LSE vs, School of Oriental and African Affairs vs. Oxford for Masters in Dev Economics for an American student with Arabic language skills? Any thoughts? Masters only programs in this field in the US seem to be low on “value” scale. Thanks in advance.
Do you have offers from all three? if not, and if all 3 programs look equally attractive in terms of content, why not apply to all three? Don’t really see either being American or having specific language skills as being a relevant decision factor, unless it links to an interest in a particular region, in which case SOAS would be the usual choice, b/c of the regional modules.
Not sure exactly what course at LSE you are thinking of- Development Studies? if so, it is the outlier, as the other two require a strong econ background.
Thank you for your reply. My daughter is just starting to look at choices. SoAs seems to be the best fit On paper as she does have an interest in Middle East. I just know nothing about this school and was wondering it’s reputation. Oxford, obviously is a pipe dream.
SOAS is entirely reputable!
Oxford is not as big a pipe dream for Masters as it is for undergrad, but be careful of being seduced by the name, and not looking closely at the course. The Oxford Development Econ Masters is assessed by a single final exam in each of four subjects: microeconomic theory, macroeconomic theory, quantitative methods, and development economics, plus a 10,000 word dissertation. Information on the coursework is available [url=<a href=“http://www.qeh.ox.ac.uk/content/msc-economics-development%5Donline%5B/url”>http://www.qeh.ox.ac.uk/content/msc-economics-development]online[/url].