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Canadian accepted to Msc Environment Management, Did anyone get their college acceptance yet?

Thanks for the help. Tere are only 3 lines on my conditional offer 1. Graduate with final mark equivalent to UK first class 2. Pay fees by the deadline 3. Respond by the deadline I applied with GPA 3.64 and after 4th year and all the hard courses my final GPA is 3.61. One consolation I got was that mcgill has serious grade deflation so most university lower their standard when considering us. It's not a huge drop and my major GPA actually increased cuz I performe well on classes under my major. But the wording of the letter is so elusive and there isn't really a good equivalency table on the net about where oxford stands when comparing Canadian GPA. It's not a huge drop, but I just want to make sure that they make offers to those they already considered qualified and won't make the offer to students who are below bar but "might" meet the bar, does that make sense? So if anyone has any prior experience with this please let me know. I contacted the grad office but they are super slow at getting back at me.

But my application mark is not even 3.68. I was just thinking they won't make an admission offer if they are not sure my final grade even reaches the bar, would they?

Hi So I recently got my MSc offer from oxford and the condition is to have a GPa equivalent to UK first class. In canada we are on a 4.0 scale and my mark basically drop about 0.03 points from my application average. I got no idea what oxford considers first class by Canadian standards and not sure if this will affect my final admission. I was just wondering if anyone has a similar experience and can comment on it?

It makes sense. I'm not very picky about the college actually, I chose St. John's because it has the most endowment and is large enough to allow some multi-cultural/experience representations. Though I feel like I'll be stuck mostly with people from my program, which is around 25. One concern I got with Oxford or LSE is that the degree may be considered a "tourist degree" and I don't end up learning much except going away with a nice name on my resume. Another problem for me is the exchange rate. Oh man Canadian dollar is worthless nowadays, I have to end up paying so much more than planned for the same amount of sterling. But I guess you'd have the same problem if you end up in Switzerland.

I think you should look through Yale open courses, especially that macro course taught by Polak, to know if you really like it. If you are able to understand all the models and concepts, then by all means proceed a little further. My econ class dwindled from 200 to just about 40 people in my final year, and most people don't go into econ because it just gets harder for them to understand. If you just want a job though, honestly, it's better to do a finance degree than Econ. If you truly loves it then go for a degree that grants you with knowledge in applied econometrics, it's analysis and modelling, which are practical skills that makes finding a job easier. I got friend who's doing comp sci and econ, he went into consulting afterwards. So I suppose you can aim for something that lets you use your knowledge in software development or web language (excuse my limited knowledge in comp sci) and make business decisions using econometrics models/market analysis. Econ PhD is quite unnecessary if you are not into academia and it takes around 7 years to complete. Normally people come back for PhD after a few years working in the field, it's more about your experience/professional credentials than education. i guess the US system is different, go somewhere that lets you do a master's degree with practical and structured program in UK or Canada. Though most master's requires you to have 3 basic courses in macro, micro, and stat to qualify for the application. Hope this helps!

I'm surprised no one responded to this topic, I'm interested in other people's opinion as well. I did a bachelor in Economics in McGill, and there is a difference between theoretical econometrics and applied econometrics. Since you are an engineering grad I'm going to assume you are particularly adapted to doing math, especially linear algebra, so I would personally suggest just go ahead and do a specialization in the specific field of Econ you are interested in. If you want to work in a bank, there's international econ/financial econ, all of which requires a solid macroeconomics knowledge base. I always thought of economics as building a pyramid, and most universities require you to have Micro, Macro, and Stat (econometrics) to even qualify for a Master's application, and then you branch off and chose your specialization once you got these under your belt. As far as I know, LSE also provides basic macro/micro courses for those who are doing their master's regardless of your specialization, these are listed under required courses. But since you do not have these basics, which took us about 3 years to learn, you'd have to just work a bit harder to understand and memorize the concepts. I applied for LSE in Nov. and they just got back to me with an admission, so I hope you'd be able to catch the October semester. I don't think they worry too much about GRE unless you get below the 85th percentile for math, it might be a bit problematic. Also, (just the pet peeve I learned from my professors, feel free to ignore the rest of the sentence...) economics is not just about money, and banking. If you are interested in the financial sector then it's better to do a finance degree, which is more practical. Economics is more about welfare and how to view the market from a macro/systematic point of view that encompasses not just funds but also people's behaviours and how it affect their well-being overall. I feel like this is an understanding that develops with time and the variety of courses you encounter in this field. I don't know how to recommend other universities to you since I'm not sure which field of economics you plan to get into. A very obvious choice is MIT. UBC also offers great applied econometrics training as well as Berkeley. There are some Yale open courses you can look through to get a basic idea of what academic econ is like. Hope this helps!

Hi From my own experience, if you email your department as well as the admission office asking for an extension based on reasons not related to waiting for other admission (unable to pay for deposit due to financial reasons, for example), then you can definitely be allowed for an extension. Also for those who are a little anxious about the schools that are yet to respond, if you email the department that's making the admission decision saying that you are accepted elsewhere and is under a deadline, they will consider expedite your application. Be sure to word it carefully.

They are very different topics. If you want a job with world bank or IMF, go for international economics and make sure you are absolutely fluent with applied econometrics. International econ is more about international movement of money/labor/products, you'll be encountering models like Hecksher-Ohlin, and maybe work on topics like how the EU can (or can't) save Greece's economy through manipulation of the euro. International econ is also quite broad, you can specialize by specifically focusing on how international trade of products affects the market etc. Development economics is working with developing countries. You'll be working on projects such as how microfinance will help Indian women, working with models such as Solow, and learning about how a country transitions from developing to developed, working with poverty - Lorenz curve, poverty line, human development index etc. They are completely different topics, can be inter-connected like everything else in life, but yeah. If you got an institution that you absolutely wanted to work for, aka world bank, go for the subject that lefts you do it.

I agree, the collegial system is a definite plus for student experience and networking. I applied to St. John's since I'm a little clueless as to the reputation behind each college, so I chose the one that seems to offer the most well-rounded option, which one did you chose? I suppose not having to look for an apartment and related distractions are also a plus, though the price to pay may be quite high. But living in London is not far off from the 15000 pounds Oxford suggested on its website.

Thanks! I'm going to look for meet and greet when they are in Vancouver. Thank goodness Vancouver is a big city so it's likely they'll be here. Unfortunately I'm financial constrained so I can't really go see the campus beforehand, so I just looked up things on Youtube and of course Oxford looks a lot nicer and similar to McGill's gothic buildings, which is my favourite part of the university. It's good to note student experience, I became very close with a professor visiting from Oxford this year and he said student life is absolutely the best at Oxford. It's curious that you used the word yesterday to describe Oxford, one worry I have over going for a small and enclosed environment is that I lose the whole business feel and street smartness (if you can call it that) of living in a big city and having to constantly put on your competitive face. I see you've chosen SOAS out of all the schools, just wondering what's your reason behind that?

YAY got my admission last week for Msc Environmental Economics and Climate Change. but sadly no funding :/ Haven't decided where to go yet, still waiting for Oxford. Anyone else?

Haven't decided yet but I'll be doing MSci in Environment Economics and Management. They promised me a reply by March 5. My other choice is LSE, unfortunately finance is a huge problem and it looks like there's not much scholarship/funding offered to Canadians. We'll see what happens. Is there a meet and greet in person for Oxford? I'd love to meet and chat.

I'm not in Engineering so I can't say much in terms of the technical aspects. But here's some advice I got from professional who are pretty higher up in the food chain: Frances, as a "Harvard educated" environmental economist I can tell you that the name may catch some peoples' eyes, and it may even open a door or two, but your capability, training (not where you trained), and your ability to show what you know are going to be far more important and that all will show itself in the first year or two of your professional career. The worst thing to have happen would be to show up with a big name behind you and not be able to deliver. Go with your heart and that which you believe will make you better at what you want to do. ...If one goes to a reputed institution, the first impression about the quality of the person is likely to be good given that a substantial quality is required, in the first place, to get into that institution. Also, the reputation of the teachers teaching the courses and the apparent quality of the programme of studies in an institution should be of value in relation to that first impressin about the person. But, beyond that, all depends on what the person concerned delivers. Hence, I would think your focus should be to get the best education and training you can under the guidance of the teachers but, more importantly, through hard and conscientious studies, regardless of which of the institutions you go to. What I have said is based on my long experience of emloying and supervising professionals coming from different backgrounds and having studied in different universities in different countries. Hope this helps?

One of the things I learned from going to Undergrad in McGill is that ranking means very little when it comes to real student experience. I applied for master's in Environmental Economics and really wants to work on issues on climate change/caps-n-trade/the energy sector. Since LSE and Oxford are very similar in most aspects, which one should I choose? (Okay, I applied to UBC as my last resort, so I don't really think I'd be going for it since I got my other admissions, even though it's my cheapest option as a Canadian) Thoughts? Also you can ask me q's about McGill as an exchange for your help. Thanks ya'll.