walt526

It appears that I misread your post. Specifically, you wrote "If you want to go Public Sector or return to China after your degree, Vanderbilt is your better option" (emphasis added) was initially misread as public economics (which is Vanderbilt's greatest strength). Or I mistyped--I honestly don't remember. But it doesn't really matter, as I still disagree that Vanderbilt is a better option for any domestic career ambitions. Or to put it a little more diplomatically, it's not clear to me why Vanderbilt would be a considered a better option for preparing one to go into the public sector than UMich. Again, I have no idea which a Chinese employer (private or public) would prefer.

It varies by school. I'm expecting/hoping that it will come soon just that I can make travel arrangements as well as starting to look for a place to live (or roommate). I emailed the grad secretary at my school earlier this week inquiring as to when Math Camp was supposed to start and never heard back.

No, I'm not. But just wanted to say that I'm quite jealous. UBC is a great school and Vancouver is one of my all-time favorite cities. Best of luck!

Hey Dennis, A good starting point for comparing graduate programs in terms of relative strengths by field, probably the best place to start is: http://econphd.econwiki.com/rankings.htm Now it's by literature productivity, so it's not a perfect ranking (i.e., it doesn't take into account quality of placements, support for grad students, etc). But it's a good starting point. A similar type of study can be found here: http://www.econ.uconn.edu/Ranking.pdf But it only sorts by JEL classification code. As for your question about time required to complete the degree, in most cases you will not receive academic credit for any of the courses that you completed at LSE and you'll have to complete the same requirements (core course, field course, etc). That would still be the case even if you were coming into the school with a MSc in Economics from a top school (as LSE obviously is). Now it's possible that you will be able to complete your research in less time than many in your cohort because you have a clear idea of what you want to study and probably a better understanding of how to successfully complete academic research than the typical student starting a PhD right after completing his/her undergrad degree. I'll be starting my PhD Economics this fall with a MA Economics (from a state school nowhere near as good as LSE) and I'm hoping to be able to complete the PhD in 4 years (mean is ~5.5 years).

I certainly understand the frustration (I wish that I was getting more information about next year right now, since I've made a decision). But try to see it from their perspective: if you already committed to the school before learning about funding our the project assignment, then they'll assume that it's not information that you need by April 15th in order to make a decision. There is a difference between "important" (which your project assignment is) and "urgent" (which your project assignment isn't, given that you already committed).

I think that if the Master's will be your terminal degree, then the UMich is probably a better "brand" in most of the country than Vanderbilt. That's not to say that Vanderbilt's not a great school, but outside of maybe the south I think that both the institution and certainly the Economics department at UMich have the edge. Also, I'll respectfully disagree with the previous poster who said that Vanderbilt clearly dominated on public; for law and economics and maybe social choice theory than yes, but Michigan is a GREAT place to do public (and even in the subfields of public that Vanderbilt is stronger, I think that it's a quite good). I have no idea which would be better for China.

In the case of Vanderbilt, no-news-is-good-news at this point. My understanding is that they have sent out their auto-rejects and admissions offers to their most qualified applicants. More will gradually come in over the next 3-6 weeks. IIRC from last year's TM decisions thread, the last reported acceptance was end of March or early April. So just sit tight for the time being.

Sorry. On second thought, it might be better to not comment on this until a complete, official offer is made. Please disregard.