<p>Hi I'm another Vandy hopeful and I am very interested in attending graduate school in economics after college.</p>
<p>I was wondering how Vanderbilt's Econ Department's record was with sending students to top tier graduate programs in Economics?</p>
<p>I also heard that graduate Economics requires a TON of quantitative, formal proof, mathematical/modeling skills. I was wondering how prepared a Vanderbilt Econ student would be for such work?</p>
<p>I am under the impression that most (if not nearly all) Vanderbilt Econ majors go on to a professional grad school (MBA, JD, some MD), and that very few actually go to grad school in economics. Is this true?</p>
<p>Don't get me wrong, I love Vandy and would love to attend if accepted. But, career considerations and grad school prep/admission is a factor in my decisions.</p>
<p>Vanderbilt’s economics program will prepare you very well for graduate school. Since there is no official business major for Vandy undergraduates, there is a very large emphasis on the economics department. It is a challenging program, but is very rewarding and well respected. Assuming you do well in your classes, the economics program will only give you the edge above other applicants. Vanderbilt also offers many student clubs related to economics, business, and cross-overs with many disciplines, which will also be very important in determining your graduate school acceptance. You will be prepared extremely well, as long as you do the work and do it well.</p>
<p>well, my specific question was concerning economics grad school. I checked the vandy website for the econ dept. and they said that 1/2 of econ majors go onto get an MBA 1/4 to law school and very few go on to econ grad school.</p>
<p>So I was just wondering if the spirit of Vandy’s econ dept. was very geared towards preprofessionalism rather than academia.</p>
<p>Man, yeah. I posted this about a month ago and the paucity of replies worries me.
Imnotafraid, “as long as you do the work and do it well” can only take you so far. As far as I know it, economics grad schools admissions take into consideration the rigorousness of the math/economics curriculum at each specific school and the professor’s research which the student took part in. And also the weight of the professor’s recommendation in an academic context. NOT just the academic performance of the student, gmat scores, etc.</p>
<p>You should look into whether or not the Honor Economics option is currently available. S was one of 200+ econ majors graduating in '06, but he was one of only 6 who pursued the honors option which includes writing a thesis. If I remember correctly, prior to his class, the honors program was “on hold” for a few years while it lacked an advisor. The professor who served as advisor for his group was close to retirement, so I don’t know if this option is currently available.</p>
<p>If you want to graduate school in economics, </p>
<p>1) you don’t need to major in economics
2) taking as many challenging math/statistics/computer science/ classes as possible will probably be you best bet for being prepared for graduate economics</p>
<p>Of course, the level of the mathematics in an undergraduate economics curriculum is somewhat limited, given that “most” courses are really meant for a people with just a calculus background. </p>
<p>Like I’ve said in earlier posts, you can easily circumvent any mathematics in economics by taking the right classes, but if you want to take the most mathematics based economics classes at Vanderbilt, take Econometrics 253 & 284 and Game Theory 273. Of course, completing an honors thesis can also make you stand out to graduate programs. (yes, the honors program is up and running) </p>
<p>Feel free to PM if I haven’t really answered your questions.</p>
<p>I’m a freshman at Vanderbilt who intends to major in economics.
Economics is one of the more popular majors here; as was mentioned, somewhere in the ballpark of 200 students graduate with a major in the field each year. It is true that many of these students pursue professional degrees after graduation, although such is the case at any university. Economics is often the major of choice for those who aspire to careers in business, for instance, because BBA programs are either not offered at the university that they attend; are inferior to potential MBA programs; or preclude, to some extent, a liberal education.
Here’s a link to the department page with information for undergrads who are considering graduate study in economics: [Department</a> of Economics | Vanderbilt University | Nashville, Tennessee](<a href=“http://www.vanderbilt.edu/econ/undergraduate/graduate-economics.html]Department”>http://www.vanderbilt.edu/econ/undergraduate/graduate-economics.html). It may answer your question about the math that you would need to take for graduate econ.</p>