<p>Ive been accepted to UMass Amherst and Drexel for Economics. Money isn't really a problem for me but I was just wondering which is better and if either or is good at all.</p>
<p>Any ideas anyone?</p>
<p>I’m not sure about Drexel, but the UMass econ department is incredibly different than most departments in the U.S., as it’s heterodox-focused. Most economic departments are predominately neo-classical, and are essentially appendages of B-Schools. That’s not to say you won’t get neoclassical theory at UMass (they require you to take the usual 2 semesters of calc, 2 semesters of micro and two semesters of macro theory -all mainstream courses). What sets UMass apart is that a large portion of the upper-level economics courses focus on the derivatives or byproducts of these theories, and in many instances, you’ll be critically examining them through a political-economy lens. </p>
<p>This isn’t to say this is bad thing; all of the Professors I’ve encountered are just brilliant - many coming from Harvard and Yale because of UMass’s unique program. They do, however, often push against the mainstream view that emerged with the Chicago school-style mantra of Milton Friedman 40 or so years ago. </p>
<p>Much of their work is becoming increasingly relevant in the mainstream economic community with the emerging importance and notoriety of behavioral economics.</p>
<p>So I guess it just depends what you plan on doing when you graduate. </p>
<p>If you’re planning on applying for a PhD in Econ afterwords (not like you would know now, but if you think it may be a possibility), I would not go to UMass, or if you do, take Math 131 and 132 instead of 127 and 128. The econ department is also incredibly flexible when it comes to five-college courses, and I was able to transfer two econ courses from Amherst college over as upper-level major requirements, so that is also an option.</p>
<p>Likewise, if you’re thinking about going into investment banking, I’d major in Finance / Operations Mgmt at Isenberg instead of Econ. (You can, however, double major with Isenberg which is really easy to do as many of the courses for the Econ requirement cross over into the business core).</p>
<p>Nonetheless, I’ve found the major to be incredibly applicable in my work in the public sector, and it will definitely open your eyes.</p>
<p>Thank you that helped me out so much!</p>
<p>I was just wondering though. Would it be easy to change my major if I were to go there? And did you mean to not get a phd in economics at umass or just in general because regardless of what I go for I was planning on heading to grad school</p>
<p>Changing majors is relatively easy, depending upon where you’re transferring majors from. </p>
<p>If you want to switch from Econ to SOM, or double major, that shouldn’t be a problem after your first year, or even second year since almost all of the prerequisites are similar, and everyone is trying to get their GenEd’s out of the way anyway. </p>
<p>You’d probably want to get at least a 3.4-3.5 GPA and A’s or B+'s in math 127 / 128 and econ 103 / 104 / stats / to be particularly competitive. </p>
<p>Insofar as other majors, I’m not entirely sure, you’d have to check with the dept. I know nursing is impossible to transfer into if you’re not admitted and Engineering is pretty hard to transfer in as well given the credit load. </p>
<p>But a lot of students enter undeclared for the first year and a half anyway and then choose a major after fulfilling their gen-eds, so I wouldn’t worry about it all that much. </p>
<p>RE: The PhD, I just meant if you were planning on applying for a PhD program in Econ at another institution down the road, you would probably want to think twice about getting a BA in Econ from UMass. Other than that, IMO, the major wouldn’t preclude you from any other advanced degrees; most of my friends who also majored in econ are in grad school - many at top institutions - getting MBA’s, Ed.D’s, etc…</p>
<p>Perfect! Thank you very much! That definitely clears up a lot of worries because I am not entirely sure i want to pursue economics. I will definitely look into it and contact the department if I decide to switch. Thanks again crelindr, huge help!</p>
<p>My son wants to go for under grad economics major and then go far research. He got the acceptance from the following:
NYU (Beyond our affordability)
U Roch
UMASS Amherst
SUNY Bingh
U Miami
Trinity Univ</p>
<p>Pl give input for academic scene of the economics dept of these univ for under graduate program</p>