc 1&2, Linear Algebra, Probability, Statistics, Real Analysis, Intro to Discrete Math, Modern Algebra, Intro to Stochastic Modeling (Grad course). About half As and half Bs, with more As in the later years.
Econ Courses: Intro and Intermediate Micro and Macro, Econometrics, Education, Development, Behavioral, Public Policy, Environmental, Econ research class. Mostly As.

Other Courses: Chinese
Letters of Recommendation: 3 profs with PhDs from MIT. The first was my development teacher and I RA'd for her a couple of semesters. I worked for the second two doing field research for 2 years after graduating.
Research Experience: Working at a econ research NGO for 2 years after college. RA for a bit in college.
Teaching Experience: Tutoring probability course in university, and general tutoring stuff.
Research Interests: Development, Behavioral, applied micro

SOP: My experiences and my interests. Why I like econ.
Other:

RESULTS:
Acceptances: UCSD, UCLA, UC Davis ARE, Northwestern, Chicago, Duke, USC, Berkeley, Harvard, Stanford
Waitlists: nope

Rejections: MIT, Columbia, Brown


What would you have done differently?
My results were great, I think mostly because of my LORs so I think my after-college job really saved me. If I had to do it again, I would get As in key courses (mostly math) and do an economics thesis, but this is just theoretical since it wasn't necessary. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
wind up bird 2009:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Large Public University, Top 50 Econ
Undergrad GPA: 3.82
Type of Grad: Masters in Statistics at same school

Grad GPA: 3.75
GRE: 800Q, 700V, 5.5AWA
Math Courses: Calc Sequence, Linear Algebra, Intro to Abstract Math (Baby proofs), Cryptology (Baby Number Theory), Real Analysis I & II, Algebra I, Lots of probability and stats.
Econ Courses: Intro, Intermediate sequences, Econometrics, Public econ, Game Theory, Asymmetric Info, Economic Anthropology, Economic History (graduate), Empirical Methods (graduate), Math camp

Other Courses: Sociology of Sexuality
Letters of Recommendation: 1 Berkeley, 1 UCSD, 1 Stanford. All apparently pretty strong.
Research Experience: 2+ Years of RAing, summer research internship at Fed, crappy honors thesis and undergrad presentations
Teaching Experience: Tutoring for intermdiate micror, TA-ing for stats (only made it to my Cornell application)

Research Interests: Micro theory, decision theory, game theory, mech. design, experimental, economic history, social choice, public economics, etc etc. Short answer is "not macro"
SOP: It was kind of bad, I'm not going to lie. Mostly I tried to demonstrate how I have been gearing myself up for research. Then the last paragraph was tailored for each school; I dropped names at all of them.

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Caltech($$$), Northwestern(WL$), UCSD(No$), BU($$$), University of Illinois - Urbana Champaign($$), UNC-Chapel Hill (?$), Boston College($$), UW-Seatte(WL$)
Waitlists: None! Awesome.

Rejections: Berkeley, Stanford, Harvard, MIT, Chicago, UCLA, Cornell
What would you have done differently? Besides working harder in school? Probably nothing. I have an acceptance with funding at my dream school and have some other ego-boosting admits as well.

Comments: Italos is right, LOR is everything ;)

Might as well document some of my weird admissions cycle happenings as well:


- Boston College sends me an email saying I am not being offered admission because I will get into "superior" schools.
- UW-Seattle pulls the same thing
- Northwestern rejects me, then admits me a week and a half later. Looks like my one top 10 admit really did involve a clerical error.

Attending: Caltech! Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
mermel 2009:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: B.S. Math, B.S. Econ honors from top 40 public school, Math semester abroad at strong Russian math program

Undergrad GPA: 3.94, Econ 4.0, Math 3.93
GRE: 800Q, 600V, 5.5AWA
Math Courses: Multivar Calc, DiffEq, Number Theory, Matrices (Linear Algebra), Real Analysis, Abstract Algebra, Probability, Topology, Complex Analysis, Computability and Complexity (all A's), Combinatorics (B), Integer Partitions (B+)
Econ Courses: All those required for undergrad econ, was in Honors Economics program my senior year

Letters of Recommendation: 3 from econ professors, one from Econ PhD partner at the firm where I work, PhD's from Chicago, Princeton, Harvard, and Berkeley, 2 I am sure are very strong, and others are probably strong as well
Research Experience: Not any good research experience undergrad. Have been working in econ consulting since, so that sort of counts.
Teaching Experience: just tutoring
Research Interests: Micro theory, game theory, decision theory

SOP: I'm not really sure how to judge my SOP, I think it told a good story of why I want to get econ PhD.
Concerns: Lack of research experience, I had a withdrawal passing from graduate level analysis when I decided to do a second major in econ rather than doing a masters in math. I stated this in many of my essays, so hopefully that's ok.
Other: Working for past 2.5 years in economics litigation consulting

RESULTS:

Attending: Northwestern
Admitted, Declined: UPenn
Waitlists: Princeton(eventually rejected), Chicago(Admitted without funding for first 2 years)
Rejections: Harvard, MIT, NYU, Berkeley, Stanford, NSF

What would you have done differently?
I think some RA'ing as an undergraduate would have helped, but I am very happy with Northwestern and don't really have any regrets. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Lurker_ 2009:
Type of Undergrad: McGill University (B.A. Math and Econ)

Undergrad GPA: 3.89/4.00 overall
Type of Grad: Cornell, 1st Year in the Econ PhD (2007-2008)
Grad GPA: 3.84/4.30
GRE: 800Q, 590V, 5.5AWA
Math Courses: Multivariable Calculus, Advanced Calculus, Analysis 1, Linear Algebra, Abstract Algebra, ODE, Differential Geometry, Numerical Analysis, Theory of Interest (All A's), Analysis 2 (B+), Analysis 3 (B+), Analysis 4 (B), Complex Analysis (A-)

Econ Courses: Undergrad: Intermediate Micro, Statistics, Intermediate Macro, Econometrics, Advanced Theory (All A's). Grad: Micro I, Micro II, Metrics I, Mathematical Econ (All A+'s), Macro I (A), Metrics II (A), Macro II (C-).
Letters of Recommendation: Two junior and one well-known.
Research Experience: Part-time RA for one year at Cornell and Full-time RA this year at the NBER.
Research Interests: Theory, Behavioral Economics

SOP: Awkward.
Concerns: The lack of tractability of current behavioral models.

RESULTS:
Attending: Going back to Cornell.
Admitted, Declined: Northwestern

Waitlists: Princeton (Ultimately Rejected) Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
funkychinamen 2009:
PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: Top 10 Econ program, transfer from top 40 Econ program, Econ major
Undergrad GPA: 3.892 /4.000
Type of Grad: None
Grad GPA: N/A
GRE: 780Q 480V 4.5AWA

Math Courses: Calc I, Calc II, Calc III, Vector Calc, Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, Probability Theory, Linear Algebra - proof-based, Intro to Proofs, Real Analysis, Math Stats (Spring)
Econ Courses: Intermed Micro, Intermed Macro, Topics in Macro, Analysis of Econ Data, I.O., International Micro, International Macro, Labor, Intro to Mathematical Econ, Game Theory, Econometrics, Grad Micro I, Applied Econometrics (Spring)
Letters of Recommendation: One from an associate professor in the Ag Econ department who I researched with, one from an assistant professor at Business School who I researched with, one from professor who taught grad course
Research Experience: One year with an associate professor in the Ag Econ department, One semester with assistant professor in Business school, senior thesis in progress

Teaching Experience: None
Research Interests: I.O., Micro Theory, Labor
SOP: Looked back at it the other day. I HOPE they didn’t read it.:(
RESULTS:

Acceptances:
USC Marshall ($), Duke ($), Northwestern ($), UCSD (No $), Texas (No $), Boston U (No $)
Waitlists:
UPenn (rejected), Caltech (rejected)
Rejections:
Yale, Princeton, Berkeley, Stanford, Columbia, MIT, Minnesota, Maryland, UCLA Anderson, Harvard, Michigan, NYU, Cornell, Brown
What would you have done differently?

I would have studied harder for the GRE, finished a major in applied math, and applied to UCLA econ.

(Not-so) Fun Facts:
-Not accepted to any Ivy League school (UPenn waitlist)
-Not accepted to any school that used the Embark system (Caltech waitlist)

Attending: Northwestern! Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Visible Hand 2009:
PROFILE:

Type of Applicant: International, big continental european country.

Type of Undergrad: Good public university but with a very bad school of Economics. Student of the university honor college (more selective than Ivy) which offers courses on its own, including in heterodox Economics.

Undergrad GPA: Overall: ~3.9/4.0; Economics: 4.0(+)/4.0; Math/Stat: 4.0(++)/4.0.
(+), (++) and ~ are due to different conversion methods that can be applied.

Type of Grad: Two-years Master in Economics (attending 2nd year), best public university of the country, 2nd department of Economics in the country, best in my fields. Enrolled in the first year of run of the program: it was brand new! Also student of the university honor college (less selective and prestigious than undergraduate's).
Grad GPA: 4.0-ε/4.0 or 4.0(+)/4.0 according to different conversion methods.


GRE: 790Q 530V 5.0AWA - TOEFL: 110

Math Courses: Several courses in Math and Stat covering all the basic Calculus/Analysis/Linear Algebra/ODE/Optimization/Measure stuff up to Simon-Blume (Vol. 2) and De La Fuente level, as well as Probability/Inference/Multivariate Stats up to Casella-Berger.
All full grades with mention.


Econ Courses: All the basic undergraduate Micro/Macro/Metrics stuff plus some applied/heterodox/history/quantitative courses. At Master Level, Micro I/Macro I/Metrics I (taking II for each in the fall) plus: Topics in Economic Theory, Economics of Innovation, Competition Policy.
All full grades, often with mention, apart from graduate Macro I (~A–).

Other Courses: Undergraduate courses in Accounting, Management and Law; graduate Corporate Finance. I have lower grades on these on average.

Letters of Recommendation: 1 MIT, 1 Toulouse, 1 Louvain (from the Master program), 1 Sussex (from my undergraduate honor college). I know ex-post, they were good but not too informative (apart from the Toulouse one maybe); the Sussex one was maybe not very good in the "fill the form" part. They were not always all of them four on every place I applied to.


Research Experience: Started to work on Master Thesis in theoretical I.O.; some short dissertations and empirical projects in the past (none of them valuable).

Teaching Experience: In line of principle, not possible in my country before Master graduation. Starting this march, however, I have assisted my MIT Ph.D. recommender in the graduate course in Econometrics taught by him.

Research Interests: Industrial Organization, Behavioral Economics, Microeconometrics.

Statement of Purpose: A synthetic overview of my academic life and interests.


Other: I obtained full scholarships from both honor colleges I have been student of. Moreover, I have been awarded 2-years full funding (tuition+stipend) to attend a top PhD in Economics, by a board of economists from a prestigious private foundation in my country; most schools I applied to knew this. So basically I would have had ($$$$) in every school had admitted me, at least for the start.


RESULTS:

Attending: Berkeley

Acceptances, declined: Northwestern, Chicago, Stern, UWM, LSE, TSE


Waitlists, eventually rejected: MIT

Rejections: Princeton, Stanford, Yale, UCSD, NYU, CMU, HBS, Wharton (Mgmt), Caltech, EUI


General Comments: If you are an international applicant and the institutions you come from are not so well known, luck and connections really matter alot, even if you have good LoRs from famous economists and a brilliant CV. I know that MIT, for instance, preferred two other students with external funding from my country over me, and they both just came from the two institutions with more reputation in sending students to top Ph.D. programs (but one of them I know, she is really a genius, 780Q). External funding might help, but it depends on the school: for some it really does (MIT, Chicago) but for others it does not (Stanford, Yale). It's not easy to decline Northwestern offer! But, in the end, I am happy with Berkeley.



What would you have done differently? Definitely, attended another undergraduate institution, the best in my country, which is very well established in sending students to top Ph.D. programs. I would have not been funded as I was, at least for the first years, but ex-post I would have had definitely very good shots for Cambridge, MA. My parents had the money, I had been admitted, so I really regret it. I should have also tried to do more research with my recommenders in the first Master year: it hurted me, they did not know me enough well (they also more or less directly told it to me). Perhaps I should have worked more in the final undergraduate years to produce a good analytical working paper to be sent as a writing sample: it may help in some schools, I think; but there was not much I could do as my undergraduate institution was a mostly empirical/heterodox place (not fitting too bad with Berkeley!). Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
calgrad08 2009:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: UC Berkeley, double major in Economics and Applied Math (with high honors)

Undergrad GPA: 3.9
GRE: 800Q, 710V, 5.5A
Math Courses (Undergrad level): multivariable calc, linear algebra (2 semesters), abstract algebra, numerical analysis, real analysis, complex analysis
Econ Courses (Undergrad level): micro, advanced micro, macro, metrics, applied metrics, game theory, development, psych & econ

Econ Courses (PhD level): metrics (2 semesters)
Other Courses: probability theory; operations research courses for applied math concentration
Letters of Recommendation: 1 from prof for whom I’d worked for years as an RA, 1 from advanced micro prof, and 1 from grad metrics prof
Research Experience: 3 years (including summers) working for Berkeley profs; 1 summer at Treasury Dept; 1 year at Federal Reserve Bank
Teaching Experience: none

Research Interests: metrics, applied micro
SOP: nothing special, and I didn't customize it at all for the different schools
Other: submitted NSF app but didn’t win

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Berkeley, Chicago, Michigan, Northwestern, Penn, Princeton, Stanford, UCSD, Wisconsin

Waitlists: Brown
Rejections: Harvard, MIT, Yale
Pending: none

Attending: Princeton

What would you have done differently?

--Senior honors thesis, both for the sake of submitting it along with my apps and being able to say that I'd done one, and for the good practice it would have been to have done my own research. I also would have tried to coauthor something with my profs, or at least get more involved in the analysis/writing of their papers rather than the (mostly) data-prep work I did for them as an RA.
--Attend office hours. I got quite good letters from my recommenders, but I can't help but think it would have been good to get to know them (and other professors) better.
--Grad-level micro. Metrics was great and I would certainly take it again if I was doing things over, but it would have been nice to have had micro under my belt as well.

But honestly I've had great luck in the admissions process and I'm thrilled to be heading to Princeton this fall. These "things I would have done differently" are really minor in the grand scheme of things, and with so much noise in the process anyway, would hardly have made much of a difference. The admissions game is as much a mystery to me now as it was before I applied! Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
canecon 2009:
U-grad: UBC, Econ (Hons)
Grad: Queen's, Econ
Ugrad GPA: 3.5 (3.98 upper-econ, 3.98 math (excluding failed calc 1))
Grad GPA: 4.0? (Not sure how it works here)
GRE: 800q 480v 5.0 AWA (despite the awful verbal I am native English speaker / English background)
Courses:
Grad:
PhD Micro I (A), Econometrics MA (A), Public MA (A)
Ugrad:
Econ:
Hon micro/macro I (A+'s) Game Theory (Hon) A, Hon Macro II A+, + intro metrics I/II (A+) + lots electives (mostly A+)
Honours Thesis, Advanced Macro, Econometrics - A+'s
Math:
Calc 1 (F first time then A), Calc 2, linear, multivariable, ODE's, probability(calc based), intro proof A+'s, real analysis A
Research:
Thesis, which is being developed into a paper with Advisor (not in a publishable state yet though)
Was RA for one summer.
LOR:
2 Assistant Profs, Should be good since one is advisor/co-author, the other I took multiple classes with and was RA for.
1 Professor for PhD Micro class - 1/2 the letters will be mediocre, other half should be decent (final grades were available).
SOP: Decent?
Interests:
Political Economy, Development (Micro)
Applying To:
MIT, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Yale, Pennsylvania, Berkeley, UCLA, Columbia, NYU, Chicago, Northwestern, LSE, Oxford
My Concerns:
My first 2 years of undergrad are poor, failed calc 1. Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Rejections:
applying07 2007: PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: Large Private
Undergrad GPA: 3.81 (Econ: 3.9, Math: 4.0)
GRE: 800Q, 560 V, 6.0A
Math Courses: Calc I-III, Lin Alg, Prob Theory
Econ Courses: Principles, Intermediate Theories, Stats, Intl. Econ, Econ Thought, Environmental Econ, Econometrics, Intl. Econ Relations, Senior Thesis

Other Courses: A bunch of other International Studies class (poli sci, sociology, etc.)
Letters of Recommendation: Associate Prof. (Ph.D. MIT) thesis advisor and teacher, Assistant Prof (Ph.D. BC) Econometrics Teacher, Associate Math Prof. Lin Alg Teacher
Research Experience: Senior Thesis, summer of consulting as an RA
Teaching Experience: Tutoring

Research Interests: Trade and Development
SOP: Probably nothing too special, described career goals, why wanted to study econ and bits about each school


RESULTS:
Acceptances:
Duke

Michigan State
Boston College
UNC-CH
Colorado

Rejections:
MIT
Northwestern
Brown

UMich
Columbia
What would you have done differently? Maybe waited a year and taken more math or worked doing a research job to fill in those gaps. Pretty happy with how turned out though
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Prometheus_Econ 2007: PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: Top 50 public university
Undergrad GPA: 4.0 GRE: 800Q, 610V, 5.0AWA
Math Courses (all As):
Undergrad Math: 3 semesters Calculus, two semesters proof-based Linear Algebra, Intro to Statistics, Probability Theory, Differential Equations, Intro to Topology, Analysis 1, Game Theory and Math. Programming, Proof Writing, Stochastic Processes (IP), Analysis 2 (IP)
Econ Courses (all As):

Undergrad Econ: Intermediate Micro, Intermediate Macro, Intro Econometrics, Game Theory, Experimental Economics
Grad Econ: Quantitative Methods, Micro 1, 2nd year seminar in behavioral economics
Letters of Recommendation: 1 math professor, 2 econ professors, from 3 different universities, all advised me on research, only one I took classes with
Research Experience: Summer REU program, independent research in mathematical finance, honors thesis, gave 2 seminar presentations and 1 poster presentation
Teaching Experience: Calculus 1 (undergraduate TA), lots of tutoring

Research Interests: Microeconomic Theory, Financial Economics
SOP: emphasized research experience, and explained how I became interested in economics, customized last paragraph
Other: Applied for NSF (got honorable mention), got several departmental scholarships and awards in mathematics

RESULTS:
Acceptances:
(with fellowship)

NYU
Caltech
UPenn (after being w*itlisted for funding about 2 weeks)
Carnegie Mellon Tepper
Johns Hopkins
University of Michigan (external funding)
Boston University
(with TAship)
Penn State

UT Austin
(without funding first year)
Wisconsin
UCSD

Rejections:
Princeton
Stanford GSB
Harvard

Harvard Business School
Northwestern
Berkeley

Waitlisted:
MIT
Stanford

What would you have done differently?

I would have applied to Yale as well, and perhaps applied to less safety schools.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
econchick06 2007: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Large, not highly ranked public university
Major: Economics Minor: Mathematics
Undergrad GPA: Overall: 3.96, Econ: 3.98, Math: 3.85

GRE: 780 Q, 600 V, 5.0 A
Math Courses: Calc I through III, Diff Equations (A+), Discrete Math (A+), Foundations of Math (Intro to Proofs) (A-), Matrix Algebra (A+), Linear Algebra (A), Probability (A), Advanced Calc (A, only A in the class)
Econ Courses: Undergrad:
Int Micro (A+), Int Macro (A), IO (A+), Urban/Regional (A+), Public Choice (A+), Math Econ (A), Econometrics (A+), Development Econ (A), International Economics (A), Money and Banking (A+)
Grad (taken as an undergrad):

Macroeconomic Theory (A), Mathematical Economics I (A-)
Other Courses: Intro Stats I and II (A+, A+), Intro to Comp Statistical Packags (SAS) (A+)
Letters of Recommendation:3 econ profs- 1 who I RA'd for and co-authored w/, 1 from grad macro prof, 1 from department chair.
Research Experience: RA for 1 year for one of my professors/TA this
Two sort-of publications (co-authored with professor,1 empirical paper in non-peer reviewed journal, and one study funded by a think tank)

Completed a thesis-type paper (we don't have a formal thesis program), will be submitting for publication shortly (and I did submit this paper to the schools I applied to as evidence of my research aptitude)
Teaching Experience: TA one semester
Research Interests: mostly applied micro
SOP: talked about my experiences with and passion for research, first para was tailored to each school
Other: founded economics club


RESULTS:
Acceptances:
full funding:
Chicago (Will be attending :D)
Rochester
Duke

University of Maryland
University of Virginia
Johns Hopkins
no funding:
UCLA
University of Pennsylvania (accepted off w*itlist)
Waitlists:
Stanford

Rejections:
Harvard, Berkeley, UCSD, Michigan, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, NYU, Northwestern, MIT
What would you have done differently?
Hmm.. I think it turned out pretty well, I probably applied to too many schools but I am happy with the outcome and wouldn't really change anything. At least I don't have any "what ifs"!
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
EconChump 2007: GRE: 800Q 610V 6.0AWA

GPA: BSc Econ (1st Class), MPhil Econ (Pass, but near-miss on distinction)

Classes:
Math: 2 years of calc, linear algebra, stats; pure math - all ug.
Econ: usual ug courses & electives; grad micro, macro, metrics, adv theory, IO.


Type of Institution: LSE bsc econ; Oxford mphil econ.

Research Experience: distinction-class mphil thesis in theoretical IO; 2x6-month long RAs (financial econometrics & environmental science); macroeconomic forecasting in research division of top-tier investment bank (recently published in top think-tank journal).

Teaching Experience: 1 year leading ug micro theory tutorials during mphil.


LORs: 3 econ profs, all fairly well published.

Interests: international, macro, industrial org, applied econometrics; pretty much anything other than micro theory.

Other: 23 yo international male; currently working as research associate in economics for i-bank, directly under former economics professor (now uk chief economist).

Admissions Decision Results


accept (and attending): NYU Stern (Econ PhD)

reject: Harvard, Yale, Berkeley, Stanford, MIT, Penn, Duke, Columbia, Northwestern, Chicago, Princeton, UCLA

Moral of the story: Be careful who writes your recs. I got a rec from a very famous mathematical economist professor that did (and probably could) not say I was outstanding. i did so in order to make up for a somewhat deficient math background (i.e. no analysis). i confirmed this with Stern who said that my recs (they only needed the other two) were outstanding. A mediocre rec is a real problem if you are only applying to top schools. (Note that I didnt apply to any more safeties as my outside option was a fully-funded dphil at oxford). If I could do it all again I would get a rec from someone that was ridiculously positive even if this person was unknown/junior. that said, i am very happy with the Stern admit and the ball is very much in my court now. in addition, i probably wouldnt waste so much time on this blog worrying that i dont have topographanalysis on my transcript.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
anothereconstudent 2007: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Top 50 research University with unknown econ dept.
Undergrad GPA: 3.97 cumulative
Type of Grad: Straight from undergrad
Grad GPA: N/A

GRE: 780Q, 690V, 5.5AWA
Math Courses:
Calc I-III (A/A/B+), Linear Algebra (A-), Diff EQ (A), Time Series & Spatial Analysis (A), Prob & stats (A-), Real Analysis (current)
Econ Courses:
Intermediate Micro/Macro, Adv Micro, about 12 subject courses and econometrics. (4.0)
Letters of Recommendation: Econ profs - senior thesis advisor, 2 profs I had TA'd for and had in at least 2 classes. They were pretty strong.

Research Experience: Senior thesis, research assignments at work
Teaching Experience: TA for Intro Micro/Macro
Research Interests: Applied Micro, applied IO
SOP: Fairly generic
Other: Won award for best thesis, best econ student. Extensive programming experience in SAS and stata. Economics-related job.


RESULTS:
Acceptances:
UIUC (attending)
OSU
Georgetown

all funded

Rejections:

MIT
Berkeley
Chicago
Columbia
Northwestern
Maryland
UT Austin

What would you have done differently?

Applied to more schools, especially schools in the 5-20 range. Taken real analysis sooner.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Mobil 2007: Profile:
GRE: 800Q/520V/3.5A
TOEFL: 263/300, 4.5/6.0
GPA: I don't know how to translate:

Undergraduate: 8.7/10
Master: 8.13/10
Classes:
Math:
Undergrad: Calculus I-II, Static Optimization, Lin Algebra, Int to Probability and Statistics.
Grad: Real Analysis, Dynamic Optimization, Probability and Statistics

Econ:
Lots of undergrad, core grad sequence in Micro, Macro and Econometrics
Electives: Money Theory, Development Economics, Advanced Theory
Type of Undergrad: International
Research Experience: Master's thesis

Teaching Experience: TA for two grad Macro
LORs: 5 LORs from professors who are based here in my home country. 3 are tenured professors (PhDs from Berkeley, Minnesota and UPenn) and two more junior (PhD from Chicago, PhD from a domestic university).
SoP & Interests: It was just about my academic history, research interests (emphasizing the field in which each university is best) and professors I could work with in each of the universities.
Other: International, Latin American, 25 yo.

Interests: Macroeconomics, Money Theory, Development Economics
RESULTS:
Acceptances:
(with funding):
NYU
Minnesota
Columbia

PennState
(no funding): Rochester
Rejections:
Princeton
UPenn
Northwestern
Yale
No answer at all: Toronto

What would you have done differently?
Nothing, I guess...
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
EconCandidate 2007: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Small, relatively unknown private university in the northeast.
Undergrad GPA: 3.65 (3.83 in Econ and Math)
GRE: 800Q/550V/4.0A
Math Courses: Intro Calc (A), Calc of Single Variable I (A-), Calc of Single Variable II (A-), Calc of Several Variables (A-), Integral Calc and Differential Equations (A), Linear Algebra (A-), Numerical Analysis (A-), Advanced Calculus (A), Intro to Real Analysis (A), Math Stats and Probability I (A), Math Stats and Probability II (In Progress)

Econ Courses: Honors Principles of Micro (A), Honors Principles of Macro (A), International (B+), Money & Banking (A), Intermediate Micro (A), Intermediate Macro (A), Law & Economics (B+), Public Finance (A-), Game Theory (A), Econometrics (In Progress), Advanced Public Policy Thesis (In Progress)
Letters of Recommendation: From 3 professors who knew me extremely well. I can't imagine they could have been any stronger.
Research Experience: Completed a summer research project about the term structure of interest rates. Currently working on a senior thesis about funding for public education.
Teaching Experience: Certified Level III Tutor. Math and Econ tutoring experience. Teaching Assistant for Intro Calc and Calculus of a Single Variable II.
Research Interests: Public Finance, Game Theory, Applied Micro.

SOP: Discussed my math preparation, research project, teaching/tutoring experience and my goals.

RESULTS:
Acceptances:
University of Wisconsin-Madison ($) (Attending)
University of Virginia ($)
Waitlists:
Boston College

Rejections:
University of Chicago
Yale University
Northwestern University
University of Michigan-Ann Arbor
University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
University of Rochester
Duke University
University of Maryland-College Park

Brown University
The Ohio State University
University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign

What would you have done differently?
My experience suggests that this process is incredibly random. I ended up with funding at a program that is clearly top 12- top 15, and got rejected outright by many programs that were not ranked as highly. Don't rule out any programs that you have been admitted to, because you never know what can happen, even at the last minute! Overall, I should have tried to improve my overall undergradaute GPA and scores on the other sections of the GRE, because coming from an unknown university probably hurt my applications some. Additionally, I would have tried to complete more research as an undergrad. A combination of these factors might have made my applications considerably less random. The best advice I can give people is that a high GPA, high GRE Math, and an extensive math background are the norm for applicants, and they are minimum preparation to be an appealing candidate. These do not seperate you from the pack any more. In the end though, no regrets at all.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
macrotime 2007: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Third world country (unknown to most)
Undergrad GPA: 76/100 (math 90/100)
Type of Grad: Third world country (well known top program)
Grad GPA: 6/7

GRE: 780Q/500V/4.5A
Math Courses: Calculus, Linear algebra, ODE, Dynamic prog., optimization, probability, econometrics
Econ Courses: micro, macro, just as many courses an econ major should take
Letters of Recommendation: 1 (MIT), 2 (NYU), 1 (Duke), 1 (UCLA) all of them really strong. 4 of them publish or have published in top journals, one less known.

Research Experience: 2 years as an RA in a well known research institute, 2 years working in an interntional organization but in a more policy oriented position
Teaching Experience: TA ecometrics grad level, TA international macroeconomics, instructor undergard macro, TA while undergrad macro, an intro courses to economics
Research Interests: Macro, econometrics
SOP: Honest, just described my research interests
Other:

RESULTS:

Acceptances:
Duke ($$)
Georgetown (no $$)
Rochester ($$)
Waitlists:
NYU

Rejections:
MIT

Harvard
Northwestern
Columbia
BU

What would you have done differently?
First, I would have resaerched more the universities I wanted to apply. Probably, that would have led me to apply to other set of universities. I would have worked less, and I would have taken more math classes.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
indyecon 2007: I've been avoiding posting my profile because of slight paranoia (and the fact that I do not compete with most of these profiles), but I guess now that I know where I'll be next year what is there to lose?

PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: small LAC no one has heard of (unless you're from Indiana - and even then it's a stretch). Majors: Economics, Math Education (I'm licensed to teach 5-12...basically a math degree plus student teaching)
Undergrad GPA: 3.85 (overall), 3.95 (Econ), 3.75 (Math Ed), summa cum laude, top 10%
GRE: 800Q/570V/4.5A

Math Courses: Calc I (high school), Calc II & III, Linear Algebra, Math Models, College Geometry, Discrete Math, Abstract Algebra, Real Analysis
Econ Courses: Intro to Micro, Intro to Macro, International, Intermediate Micro, Money & Banking, Topics in Contemporary Econ (focused on corporate tax policy)
Letters of Recommendation: two from professors (one math and one econ) - I'm pretty sure they were good and spoke very highly of me - they're just from lesser-known profs, and one from my boss at my current job (consulting) - also good, and I know because he asked me to proof it
Research Experience: none to speak of, other than a research paper (junior year) on none other than...college admissions

Teaching Experience: only tutoring at the college level (math and econ), but LOTS if you include middle and high school (math and history). I also taught linear algebra when I student taught (at an IB school in Australia).
Research Interests: mainly economics of education, lots of areas of public economics
SOP: I think it was good, but who knows? I tailored it for every school (for the most part)
Other: I'm a white female from the states, which I've heard is rare and might help, although I don't think it did. I was awarded the top econ student of my class and graduated with honors in math ed. I've been working for three years, but not in the field of econ.


RESULTS:
Acceptances: Georgia State ($26K + tuition), Indiana (no money at first...then$13K...then it was $15K...then $17K)
Waitlists: well, I'm w*iting on Purdue :doh:
Rejections: Iowa, Northwestern, Wisconsin, Stanford (School of Education - Economics of Education PhD)


I'll be attending Georgia State in the fall!

What would you have done differently? I probably would have branched out of the 'I want to go to a Big 10 school' mentality. It just so happens that the Big 10 is more competitive than I had considered, which I didn't realize until the rejections started rolling in. I think I got caught up in reading posts on this site and the idea of a 'safety' for many on here is just not realistic for those of us who went to no-name schools and have little research experience. I probably would apply to more schools, but I'm happy with my final result, so I guess the money I saved can go towards moving to Atlanta.:)
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
grahamcoxon 2007: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: B.A. in Economics from top university in my country (who has always placed students in top US PhDs)
Undergrad GPA: Econ 28.73 / 30 (= 3.83 / 4.0 ); Overall 28.27 / 30 ( = 3.77 / 4.0 )
Type of Grad: 2 years long MSc in Economics from the same university

Grad GPA: Econ 28.73 / 30 (= 3.83 / 4.0 ); Overall 28.73 / 30 (= 3.83 / 4.0 )
GRE: 790 Q, 520 V, 4.0 A
Math Courses:
Undergraduate: Mathematics (29/30; one year long course), Statistics and Probability (30/30), Econometrics (30/30)
Graduate: Multivariate Analysis (30/30), Microeconometrics (28/30)

Econ Courses:
Undergraduate: Industrial History (30/30); Microeconomics (27/30); Industrial Organization (30/30); Macroeconomics (29/30); Organization Theory (28/30); International Trade (29/30); Innovation and Industrial Dynamics (27/30); Economic Policy (28/30); Technology and Economic Development (28/30); International Monetary Economics (30 cum laude / 30)
Graduate:International Trade (30/30); Industiral Organization (29/30); Theory of the Firm and Corporate Governance (27/30); Business History (30/30); Economics of Innovation (29/30); Labour Economics (27/30); Public Economics (29/30).
Other Courses: Undergraduate: German Language, International Financial Markets, Innovation Management, … ; Graduate: Knowledge and Innovation Management, Comparative Politics, Spanish Language, …

Letters of Recommendation: associate econ professor and MSc thesis advisor (PhD UCLA); full econ professor and teacher of graduate labour econ (PhD NYU); associate econ professor and RA supervisor (PhD Northwestern); at least two of them are very very strong letters from people who know me well; two letter-writers are well-known economists and all publish on top economics journals.
Research Experience: Honors MSc thesis; started to work on co-authored paper with my MSc thesis advisor (I don’t mention it in my application but he probably talked about it in his LoR); 3 months RA at Dept of Quantitative Methods of my undergrad/grad university; 1 year RA at CHILD (Center for Household, Income, Labour and Demographic Economics);
Teaching Experience: 1 semester of Multivariate Analysis (graduate)
Research Interests: Political Economy, Behavioral Economics, Microeconomic Theory

SOP: nothing special, talked about reasons to pursue graduate studies in economics, research experience, research interests and future plans; used almost the same text for all universities; 2 pages research proposal outline added for European programs who asked for it (LSE, UCL, Oxford, UPF)
Other: international applicant; TOEFL: 107/120; no application for external funding; honor roll student in both years of MSc; submitted everywhere MSc thesis as writing sample; at least other 10 (very very strong) students applied this same year for almost the same US top programs from my university (in this sense, this was a strong year for applicants from my country/university)

RESULTS:
Admitted : Caltech (w/ funding), BU (w/out funding), LSE MSc (w/out funding), Oxford MPhil (w/out funding)

Waitlisted: Yale (not admitted in the end)
Rejected: UCSD, Columbia, Berkeley, MIT, Princeton, Northwestern, Stanford, NYU, Chicago, Harvard, LSE MRes/PhD, UPenn, Oxford Dphil, Stokcholm School of Economics, Stockholm U, Yale
Never got an answer : UPF, UCL

What would you have done differently? I would say the standard “taken more math classes” or try the alternative version “taken more graduate econ theory classes”, but since I decided to try the path of an Econ PhD less than 12 months ago (when I had already taken all classes needed to graduate) this wasn’t an option. Maybe I should have applied to a more diverse set of schools (no European at all; some Business School or some lower-ranked school with programs/faculty in line with my interests like Stanford GSB, Northwestern MEDS, Rochester or Carnegie Mellon), because I acted clearly as a risk-loving individual (I didn’t overestimated my profile, though…I know my chances at top15 schools were thin, but just wanted to come all the way to the U.S. only if it was really worth). Anyway, in this case, it worked.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
forkie 2007: GRE: 780 Q, 630 V, 5.5
Type of Undergrad: Big Midwestern State School , Econ and Math Major
Undergrad GPA: 3.95 All A's or A-'s in all math/econ major classes
Classes: Real Analysis, Abstract Algebra, Math Stats, etc
Research Experience: Worked for 1 prof, 1 grad student, had an honors thesis, worked for big journal

Teaching experience: tutored econ for 2+ years
LOR: Good, all chicago economists, all know me really well
Interests: Applied Micro
Results Admitted w/ Funding: Maryland, Wisconsin, Duke, Cornell, BC, UVA, Georgetown
w/o funding:Michigan
Rejected: Chicago, Northwestern, Princeton, Brown

Going to: University of Maryland

What I learned: make sure your applications are in AND complete. I realized a few weeks before I got my chicago and northwestern rejections that they hadn't gotten everything....i felt like an idiot!
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
phdphd 2007: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Business Administration
Undergrad GPA: 7.5/10

Type of Grad: MSc Business Administration
Grad GPA: -
GRE: 790Q / 580V / 3.5AWA
Math Courses: Calc I-III / Operations Research I-II / Stats I-II / Linear Algebra / Advanced Probability (Grad)
Econ Courses: Econometrics I, II, IV (Grad), Stochastic Economics I-II (Grad) (kind of asset pricing courses, devoted specially to derivative pricing).
Other Courses: Micro I, Macro I, Mathematical Analysis - First year PhD courses, I didn't have the grades at the time of the application

Letters of Recommendation: One supposed to be strong, finance PhD from Stanford GSB; the other two good ones I think (PhD North Carolina, local)
Research Experience: Two papers presented at a National Conference in Finance, MSc dissertation thesis.
Teaching Experience: TA for the MBA courses in my university.
Research Interests: Finance, applied micro, political economy.
SOP: I did the following: first I explained my interest in finance, second why pursuing a PhD in economics and not in business, third I mentioned three professors that I would like to work with at the university that I was applying.

Other: Male, 26, Latin America.

RESULTS:
Acceptances:
University of Southern California ($)
UNC ($)
Minnesota (no $)
Penn State (no $)

Boston University (no $)
UC Davis (no $)
Waitlists:
Cornell (I suppose) - rejected in the end
Rejections:
MIT
Princeton
Stanford
Chicago

Columbia
Northwestern
UCLA - Anderson
Rochester
Maryland
Wisconsin
Caltech

Going to: University of Southern California


What would you have done differently?
First of all, a good MSc in economics, not only because it would increase my chances of being admitted at better places but to feel more comfortable with the courses in the first year; second, I should have participated more in this forum, I remember that I asked for the evaluation of profile stuff but only this. I should have gathered more information about the places that I would fit better with the TM's; I'm happy with the school that I'm going to but a little bit frustrated being rejected in all the top 15 schools. What I mean is that the idea of applying to a lot schools can hurt a lot. Now I have kind of mixed feelings about all of this: should I wait one more year, finish the PhD core couses sequence in my program right now and apply again? Or this is just a dream? I don't know...
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
TruDog 2007: PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: Top-five public LAC
Undergrad GPA: 3.69, cum laude and with general honors
Type of Grad: None
GRE: Q800, V610, A5.0
Math Courses: Calc I/II/III (B/A/C), differential equations (pass), linear algebra (C?), nonparametric stats (B), two semesters of graduate probability (C/C?)
Econ Courses: Intermediate micro/macro (A/A), mathematical economics (B), econometrics (B), numerous electives (3.7 major GPA)

Letters of Recommendation: Strong, but from unknown professors (one each in economics, finance, and statistics--all familiar with my research)
Research Experience: Presented finance research at American Society of Business and Behavioral Sciences' annual conference, also submitted to professional journals. Also interned at US Treasury's Office of Economic Policy in Washington.
Research Interests: Public (higher education, pensions)
SOP: Fairly general--highlighted my writing and research experiences

RESULTS:

Acceptances: Wisconsin (no $), Ohio State (deferred one quarter)
Rejections: Minnesota, Michigan, Northwestern, Chicago, Emory, Duke, WUSTL, Iowa, Virginia

What would you have done differently?
My problem was that my institution never emphasized the quantitative aspects of economics, so I had to overload on math courses late in the game after discovering econphd.net. That hurt my GPA, which certainly hurt the strength of my application.

Advice: Take math courses early on, and do lots of research and writing. My writing background was the only reason why I got accepted anywhere.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
chappl 2007: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: small university in Switzerland, 215th on econphd.net

Undergrad GPA: not easy to compute
Type of Grad: same as undergrad
Grad GPA: 5.73/6
GRE: 800Q, 610V, 5.5AWA
Math Courses: Calc I-III, LinAlgebra, Mathematical econ (undergrad), Mathematical methods in finance (undergrad), Math and Statistics (MA-level), Stochastic Processes (MA-level)

Econ Courses (MA-level): Adv. Macro I-II, Adv. Micro, Game theory, Public econ, Empirical Macro, Experimental econ, Econometrics (general), Time Series econometrics, Microeconometrics, Applied Econometrics, Theory of Finance I-II
Econ Courses (undergrad-level): Macro I-IV, Micro I-IV, 3 Development econ courses, Labor, Trade, Monetary, Public, 2 metrics courses
Other Courses: lots of undergrad management and law courses (compulsory in my school)
Letters of Recommendation: 3 professors (1 Princeton PhD, 1 Swiss PhD, 1 German PhD), 1 head of research dept at central bank; all probably very positive
Research Experience: 1 year RA at central bank

Teaching Experience: none
Research Interests: modern macro, international finance
SOP: stated my background and research interests
Other: I have no BA, only an MA, as a consequence of the transition of my school to the Bologna system. My MA transcript only contains grades for MA courses, translation of undergrad level transcripts all sent as individual sheets of paper. This might have confused some adcoms.


RESULTS:
Acceptances: Michigan (no $), Wisconsin (no $), Maryland ($), Rochester ($), JHU ($), BU ($), Virginia ($), UBC ($)
Waitlists: NYU, ultimately r*jected
Rejections: Princeton, Yale, Penn, Northwestern, Columbia, Duke, Toronto, NYU

What would you have done differently? I would have taken advanced math classes, like real analysis, topology, etc. As my school had no math dept, I would have had to take these at another school. I shouldn't have applied to my supposedly safety school (MA & PhD): Toronto; and should have applied to 2 more top 10 schools instead
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Karina 07 2007: Profile:

Gre: 800 Q, 780 V, 800 A -- taken just barely within the last 5 years!
GPA: Overall undergrad: 3.82, Major: 3.89, Junior and Senior year: 3.95 or something. Graduate: about an A- equivalent.

Classes:
Math: Calc I (entrance credit), Calc II (P), Calc III - Vector (P), Linear Algebra and Differential Equations (B), Intro to Probability (A), Graduate Statistics (A-)
Econ: Intro Micro (A), then TA'd for it. During graduate school, also took catch-up intermediate micro, macro, international economics (A-). Independent research in environmental economics for two terms.
Type of Undergrad: Ivy
Research Experience: A lot, including published papers, including an economics one.
Teaching Experience: TA for intro micro during undergrad.

LORs: Strong. One from an internationally famous economist who supervised a paper of mine, one from another fairly well-known economist... then one from an unknown environmental economist who does not have an Econ Ph.D. and one extra one from an unknown Econ prof. The one from the most famous economist came late, so some schools probably didn't get to use it in their evaluations.
SoP & Interests: I *think* I've strong evidence of interest in the areas that I marked. I have a good history, having done a master's degree in international development first. I'm interested in environmental issues, development, even trade....
Other: I won a major full scholarship at a very prestigious university for my master's degree. This is probably my greatest ace up my sleeve, considering my weak math background. I took a lot of courses pass/fail at the time because I had just embarked on a set of courses which I did not have the prereqs for (essentially jumped into the middle of an honours physics sequence without having done any before even in high school or middle school). In the end, this may have actually helped me, because after a term of struggling I ended up doing better than majors, despite not having either the physics or math prereqs, showing that maybe I can pull off the same for econ. Oh, I also used to do well in math contests in high school. I know, that sounds silly (and who didn't?) -- but I'm talking on the level of top 10 out of 10,000s. Gosh knows if they care, though.

Admissions Decision Results
rejected: Cornell, Yale, Northwestern
accepted: Berkeley
Others to come....
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
jayruth27 2007: Profile:


Gre: 660 Q, 560 V, 4.5 written
GPA: Overall undergrad: 3.3, Major: 3.92, Junior and Senior year: 3.67or something.
Classes:
Math: Calc I (B-), Calc II (A-), Calc III (B+), Linear Algebra(A-), Ordinary Differential Equations (A), Stat 1 (B), Stat 2 (A), Math thought(C), Numeric Analysis (A), Math Modeling (In Progress), Partial Differential Equations (in progress), Applied Stochastic Processes (in progress)
Econ: Intro Micro (A), Intro Macro (B), Intermediate Macro (A), Intermediate Micro (A)..I have tutored all of the preceding courses; Economics of Money and Banking (A), History of the U.S. Economy (A-), 3rd world Development/Lesser Developed Countries(A), International Economics(A), Capstone/Senior Seminar (in progress)

Type of Undergrad: SMALL California State University
Research Experience: I became involved with a parliamentary style debate on the partial privatization of social security that was presented on public television through our Economics Department during my first semester at HSU. I have also worked with California Integrated Waste Management Board in conjunction with HSU's OECD office to perform net cost analysis of recycling and collecting activities. Research assistant for CCRP (California Center for Rural Policy) regarding demographic information and research for an economic impact report of health care providers in Del Norte County, CA.
Teaching Experience: I do not have any direct teaching experience, but I have tutored(paid and unpaid), and hosted study sessions for a variety of courses.
LORs: My LOR's were strong...all from professor's who had confidence in my ability. Although I did not personally read the letters, I am confident that they were all favorable. One was from our dept. chair, another from a professor I worked with on a research project, and the final from the chair of the applied math department.
SoP & Interests: I have become very interested in regional and national macroeconomic events, including free trade. Lately I have been looking at the increase in consumer debt in the U.S. and it's potential causes.

I am very interested in learning about augmenting current economic models.
Other: I have been tutoring since I began attending HSU (Jan 2005) in Economics. I have also been lucky to feel a community involvement with the faculty and staff in my small department. This has allowed me to become involved with a variety of research and other experiences.

Admissions Decision Results
accepted: UCI
rejected: Northwestern, UCSD
pending:
University of Washington-??

University of Pennsylvania -??
Penn State University - ??
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
mikethechampion 2007: My profile will be a good indicator for those at poorly ranked state schools I believe:


Profile:

Type of Undergrad: Average state school (econphd ranking 250-300) of about 30,000 students, valedicatorian/scholar of the year

Major: Dual econ theory/math major, econ honors plus university honors, 181 undergrad credits, 18 phd econ credits

GPA: 4.0/4.0


GRE: 800Q/760V/6.0A

Classes: Took almost all econ courses offered by the department, undergrad and grad, started the phd econ first year courses in my third year including Math for Econ 1 and 2, Metrics. Took all standard BA math courses plus advanced analysis, topology, Math/Stat theory, Lin al. theory, etc.

Research: Wrote three honors papers (all empirical) and a theoretical grad micro paper, senior honors thesis last semester. 3 years RA experience plus worked as a data analyst for two years.


Teaching: Substitute taught for various professors in micro, macro, labor, etc. while they were at conferences or vacation. Taught the econ sequence in the MBA core courses.

SOP: Outlined my senior honors project dealing with life-cycle consumption, outlined my interests in IO, labor, applied micro. Very poorly done as it sounded like it was computer generated and I wish I could go back and make it unique and instead of highlighting my math and econ skills, highlight my creativity, talents, and show them who I am..

LOR: 3 very strong letters (Phd's MIT, Chicago, Oregon), I did research with all three and knew them as friends going to their house for dinner etc. I wrote one of the LOR, read one, and was shown the general outline and flow of the third. They all basically said that I am the best undergrad they have seen in 30 years (the one I wrote was especially lauditory lol).

Other: 2 years foreign volunteer experience, won a national econ competiton (not well known).


I hope those of you from small state school realize that you can get good admits but I would recommend applying everywhere because grad schools may have never had a student from your school and they may think you're a great candidate but not willing to take the risk, plus you need to do a lot to overcome the ranking of your school. Good luck!

Admission Desicion Results:
Admits:
Stanford (32k)
UCSD (no $)
BU (no$)
UPenn (waitlist)

Rejects: Harvard, Princeton, Berkeley, Northwestern, UCLA, Columbia, Brown, Cornell, Caltech






Show 30 post(s) from this thread on one page








Copyright © 1998-2008 TestMagicAd Management by RedTyger


Content Relevant URLs by vBSEO 3.0.0
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Canuckonomist 2008: Type of Undergrad: Queen's University, Canada (Top 40, depending on where you check.)

Undergrad GPA: After conversion, 3.75/4.0: Econ 4.0/4.0, math 3.7/4.0

GRE: 790Q, 530V, 5.5 AW


Math Courses: Calc I-III, probability, statistics, abstract algebra, differential equations, analysis I, stochastic models in operations research

Econ Courses: Standard package in the 300/400 levels, Grad math econ, Grad Financial Theory, Grad Cost benefit analysis.

Letters of Recommendation: 1 JHU, 1 BU, and one fairly extensively published and quite influential finance prof. Funny, his alma mater is not one anyone would think would be big, but he's made a name for himself, at least so he says (ANU)


Research Experience: RA for one term for Prof with JHU PhD. Worked on a paper to be published in a year.

Teaching Experience: private tutoring for 7 years.

Research Interests: Financial Economics, Micro Theory


SOP: Standard.

Other: Male, 21 years.

RESULTS:
Attending: Queen's University, M.A Econ
Acceptances: Queen's MA ($$), UBC MA (no $), LSE F&E MSc (No $),

Rejections: Northwestern, UPenn, UCSD, Cornell

What I would have done differently: I would have started taking math earlier, but from someone who didn't like math in high school, things changed around fast enough for me. With my fall marks in graduate courses, the RAship this summer, and stronger letters from the same people, I expect things will look up next year. I did, after all, get past the first few rounds of rejections @ NWU, and almost all of them at Cornell.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Andronicus 2008: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Regional state university in North Carolina
Undergrad GPA: 4.0/4.0
Type of Grad: Same as undergrad

Grad GPA: 4.0/4.0
GRE: 760Q / 720V / 4.0AW
Math Courses: Calculus I-IV, Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, Introduction to Topology, Probability and Statistics I, Advanced Calculus I. Taking Probability and Statistics II and Advanced Calculus II this spring.
Econ Courses: All the basic micro, macro, and econometrics for BS and MS, plus electives in mostly applied micro fields.
Other Courses: Logic

Letters of Recommendation: Three from econ professors (Ohio State, Iowa, South Carolina), 2 of whom I have done research with. One more from the math professor (Michigan State) who taught my topology and advanced calculus courses.
Research Experience: I did a master's research project on dividend taxes. A further paper on this topic, coauthored with several professors (including one of my letter writers), is currently under review. I worked with another letter writer on a project examining the impact of brownfield cleanup and redevelopment on surrounding residential housing values. I've also worked with a professor in the geography department on a study of public transportation cost-effectiveness in North Carolina and another study of traffic congestion relief.
Teaching Experience: During my MS program I was the economics department tutor for managerial economics. I've also tutored and/or TA'd for many other courses at the undergrad, MBA, and PhD Public Policy levels. Last semester, I taught micro principles at the local community college. I'm teaching macro principles this semester.
Research Interests: Public, Urban/Regional, Experimental
SOP: Mostly talked about my coursework and research experience, with the last paragraph customized to the school.

Other: American male, 26, married (no kids)

RESULTS:
Acceptances: UT-Austin ($?), Ohio State ($?), Pittsburgh ($), Vanderbilt ($$$)
Waitlists: None
Rejections: Northwestern

Pending: UIUC, Indiana, Houston, Georgia State

What would you have done differently?: Worked extra hard to improve my GRE Q-score. Applied to a couple more top-20 programs instead of Houston and Georgia State. Applied to Wharton Applied Economics instead of Northwestern.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
AstralTraveller 2008: Profile 




Type of Undergrad: Top research institution in the country (Latin America), Economics major.
Undergrad Ranking: 54th out of almost 300 people
Type of Undergrad: Doctoral Stream MA in Econ at same University as undergrad.
Grad Ranking: 4th out of 38

GRE: 780Q, 550V, 3.5 AW
GMAT: 710 Overall, Percentile 95%Q, 83%V.
Math Courses: Calc I,II, Statistical Probability, Statistical Inference, Classic Algebra, Linear and Matrix Algebra, Optimization Methods, Mathematical Economics (Differential Equations).
Econ Courses:

UG: Intro Econ, Intro Micro, Intermediate Micro I & II, Industrial Organization, Intro Macro, Intermediate Macro I & II, International Economics, Econometrics, Urban Economics, Econ Growth Theory.
Graduate: Micro Theory (MWG), Macro Theory (Journal articles), Econometric Theory incl. Probability Theory (Spanos, Greene), Applied Econometrics (Hamilton, Maddala, Baltagi), Resource Economics (Journal articles), Behavioral Economics (Becker + Journal articles), Economics of Regulation (Tirole), Macroeconomic Programming (too many things to mention!), Social Projects Evaluation (Fontaine + Journal articles).
Letters of Recommendation: 3 Profs from my alma mater (two econometricians who graduated from Econ departments ranked 30-50, plus the director of grad studies who graduated at a top-15 institution), 1 prof from the current B-school I work at (graduated from a B-school in Europe, but who has held visiting positions at several top-5 US schools) and 1 letter from a professor (Info Systems and Technology Management) at a US Top 30 B-school who studied at a top-5 PhD program in the New England area. To all I related either as a student, research assistant, or both.

Research Experience: RA for three years: one at my alma mater's Econ department, two at a nascent local B-school. Several working papers.


Publications: Published an empirical paper on an ISI indexed blind-refereed minor journal, and a chapter on Maximum Likelihood Estimation on a Math for Economists textbook.

Teaching Experience: TA for entire Econometrics and Statistics sequence, undergrad and graduate Economics, and MBA.
Lecturer for graduate econ: Math camp (you know, the pre-enrollment course we'll all have to go through before our PhD...I have taught it!), plus Introductory Econometrics and Optimization Methods the following term. Also lecturer of Statistical Inference (for 2nd year undergrad business and econ) and Advanced Econometrics (for 6th year engineering students).

Research Interests: Industrial Organization, Econometrics.


SOP: Prepared over a 18 months timeframe.

Other: Male, single, 25 years old. Since I didn't take analysis at college, self taught Real Analysis from Baby Rudin and Topology from Ivorra. Pointed it out on my SOP.

RESULTS:
Acceptances: none so far
Waiting: UCLA (Anderson) [interviewed, shortlisted according to prof, but "not admitted" according to PhD program secretary]

Rejections: Northwestern (Econ), Chicago (GSB), Minnesota (Econ), Stanford GSB (EA&P), Duke (Fuqua), Brown (Econ).
Pending: NYU (Stern), MIT (Sloan) [these two already notified their admits:(], UCSD (Econ)

What would you have done differently?
Don't quite know yet :(. Prepared this season's application for years. As Mr. Keen, I don't know what a Micro or Macro course is without calculus. Have done my best throughout years to get admitted at a good place and so far I only have been "booted out". Maybe I applied to one too many business schools. Should have tried more Econ schools (2 top 10's) and some definite safeties.
Not sure if I want to go thru this process once again.:rolleyes:
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Internationalstudent08 2008: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: top U.S. school
Undergrad GPA: 3.7+
GRE: 800q, 670v, 4.5w (yeah, me knows how to writing)

Math Courses: Multivariable Calculus, Linear Algebra, Groups and Topology (intro proofs), Mathematical Probability. In my senior fall I took optimization and now in the spring I take analysis.
Econ Courses: many...
Letters of Recommendation: 2 from econ profs (1 of them is famous, the other is well-known)
Research Experience: 2 summers

Teaching Experience: I have some. does it count anyway???
Research Interests: Macro, Pol. Economy, Public stuff.
SOP: I bet they don't read it
Other: International student, good at foosball.


RESULTS:
Acceptances:
Waitlists:
Rejections: Northwestern, Columbia, Duke, Stanford, Brown, Berkeley
Pending: Princeton, Chicago, NYU, UCSD,

What would you have done differently? I could write an essay about this, but I'll do it at the end
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
ward 2008: PROFILE:
School: Oklahoma State University
Type of Undergrad: Economics (Honors) and Mathematics
Undergrad GPA: 3.9 (4.0 Econ, ~3.8 Math)

Type of Grad: none
GRE: V 530, Q 790, A 5.0

Math Courses: Calculus 1-3, Differential Equations, Linear Algebra, Calc. of Several Variables, Intro. to Modern Algebra, Intro. to Modern Analysis, Mathematical Statistics 1 & 2, Mathematical Modeling, Advanced Calc 1.

Econ Courses: Intermediate Micro, Intermediate Macro, Public Finance, History of Economic Thought, Econ Development, Econometrics (undergrad), Grad Micro Theory, Grad Math Econ.


Other Courses: Computer Science I, SAS Programming

Letters of Recommendation: not from well known professors but must have been fairly strong. Two tenured Econ professors and my Intro. to Analysis prof
Research Experience: honors thesis, but nothing substantial
Teaching Experience: none
Research Interests: Applied Micro, Micro Theory, Behavioral and Experimental

SOP: I put some time into it but it was essentially the same for each school; I just changed a few sentences here and there.
Other:

RESULTS:
Acceptances:
Duke($$) <attending>
Wisconsin (no$)
Ohio State ($$)

UIUC ($$)
Arizona ($$)
Waitlists:
NYU
Rejections:
Harvard
M.I.T.
Northwestern
UCSD

Penn State
RA position at NYC Fed

What would you have done differently?
I would have tried to pick programs that fit my interests better and probably would have applied to more schools - especially in the 10-25 range. That's really about all I would have changed.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Chess is life 2008: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Public University BA
Undergrad GPA: 3.94/ 4.0 Math/ Economics
Type of Grad: Public University MA
Grad GPA: 4.0/ 4.0 Economics
GRE: 670 V 800 Q 5.0 Writing (I took it when I was 19 to get a job at Kaplan and it worked!)
Math Courses: Topology, Real Analysis, Linear Algebra, Calculus 1-3, Differential Equations, Probability and Statistics, Numerical Analysis, Econ Courses: International Economics I and II (MA), Math for Economists (MA and PhD), Microeconomics (MA and PhD), Urban Economics (MA), Econometrics (MA and PhD), Health Economics (MA), Macroeconomics (MA), Intro. to Econometrics, Statistical Methods, Intermediate Micro and Macro, Industrial Organization (Best Class ever), Seminar in economics, Money and Banking, several independent studies,
Other Courses: Physics 1 and 2 (I seriously considered majoring in it). Computer science 1.Letters of Recommendation: Math and Economics professors. I did research with the economics professors.

Research Experience: A lot. Washington, DC think tank work for almost a year now, mainly immigration and trade issues. However, I am currently doing research on state policies that effect economic growth and presented at the CATO Institute on microcredit. I also have done research on child abuse, social capital, fed policy and housing prices, a senior thesis on NAFTA's effects on Mexico, municipal government efficiency (Global Perspective), and the fed challenge (Rutgers won our district).
Teaching Experience: Tutor for my University 2 years and tutor/teacher for Kaplan test and prep.
Research Interests: Probably Microeconomics, most likely something very game theoretical. This is subject to change given that I have yet to take a PhD level economics course in Macroeconomics.
SOP: General but adapted to each university I applied to.
Other: I think being affiliated with the CATO Institute (libertarian think tank) hurt me. Also, Rutgers has a tendency of sending students to programs and watching them promptly fail the qualifier. This couldn’t have helped me.[/font]

RESULTS:
Acceptances: Rochester (24k Fellowship), Duke (17k fellowship), Washington University, St. Louis (TA/ RA 20k), Rutgers (30k Presidential Fellowship), Michigan (Nada), UCLA (Nada), Wisconsin (Nada), Georgetown (w*it-list for funding), UCSD (TA and after a complicated formula 7k), Cornell (Nada)

Waitlists: Minnesota, NYU (High whatever that means), MIT (later rejected)
Rejections: Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Chicago, Columbia, UPenn, Brown, Stanford, Berkeley, Northwestern,
Pending: Nothing
Concerns: My letter writers are not very well-known

What would you have done differently?
Maybe take more math? I really don’t know what else I could have done. I think I will regret not taking more computer science courses.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
nash12 2008: Undergrad: B.A. in Mathematics (2006) from a well known college/university in my country (South-East Asia). Grades: 84%


Graduate: M.A. in Economics from a well known school of economics in my country. It is a two year course and I only had the grades of the first year or two semesters when I applied. Grades for the first year: 70%

GRE: 800Q, 530V, 5.0AWA. TOEFL: 117/120


Math Courses: Since I'm a math undergrad so lots. Real Analysis, Basic Algebra, Topology, Ordinary Differential Equations, Partial Differential Equations, Probability and Statistics, Linear Algebra, Group Theory, Ring Theory, Mechanics, Multivariable Calculus, Numerical Analysis, Number Theory, etc.

Econ Courses: All Grad Level. On my transcript with grades when I applied- Microeconomic Theory, Macroeconomic Theory, Introductory Econometrics, Mathematical Economics and two more. On my transcript without grades when I applied- Topics in Economic Theory, Game Theory-I, Topics in Macroeconomic Theory and Econometric Methods.

Research Experience: Was a visiting research scholar in a European Institute during the summer of 2007. Wrote two papers there. Both were selected for decent conferences which I mentioned in my application. Sent one of the papers in all the applications.


LORs: One a well published and reasonably well known econ theory professor at University of Warwick. One econ professor in my grad school, phd from Princeton. Another econ associate professor in my grad school, phd from Yale. I think all of them were strong.

SOP: Talked about my interests- Micro and Game Theory. Talked about some of the papers that I've really liked. Also, about my motivation to do economic theory.

Teaching Experience: None.


Other: Male, 22 years old.

Results
Acceptances: NYU($), Columbia($), University of Chicago($), LSE MRes/PhD($), Cornell($), Brown($), Penn State($).
w*itlisted and finally in Yale($) and Princeton($).
Rejected: Harvard, MIT, Northwestern, UPenn and Stanford.


Attending: Princeton. Yuhoooo..:)

What would have I done differently? Nothing in particular. Well I don't really know if I would have ever made it to Harvard and MIT. None have made from my school in the past 10 years. As an aspiring economic theorist, Princeton was really my dream school and I'm over the moon to have got it..:) My suggestion to all the future applicants, esp the International Students is guys dream big and work hard. Dreams do come true..:)
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Andronicus 2008:
Quote:







Originally Posted by Andronicus
(Post 556865)

PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Regional state university in North Carolina

Undergrad GPA: 4.0/4.0
Type of Grad: Same as undergrad
Grad GPA: 4.0/4.0
GRE: 760Q / 720V / 4.0AW
Math Courses: Calculus I-IV, Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, Introduction to Topology, Probability and Statistics I, Advanced Calculus I. Taking Probability and Statistics II and Advanced Calculus II this spring.
Econ Courses: All the basic micro, macro, and econometrics for BS and MS, plus electives in mostly applied micro fields.

Other Courses: Logic
Letters of Recommendation: Three from econ professors (Ohio State, Iowa, South Carolina), 2 of whom I have done research with. One more from the math professor (Michigan State) who taught my topology and advanced calculus courses.
Research Experience: I did a master's research project on dividend taxes. A further paper on this topic, coauthored with several professors (including one of my letter writers), is currently under review. I worked with another letter writer on a project examining the impact of brownfield cleanup and redevelopment on surrounding residential housing values. I've also worked with a professor in the geography department on a study of public transportation cost-effectiveness in North Carolina and another study of traffic congestion relief.
Teaching Experience: During my MS program I was the economics department tutor for managerial economics. I've also tutored and/or TA'd for many other courses at the undergrad, MBA, and PhD Public Policy levels. Last semester, I taught micro principles at the local community college. I'm teaching macro principles this semester.
Research Interests: Public, Urban/Regional, Experimental

SOP: Mostly talked about my coursework and research experience, with the last paragraph customized to the school.
Other: American male, 26, married (no kids)

RESULTS:
Acceptances: UT-Austin ($?), Ohio State ($?), Pittsburgh ($), Vanderbilt ($$$)
Waitlists: None

Rejections: Northwestern
Pending: UIUC, Indiana, Houston, Georgia State

What would you have done differently?: Worked extra hard to improve my GRE Q-score. Applied to a couple more top-20 programs instead of Houston and Georgia State. Applied to Wharton Applied Economics instead of Northwestern.






UPDATED RESULTS:
Acceptances: Ohio State (Fellowship, Attending), UT-Austin (TAship), Pittsburgh (Fellowship), Vanderbilt (Huge Fellowship), UIUC (TAship), Houston (Fellowship Nomination), Indiana (Unfunded, Didn't hear anything until mid-July!)
Waitlists: None
Rejections: Northwestern
Application Withdrawn: Georgia State
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Internationalstudent08 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Top-5
Undergrad GPA: 3.7
Type of Grad: N/A
Grad GPA: N/A

GRE: Q800, V670, A4.5
Math Courses: Real Analysis, Optimization (As)
Econ Courses: Typical undergrad courses, intro+field courses
Letters of Recommendation: 3 good ones
Research Experience: 1 year RA (+2 summers as an undergrad)

Teaching Experience: Some tutoring
Research Interests: Mostly applied micro
SOP: Must have been good
Other:

RESULTS:
Acceptances: UChicago (waiting to hear about funding), UMaryland (18k), Penn State (25k)

Waitlists: Wharton AE
Rejections: MIT, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Berkeley, Yale, Northwestern, Columbia, NYU, Brown

Total Score: 10-1-3
Pending: None

What would you have done differently?


I really didn't take advantage of my undergrad school as I should have. I should have started RAing earlier, and I should have taken graduate-level courses as an undergrad, instead of being a chicken. Also, I made some bad thesis-related choices hehe

However, since last year's admission cycle, I did everything that I could to improve my profile, and ended up working with some great people. I learned a lot- perhaps more than what I'm going to learn in grad school.

The only significant econ-phd-related mistake I made was to apply to all top-10 schools and almost none of the schools between 10 and 20 (except for UMaryland). I rejected most of the schools in that range based on location preferences. Since my profile was not clear-cut top10, I should have been more careful.

Anyway, I'm glad I made it!!!!!
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Swingkid 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: University of California, BA Econ & Applied Math, French Minor
Undergrad GPA: 3.85

Type of Grad: micro
Grad GPA: 4.0
GRE: 800/700/6.0
Math Courses: Multi-var Calc, Linear Algebra, Real Analysis, Complex Analysis, Abstract Algebra, Numerical Analysis, Probability
Econ Courses: Grad Micro, Intermediate Micro and Macro, Metrics, Applied Metrics, Corporate Finance, Game Theory, Contract Theory, Development
Other Courses: a lot of French
Letters of Recommendation: 3 letters, one of which was from a fecund researcher that I've worked with for two years. The other two are from my grad micro professor and my undergrad development professor; the former barely knows me, the latter I've spoken to about my research ideas.
Research Experience: Two years undergrad RA. Thesis (?)
Teaching Experience: Does dance count? =P

Research Interests: Development, Applied Micro
SOP: I don't think it was that special. In any case, it probably didn't carry much weight.
Other:

RESULTS:
Acceptances: UCLA, Yale, Berkeley, Brown
Waitlists: U Penn
Rejections: MIT, Columbia, Princeton, Harvard, Stanford, Northwestern, NYU

What would you have done differently?

I would have definitely submitted a better-prepared application for the NSF, since funding is kind of an issue for me. I found out about the fellowship a week before the deadline and decided to apply anyway. That said, I wouldn't have done much else differently, since I'm really ecstatic about my acceptances! :-)

Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
FierceEconDR 2009: Type of Undergrad: B.A. Math & Econ from the Poor's people Harvard aka CUNY

Undergrad GPA: 3.92/4, Summa Cum Laude
Type of Grad: M.S. Economics courses
Grad GPA: ?
GRE: 790Q, 540V, 5 AWA
Math Courses: All required courses for math degree, Calc I-III + Real Analysis I (B), Abstract Algebra, Linear Algebra 1 and 2, Probability Theory(B+), Statistics (Theory) (A+) All others A's

Econ Courses (undergrad-level): Micro and Macro Theory, Labor, International Finance(Macro), Development theory- All A's Advanced econ stats (A+)
Grad courses: Took the Macro, Micro, Econometrics, and some other stuff at a masters in europe. Not in my applications.
Letters of Recommendation: 4 econ professors=1 Berkeley ('semi-known') + 1 Harvard + 1 Kansas/NBER +1 Queen's ('Known'), I am confident they were solid and very enthusiastic.
Research Experience: AEA Summer Training Program, some development research in Paris IX

Teaching Experience: Macro & Micro, Math Tutor
Research Interests: Labor, Development, Applied Micro-econometrics
SOP: I think it was ok, I did it alla S. Athey: Why I want it (duh research!) what research have I done, what papers did i like, some questions I would like to answer, why U X is good. Name dropped in all of them (2 names).

RESULTS:


Acceptances: Maryland ($),Texas ($)
Withdrawn: UC Davis
Rejections: MIT, Harvard, Yale, Chicago, UPenn, Berkeley, Michigan, NYU, Cornell, Northwestern, UCSD, Brown, Penn State

ATTENDING: Maryland :grad:


What could I have done differently?
In terms of the application process: not apply to PSU and apply to Columbia for my NY Bias (not that I would've gotten into!). I have to second: stayed away from TM/Gradcafe during admissions season! ;)

I am extremely happy with UMD so in the end it payed off.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Zmoney 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Large U.S. Public University ranked 40-55 (best in state) typically known for Football not Economics
Undergrad GPA: 3.93 overall 4.0 in Econ 3.69 in Math Graduating Summa

GRE: 800 Q 540 V 5.0 AWA
Math Courses: Calc 1-3 1,2 tested out 3(B+), Differential Equations(B), Stat 1(A), Probability(A) Lin Alg (A) Math Stats 2 in Spring
Econ Courses: Intros, Intermediates, Public Econ, Sports Econ, Empirical Research, Independent Study (for research) Labor, Empirical Public Econ I (PhD field) All A's
Other Courses: Minors in Food and Resource Economics, and History
Letters of Recommendation: 3 LORS 2 excellent letters from pretty well known Econ faculty in their concentrations (one Phd Chicago the other Wisconsin) and 1 very good letter from a senior member of the Ag Econ Department (Purdue well known in Ag econ)
Research Experience: 2 written empirical papers one for the class in research and the other (to be my thesis) I want to get published. Database work and research at Fed

Teaching Experience: N/A
Research Interests: Public Econ, Public Choice, Taxation Policy, Political Economy
SOP: Solid i think, had multiple profs say they wouldn't change a thing
Other: Internship at the Federal Reserve, Strong Undergraduate leadership positions
Concerns: My B in Diffy Q, Coming from a big public school, No Real Analysis.
RESULTS:

Attending: Virginia
Admitted, Declined: Michigan State, Boston College, Florida
Waitlists: none
Rejections: Northwestern, NYU, Penn, Wisconsin, Michigan, Maryland, Texas-Austin, Cornell, Duke

What would you have done differently?
Started taking math freshman year as opposed to junior year. Double majored in Stats
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
freecon 2009: PROFILE:

Type of Undergrad: BA Econ
Undergrad GPA: 3.90/4.0 (gpa in math&econ 3.96) Top ranked out of 150
Type of Grad: No grad degree
GRE: 780Q
Math Courses: Calculus I-II, Linear Algebra, Math for economists, Math Analysis, Graph Theory and Networks, Probability and Statistics I-II
Econ Courses: Many...Macro and micro theories, Game Theory I-II, Growth and Development, International Trade I-II, Public Finance, Monetary, Econometrics I-II, Time Series

Other Courses: Java, Matlab, Management courses...
Letters of Recommendation: I used five different recommenders. One was a famous prof, one was department chair, others were associate profs knowing me well.
Research Experience: non
Teaching Experience: Tutoring in Econ 101&102 for two years, assisting in CS 123 for a semester
Research Interests: Game theory, Macroeconomic theory, macroeconomic policy games
SOP: I have sent a standard SOP to each school by just changing the name of institution. It is neither bad nor well-prepared, although I spent great time on it.

Other:

RESULTS:
Attending: BU ($$$)
Acceptances, declined: UMD ($$$), JHU ($$), Brown, LSE-MSc, UPF-MSc ($$$)
Waitlists: Brown funding list

Rejections: MIT, Princeton, Berkeley, Yale, UCLA, UPenn, Northwestern, NYU, UCSD
Pending: UWM

What would you have done differently? Firstly, I didn't study for GRE assuming that the quantitative part was easy. Yes, it was easy. But I should have studied to gain speed. Further, the verbal part was horrible for me as an international student. If I had studied, I may do well. Secondly, I didn't apply to Cornell, Columbia, Michigan, Chigago and Minnesota. I should have made a better combination of schools instead of applying Princeton,MIT,Berkeley,Yale and so on. Thirdly, it is the important one: I should have written more specific SOPs. But, it was impossible for me since I still haven't know exactly my research interests.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Mankins 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Very large US public university
Undergrad GPA: 4.0
GRE: 800Q, 600V, 4.5AWA

Math Courses: Calc I-III, Mathematical Structures, Differential Equations, Linear Algebra, Probability, Advanced Calculus I, and Intermediate Real Analysis I (all A or A+). Topology and Mathematical Statistics (Spring 2009).
Econ Courses: The usual, plus Econometrics , Advanced Honors Micro (uncertainty), Advanced Honors Macro (taught by Nobel Laureate). All A or A+, except Econometrics where I got an A-. Game Theory (Spring 2009).
Letters of Recommendation: One from a Nobel Laureate (not sure how solid it was). One from a well-known economist in micro theory and information (probably knows me better than any of my other professors). One from my Advanced Calc professor.
Teaching Experience: N/A
Research Experience: Some preliminary work on an undergraduate thesis (never finished), Econometrics paper co-authored with two other students

Research Interests: micro theory, advertising, economics of information, behavioral/neuro/experimental, IO, development
SOP: Standard
Concerns: Very little research experience, no graduate courses
Applying to: Yale, Duke, Stanford, MIT, Northwestern, Chicago, Illinois Urbana, Berkeley, Texas, Minnesota, Arizona State, Carnegie Mellon, and Duke Decision Sciences


RESULTS:
Attending: Minnesota ($$)
Acceptances, declined: Carnegie Mellon ($$$), U Texas at Austin ($), U Illinois at Urbana-Champaign ($$), Arizona State ($$)
Rejections: MIT, Berkeley, Yale, Stanford, U Penn, U Chicago, Northwestern (on the waiting list, briefly), Duke Economics, Duke Decision Sciences
What would you have done differently? There's not much more I could have realistically done. Maybe I could have gone to more office hours and talked to professors more outside of class. I think I may have had better results if I had taken PhD Micro, but I don't know where I would have fit that into my schedule. I transferred schools and switched majors halfway through my junior year, and it took 5 years to finish my Bachelor's degree because of it. I hadn't finished Calc I until the summer of 2007, so I had to catch up quickly on the math required for graduate economics. Considering what a tough year it was, things could have turned out much worse.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
miaataro 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad/Grad: BSc in Economics (minors in Mathematics, Statistics and Business Studies) and MSc in Economics (+ a still unfinished MSc in Statistics) from an unknown university in Finland.
Undergrad/Grad GPA: Overall 4.90, Econ 4.94, Math 4.83, Stat 4.94 (on a scale of 1-5)
GRE: 800Q, 390V, 4AWA

TOEFL: 111 (29R, 30L, 23S, 29W)
Math Courses: Unfortunately, they don't have illustrative names. I tooks a course sequence for a minor in math that dealt with the basic areas (linear algebra, differential calculus, integral calculus, real analysis, etc.) in more of an applied fashion.
Stat Courses: A lot. Mathematical Statistics 1 & 2 and Probability Calculus A & B + courses in time series analysis, survival models, mixed models, regression models, multivariate statistics, stochastic simulation, computational statistics, bayesian statistics, robust and nonparametric methods etc.
Econ Courses: A lot. Intermediate and advanced level courses in microeconomics, macroeconomics, mathematical economics and econometrics + courses in labour economics, regional economics, microeconometrics, applied econometrics, game theory etc. I also took the econometrics core course in the Finnish Doctoral Program in Economics during the ongoing academic year.

Letters of Recommendation: 2 economics professors and a statistics professor from my university and a research director from an economics research institute. I guess they all know me quite well and believe in me, so their letters should have been good in that sense. None of them were well-known, however (but apparently they had some important connections after all).
Research Experience: BSc and MSc theses in economics, RA for one of my economics professors for 7 months, two last summers as a research trainee in an economics research institute, two last falls as an assistant researcher in an economics research institute, a researcher in an economics research institute from January onwards.
Teaching Experience: None
Research Interests: Econometrics and empirical/applied microeconomics

SOP: Nothing spectacular. Tried to emphasize my research experience and convince the reader that my educational background in economics, mathematic and statistics is strong enough, I guess.

RESULTS:
Acceptances: MIT, Tinbergen, LSE MSc EME (Research), Tilburg MPhil (2nd year), Uppsala (it was never official, though, as I withdraw my application)
Waitlists: -
Rejections: Princeton, UC Berkeley, Northwestern, U Michigan, UCL MSc


What would you have done differently? Absolutely nothing. I'm still amazed by my outcomes and really happy that I listened to my recommenders advice to try my luck with some of the top US schools. It definitely paid off... :grad:
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
tmdruie 2009: So I can get on the shiny charts!


PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: B.A. Physics and Economics from a top 10 liberal arts college
Undergrad GPA: 3.14/4.0
Type of Grad: One stats class
Grad GPA: 3.3

GRE: 790Q, 600V, 5.0AW
Math Courses: Calc I-III(I took them in high school, I really don’t remember and nor do my transcripts), Linear Algebra (B), Mathematical Probability and Statistics (B-, B), Real Analyst(A, at a different school then my undergrad), Stochastic Processes (B+, grad course, at a different school then my undergrad)
Econ Courses: AP Micro and Macro (A, in high school), European Economic History (B+), Law and Economics (B), Intermediate Price Theory (B), Intermediate Macro Theory (B), Econometrics (B), Contemporary British Economy (B), Industrial Revolution-Britain (A-), Econ of Multinational Corps (A-), Thesis (labor econ)
Other Courses: Physics, which I put in my math lists. Quantum Mechanics I, Partial Differential Equations (B+), etc. I only did the bare minimum for a liberal arts major
Letters of Recommendation: 2 econ professors (my thesis advisor and the person who led my study abroad), 1 physics professor (thesis advisor), 1 economist who is my supervisor

Research Experience: RA for 2.5 years at ‘a central bank’
Teaching Experience: Tutored, graded and lab assisted for two years for physics in college
Research Interests: All over the place. Labor, policy, experimental, applied micro, development, etc.
SOP: Intro, I did physics I can do math!, I wrote a thesis in economic and liked doing research, I’m working as an RA and like doing research, I took extra math and can write proofs, I was part of an econ paper reading group and like reading papers, interests (changed a bit depending on what the school had, and more policy oriented for ag econ schools). Also a few sentences about things I did that I removed or added depending on the school. The 500 word schools were hard, the 1000 word schools were easy. I also had a Personal History Statement about being a female doing math for the schools that wanted it.
Other: Applied for the NSF. I tried not to say anything to risky, and not say much about interest in policy to non policy/ ag econ schools. I like Aikido.


RESULTS:
Acceptances: Boston University (waitlist for $), Michigan State(no $), University of Essex (ISER), Ohio State (Agricultural, Environmental, and Development Economics) ($-Fellowship), Indiana University ($-TA), Iowa State University ($-TA)
Waitlists: University of Minnesota
Rejections: MIT, Harvard (Econ and Political Economy and Government), Yale, Berkeley (Agricultural & Resource Economics), Northwestern, NYU, U Penn (Econ and Wharton), University of Wisconsin – Madison (Econ and Agricultural and Applied Economics ), Columbia, Brown, Cornell, Caltech, University of British Columbia , Ohio State, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor (Econ and Public Policy and Economics), University of Maryland (Econ and Agricultural Economics), Boston College, Johns Hopkins, University of Minnesota (Applied Economics), University of California – Davis (Econ and Agricultural Economics), Duke, University of Essex, Vanderbilt, Rutgers, Carnegie Mellon (Econ, Department of Social and Decision Sciences, Public Policy and Economics)
Pending: Toronto MA, Queen’s MA


What would you have done differently?
Gotten better grades in undergrad. When I really started understanding what the things I need to do for a PhD I think I did the best I could, took real analysis, applied for the NSF (if only to write a SoP for them), read papers etc. I probably could have gotten more research experience at my job (co-author), and I defiantly could have gotten better grades and taken more math as an undergrad. But over all I’m happy.

Attending:
Boston University
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Mobius Strip 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: B.A. Mathematics and Economics from a top 10-15 liberal arts college
Undergrad GPA: 3.87/4.0
Type of Grad: NA
Grad GPA: NA
GRE: 800Q, 570V, 5.0AW

Math Courses: Calc I-III, Linear Alg, Modern Alg, Adv Modern Alg, Real Analysis, Game Theory (in Math Dept), Topology, Chaos Theory. Received department honors in Math.
Econ Courses: Basically all of them, 4.0 GPA, Thesis (A), Department Honors, Brownell Prize for Distinction in the Study of Political Economy
Other Courses: NA
Letters of Recommendation: 2 from Federal Reserve, 1 Math from Undergrad
Research Experience: RA for 3 years at FRB in DC. Co-authored published paper on racial discrimination in credit markets.
Teaching Experience: NA
Research Interests: Labor (Education), Real Estate, Financial Markets
SOP: Talked about my volunteer activities in tough, urban schools and how it shaped my interests in research in education. Transition to work at the Fed regarding discrimination in the credit markets. Final, throw-away paragraph naming some profs at schools who I'd be interested in working with.
Other: Crushed by NSF


RESULTS:
Acceptances: U Michigan (off waitlist, after 0-14 start)
Waitlists: NA
Rejections: MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Yale, Berkeley, Princeton, Chicago, Chicago Booth, Northwestern, Wharton, U Penn, NYU, Columbia, Duke
Pending: NA
Outside Fellowship: Received a $20k fellowship from undergrad college to supplement lack of funding from UM

What would you have done differently?
After receiving NSF results and reading Jeeves's posts, spelling out the broader impacts to make it easier to checklist. I scored fairly well on intellectual merit, but only average on the broader impacts.


Other than that, it's hard to say. I had nearly a 3.9 GPA with a Math and Econ double major, 3 years at the Federal Reserve, a published paper, and a presented working paper. I did spend 3 years in the private sector at a major bank, which probably hurt my admissions results, but gave me a broader personal, real-world experience that I do not regret taking.

Attending: U Michigan - Ann Arbor
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
sihnt2307 2009: profile evaluation
Profile evaluation and advice please!
Undergrad: small but good LAC
GPA: Overall - 3.845, Majors - Econ 3.94/Spanish 4.0, Minor - Math 4.0
GRE: Quant 800/Verbal 540/?
Econ: Principles (A), Intermediate Micro (A-), Intermediate Macro (A), Econ Stats (A), Internship Abroad - for credit, with econ research and consulting firm (A), Econometrics (A), History of Econ Thought (A), Game Theory (A), Intl Trade (in fall 08), Advanced Micro Theory (in spring 09)
Math: (took AP calc in HS), Cal 2 (A), Cal 3 (A), Diff Eq and Lin Alg (A), will take two Math Stats classes during the next year
LOR: 3 Econ profs who know me well and think highly of me (?), all went to very reputable schools
SOP: probably something about my research and teaching experience, want to go into intl econ
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
dancerdf 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: B.A. Econ from top-ranked university in the Netherlands
Undergrad GPA: 3.9, Summa Cum Laude
Type of Grad: M.S. Econ, LSE
Grad GPA: -
GRE: 790Q, 550V, 5AWA
Math Courses: Standard, although no separate courses, everything included into quantitative methods 1-3
Econ Courses (Master-level): Micro, Macro, Metrics, Development
Econ Courses (undergrad-level): Public, International Economics, Micro, Macro, Competition Policy, Growth Theory, Financial Economics, Development Economics, History of Economic Thought, Auction Theory
Other Courses: Finance, Strategy, Marketing, Sociology
Letters of Recommendation: 3 econ professors (2 from Maastricht, 1 from LSE)
Teaching Experience: Tutor for microeconomics at student association in cooperation with the university
Research Interests: Development
SOP: Standard
Concerns: 790Q GRE, no course in real-analysis
Applying to: MIT, Harvard, Princeton, Northwestern, Chicago, UPenn, Stanford, Berkeley, NYU, Columbia, Brown
Can't wait for the results!!! :rolleyes:
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
tobleronic 2009: Type of Undergrad: B.A. in Economics and Math, One of the "New Ivy Leagues"
Undergrad GPA: 3.87, 3.92 Math/Econ
GRE: Q 800; V 490; AW 4.5
Math Courses: Calc I-III, Linear Algebra, Real Analysis I, Theory of Numbers, Transformations and Geometries, Combinatorics, Statistics
Econ Courses: Intro, Intermediate Macro/Micro, Labor, Financial Econ, Advanced Micro Theory, Metrics, Honors Thesis, Math for Econ (MA and PhD), Micro (MA), Micro I and II (PhD)
Letters of Recommendation: 3 Econ Professors (a part time) and 1 math professor
Research Experience: None
Teaching Experience: None.
Research Interests: Labor , Micro
Applying to: Columbia, Yale, Harvard, MIT, Penn, Berkeley, Stanford, Princeton, NYU, NW, Duke
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
DesperateEconomist 2009: It's time to do this:
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Bachelor in Business Administration, prestigious institution in Latin America.
Undergrad GPA: 7.6/10
Type of Grad: Master in Economics, same institution than undergrad.
Grad GPA: 8/10
GRE: 800Q, 490V, 4.0AWA
TOEFL: 104 (30R, 30L, 20S:crazy:, 24W)
Math Courses: Mathematics I, II, Linear Algebra, Metric Spaces, Statistics I, II, III, Mathematical Economics (grad).
Econ Courses (Masters): Macro I, II, Micro I, II, Metrics, Time Series and others not so relevant.
Econ Courses (undergrad): Macro, Micro, no Metrics.
Other Courses: Several other courses, but with small or no relevance for admission purposes.
Letters of Recommendation: 3 econ professors (1 Chicago PhD, 1 UCLA PhD, 1 Cornell PhD), and I believe that all of them are solid.
Research Experience: RA for two econ professors and currently working on my master's thesis. I also presented a paper in an economics meeting in my country.
Teaching Experience: TA for two graduate courses (Macro and Time Series) and 1 undergrad course (Statistics).
Research Interests: Macro and IO.
SOP: The usual stuff: I put a brief description of my profile and talked about my preferences and why I think I would succeed in their program.
Concerns: Low score on the speaking section of the TOEFL. Maybe my math background is not as strong as desired by some schools. At least a few low grades that could hurt me.
Applying to: Berkeley, Boston College, BU, Cornell, Columbia, Maryland, MSU, Minnesota, Northwestern, NYU, UT Austin, UCLA, UPenn, Washington St. Louis, Yale.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
SF_Haole 2009: I've been pretty nervous about my chances, and rightly so thus far: 1 admit, 1 waitlist, 3 official rejections and 4 schools that haven't rejected me but appear to have admitted everyone already.
PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Stanford
GPA: 3.7
Major: Physics (BS), International Relations (BA)
Type of Grad: Stanford
GPA: 3.9
Major: International Policy Studies (MA)
GRE: 800Q, 690V, 6.0 writing
Math Courses: Multivariate Calculus: Differential (A) & Integral (A), Linear Algebra: Basic (A) & Advanced (A), Honors Diff Eqns w/proofs (B). Also a shit-ton of physics classes.
Econ Courses (undergrad): Basic micro/macro (A) intermediate micro (B+,A-) intermediate macro(B+), economic history (A), env. econ(A), public policy analysis(A+), stats for econ(A-), metrics(B+).
Econ Courses (grad): None, but I took grad-level courses in international macro (A-), and development (A) through my masters program and the political science dept's Ph.D-level game theory class (A).
Letters of Recommendation: 2 from fairly famous econ professors. I do research for one of them and took a class from the other (and worked for his colleague). 1 from a very famous political scientist (has his own wikipedia article) who taught my game theory class. Kinda nervous about the polisci rec but my options were limited.
Research Experience: lots of physics research; worked as an RA for the RBI (Indian Central Bank) for 1 summer; currently work in applied econ & policy analysis for one of my recommenders (past 2 years).
Teaching Experience: 1 year as a TA for intro to economics.
Research Interests: econometrics, development
SOP: Decent, I might have explained my research more but I built off my NSF essay, which had a separate previous research essay.
Applying to: 21 schools, including the top 10 overall, top 10 econometrics, and top 10 in development. Also UW-Seattle
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
Waitlists:
ForTheWin!_08 2008: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: International, best in South Africa (University of Cape Town for those in the know)

Undergrad GPA: We don't use the GPA system. About 80%, which is 4.0 according to the WES conversion scale.

Type of Grad: N/A

Grad GPA: N/A

GRE: 800Q, 5.0 A, 670 V

Math Courses: A year and a half of calculus, Linear Algebra, Algebra I and II, Real Analysis, Metric Spaces, Complex Analysis, Measure Theory, Functional Analysis I + II, Differential Geometry, Topology I + II. All above 75%, so I guess A- to A+ range.

Undergrad thesis: Explained the Delbaen-Schachermayer version of the "Fundamental Theorem of Asset Pricing" (basically, a financial market satisfies No Arbitrage iff there exists an equvalent martingale ["risk-neutral"] probability measure). Essentially, it was just a whole lot of functional analysis and a little bit of stochastic integration.


Econ Courses: Intro macro/micro/game theory, Intermediate Macro/Micro, Honours Macro/Micro (i.e. 4th-yr level - we used adult Varian for micro, to give you an idea of the level), Undergrad Metrics and Quantitative Methods, Computational Political Economy (4th-yr elective on simulation methods and behavioural econ), Masters Econometrics, Masters/PhD Microeconometrics. All A- to A+ range.

Other Courses: 3 years of Mathematical Statistics, including stuff on: basic probability theory, regression analysis, stochastic processes/time series (not that I remember much of it!), Bayesian statistics, generalised linear models/qualitative regression models. Some basic applied math courses on ordinary differential equations (A's).

Letters of Recommendation: One should be very enthusiastic, from the one of the country's most hardcore empirical microeconomists (though his PhD is local)... another is likely to be good (I mean, I'm certain the guy thinks I'm smart, I got the second-best grade in his class), from quite a big-shot macro guy (PhD Cambridge, and he's co-authored some stuff with Phillip Aghion), but he's only taught me once. I'll probably use my honours thesis supervisor for the third one.

Research Experience: Not a lot... I've ostensibly been an RA for one professor for a summer, but I'm not sure how much work you should do to say this of yourself... I attempted to solve this game theory problem for him (he kind of gave me a half-finished paper of his and said "Can you fix this up?"... I couldn't). So not so impressive on this front I think.


Teaching Experience: Tutor for intermediate micro for two years, rewrote some of the problem sets for the same course.

Research Interests: Development micro, game theory, criminology

SOP: Decent, I thought. I posed a few questions that I thought were interesting and tried to show how my personal background led me to be interested in them. Customised one paragraph to mention which fields at the respective schools were strong, and why I thought they should want me.

Weaknesses: No research experience, from a relatively unknown university; no money to live off of if financial aid is denied.



Results:
Admissions: Michigan ($16k + tuition + health insurance), Chicago ($20k + tuition + health insurance) [attending]
Waitlists:Northwestern, Pennsylvania, Princeton
Rejections:Yale, MIT, Berkeley, Stanford, Harvard
No Reply:NYU

What would I have done differently: Not much. I wish I had gotten my undergraduate degree from a more prestigious place. Other than that, I'm not sure there was much that I could have done differently. But I'm not at all unhappy with what I got...
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists:
mathy backpack 2009: PROFILE:
Type of Undergrad: Large Public University, BA Economics
Undergrad GPA: 3.75 Overall, 3.9 Econ, 4.0 Math
Type of Grad: MA Economics (1/2 of credits were math though)
Grad GPA: 4.0
GRE: 800Q, 690V, 5.0AWA
Math Courses: Calc I, Calc II, Vector Calc, Linear Algebra, Logic, Probability/Statistics (multivar calc), Real Analysis, Linear Algebra(grad), Probability Theory(grad)...All A's Taking: Statistical Theory(grad)
Econ Courses (grad): Micro(MA), Macro(MA), Econometrics(MA), Labor(MA), Public Finance(MA), GameTheory(MA), Optimization I(PhD)...All A's Taking: Adv Macro(PhD), Optimization II(PhD)
Econ Courses (undergrad-level): Intermed. Micro & Macro, plus 12 other Junior/Senior semester courses for the major...All A's in these, but with a spicy little B and a C in intro Micro and Macro(101 and 102) as a Freshman
Other: English Minor, Drum & Bass show on student radio
Letters of Recommendation: Different combos of 5 Econ profs from master's program
Research Interests: Micro Theory, Game Theory, Behavioral, Micro-ish Development
SOP: Spent way too much time, 1 1/2 pages, standard I'm sure
Concerns: Picked a great year to apply!?!
Other: Despite the random attacks of anxiety, I am pretty excited. Trying to prepare myself to not take the rejections too personally. I have faith that I will end up exactly where I am supposed to be.
Applying to: The usual suspects...Princeton, Yale, Berkeley, Chicago, Northwestern, NYU, Columbia, Cornell, Brown, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Minnesota, Penn, WUSTL, Duke, Carnegie Mellon.... hopefully enough!
Fingers: crossed
:)Good Luck to everyone.
Accepts: Rejects: Waitlists: