Summer Mailing

To:  Economics Majors, Joint Majors, and Concentrators
From:  Susan Elmes, Economics Department DUS
Subject: Information for academic year 2012-2013
Date:  August 2012

This memo is addressed to all students who have declared a major, joint major, or concentration in economics to help you plan your academic program.  Please take a few minutes to read through the information below and be sure to check the department’s Web site for any last minute changes.

Department Newsletter

Each semester the department sends out a newsletter highlighting the interests and accomplishments of the faculty and the students of the department.  You can find a link to the newsletter on the homepage of the department’s website.
 

Advising

Graduate student advisors will hold office hours each week and respond to student emails to provide timely answers to the most common questions that students have regarding the major. The graduate student advisors will be able to discuss major requirements, scheduling and course selection as well as review your checklists and discuss your progress in the major. Other than transfer credit or study abroad questions (see below), students should direct all questions and concerns about their major to the graduate student advisors. The graduate student advisors in most cases will be able to answer student questions directly. In a few cases, they may decide to refer you to someone else in the department (such as myself) or in your school for further information. You may email them at econ-advising@columbia.edu. Office hours will be posted on the Advisors page of the departmental website in the week prior to the beginning of the semester.

The one issue that graduate student advisors will not handle is approval for transfer credits or study abroad credits. All economics transfer credits must be approved by the Department of Economics. The department divides transfer credit approvals between myself and Sunil Gulati. If you have transferred to Columbia and you would like to transfer credits from economics courses taken before you came to Columbia, then you should contact your CC or GS advisor. If you are at Columbia and would like to take economics courses at another institution (including summer courses and courses taken abroad), then you should see Dr Gulati. Information regarding the application for transfer credits and the materials you must present with your application is available on the departmental website on the Transfer Credit Information page. Please read that material carefully before submitting your materials for approval.

Students may request a personal faculty advisor to discuss academic or career goals. Faculty advisors will not discuss major requirements (that is the role of the graduate student advisors). Faculty advisors will discuss course selection to meet intellectual goals and interests, as well as career or research options. If you plan on attending a PhD program in economics or pursuing economics research after graduation, then it is recommended that you request a faculty advisor. There is a form at the end of the summer mailing and available on the Advisors page of the website to request a faculty advisor. Fill out the form and leave it in my mailbox on the 10th floor of IAB in the main office of the department. We will try to match you with a faculty member that shares your academic interests.

New BA-MA Program in Economics

Beginning this year, the department will offer a new 5 year BA-MA program in economics. Students admitted to this program will begin to take first year PhD courses in economics in their senior year at Columbia while they are completing their undergraduate studies. Students will remain at Columbia one additional year to finish the first year courses in economics and to take at least two field courses in a field of their choosing. Students will apply in the spring of their junior year for admission to the program. Details about the program including admission requirements and course requirements can be found on the department's website at http://econ.columbia.edu/ba_ma.  Questions about the program should be directed to the Director of Graduate Studies, Brendan O'Flaherty at bo2@columbia.edu.

Course Information

For the most up to date information on class offerings (including registration numbers, days, times and classrooms) you should always check the Registrar’s Directory of Classes website. In most cases the economics department sets the course registration cap equal to the room capacity. Because of the shortage of classroom space, it is generally not possible to move classes to larger rooms. Hence, when class registration reaches the cap number, you cannot be added to the class roster by the department or the faculty member. In this instance you must wait until the registration falls below the cap before you can register.

Finance Related Courses 

The department is offering the following finance related courses in the fall semester. At this time we expect to offer all of these courses again in the Spring ’13 semester. We recommend that students interested in financial economics take their finance core courses as early as possible in their academic programs.

The Business School will be offering W3013 Financial Accounting in both the fall and spring semester. 

College Business Courses

In addition to W3013, Columbia College offers several other business oriented classes. The department does not oversee these courses and does not have any information about them. If you have questions about these courses, please contact Saphia Najafee in the Business School for more information at BusinessManagement@gsb.columbia.edu. Note that you may only take these courses for elective credit towards the financial economics major. You should consult the bulletin for more information on the elective requirements for the financial economics major. You may not take these courses for credit towards an economics major or any of our other joint majors.

W4370 Political Economy

Political economy will only be offered in the fall semester.  All seniors in the joint major with political science who have not previously taken political economy must take W4370 Political Economy this fall.

W4325 Economic Development of Japan

In the fall semester, Dr Edward Lincoln will be replacing Prof David Weinstein, who is the new chair in the department.  Dr Lincoln is the former director of the Center for Japan Business and Economic Studies at the Stern School of Business at NYU.

G4301 Economic Growth and Development

Prof Sala-i-Martin will be offering 4301 this fall.

W4280 Corporate Finance

Corporate Finance will be open to all CC, GS and BC students who have completed the course prerequisites during the final registration period for the fall semester. This registration period will open on August 31st.

W4415 Game Theory

The department may offer an additional section of Game theory in the spring semester this year.

SDEV W2320 Economic and Financial Methods for Sustainable Development

Beginning in Fall 2012, the department will now accept SDEV W2320 for 2000 level elective credit towards the completion of an economics major or concentration. If you are pursuing programs in both economics and sustainable development, you should check with your advisor in the sustainable development program as to whether or not you may double count this course towards both programs. If you took this class in a previous year and would like to count it as a 2000 level elective then you must send Laura Yan an email indicating that you would like to count this course as your 2000 level elective in economics.

W4400 Labor Economics and W4625 Economics of the Environment

The department will not be offering these two classes in the fall. We do hope to offer the Economics of the environment in the spring. However we will not be offering W4400 Labor this year.

Elective Courses Offered Only in the Fall

The following courses will be offered by the department only in the Fall semester: W4213 Advanced Macro, W4228 Urban Economics, W4251 Industrial Organization, G4301 Growth and Development, W4325 Economic Development of Japan, W4370 Political Economy, W4412 Advanced Econometrics, W4465 Public Economics, W4480 Gender and Applied Economics, and W4750 Globalization and It’s Risks.

Elective Courses Offered Only in the Spring

The following courses will be offered by the department only in the Spring semester: W2257 Global Economy,  W4020 Economics of Uncertainty and Information, W4211 Advanced Micro, G4235 Historical Foundations of Modern Economics, W4321 Economic Development,  W4413 Time Series, G4421 Problems of emerging market economies, W4438 Economics of Race, W4500 International Trade, W4505 International Monetary Theory and Policy, G4526 Transition Reforms, Globalization and Financial Crises, G4527 Economic Organization and Development of China, W4615 Law and Economics and W4625 Economics of the Environment.

Elective Requirements for Joint Majors

• If you are not a joint major with philosophy or a financial economics major, then only economics elective courses at the 3000 level or higher may be counted towards your major requirements.

• If you are an Economics-Philosophy joint major, then only courses from the following list may be taken to fulfill your major requirements: W4020 Economics of Uncertainty and Information, W4080 Globalization, Incomes and Inequality, W4213 Advanced Macro, W4228 Urban Economics, G4235 Historical Foundations of Modern Economics, G4301 Economic Growth and Development, W4321 Economic Development, W4370 Political Economy, W4400 Labor Economics, W4415 Game Theory, W4438 Economics of Race in the United States, W4465 Public Economics, W4500 International Trade, W4615 Law and Economics, W4625 Economics of the Environment, W4750 Globalization and its Risks,  BC3011 Inequality and Poverty, BC3019 Labor Economics, BC3029 Development Economics, BC3039 Environmental and Natural Resource Economics and BC3041 Theoretical Foundations of Political Economy.  Underlined courses indicate that these classes are offered in the fall semester.

• If you are a Financial Economics major, then you must select your electives from the following list  and at least two courses must be chosen from the economics department:V3265 Economics of Money and Banking, W4020 Economics of Uncertainty and Information, W4213 Advanced Macroeconomics, W4251 Industrial Organization, W4412 Advanced Econometrics, W4415 Game Theory, W4465 Public Economics, W4505 International Monetary Theory and Policy, G4526 Transition Reforms, Globalization and Financial Crises, BC3014 Entrepreneurship, BC3017 Economics of Business Organizations, STAT W4290 Statistical Methods in Finance, STAT W4635 Stochastic Processes for Finance, Stat W4840 Theory of Interest, Math V3050 Discrete Time Models in Finance, Math W4077 Intro to the Math of Finance, IEOR E3106 Intro to OR: Stochastic Models, IEOR E4700 Intro to Financial Engineering, BUSI W3021 Marketing Management, BUSI W3701 Strategic Behavior/Strategy Formulation, BUSI W3703 Leadership in Organizations, BUSI W4412 Managerial Negotiations, and POLS W3630 The Politics of International Economic Relations. Underlined courses indicate those courses offered by the economics department in the fall.

Seminars

• Please note that seminars will be strictly limited to 15 students.  Seminar registration is closed to on-line registration and is done in person in the Economics department at 9 AM on the first day of the semester, Sept 4th. The sign-up is on a first come-first serve basis. During the first week of classes only seniors may sign up for seminars. After the first week of classes any student who has completed his or her core requirements in economics may sign up for any seminar that remains open. For more information about the sign up process and specific sign up dates, please see the Senior seminar sign-up page in the department’s website. Seminar descriptions are now posted.  A separate announce-ment will be sent to seniors in late August. 
   
• Students in the Econ-Political Science joint major must take W4921. All students must have completed their econometrics requirement (either W3412 or POLS W4911) and W4370 Political Economy before taking the seminar. This seminar will only be offered in the spring semester. If you are a junior and are planning on graduating early (either in your junior year or fall of your senior year), then you must take this seminar in the spring semester.
   
• Students in the Econ-Philosophy joint major must take W4950 the economics and philosophy seminar which is only offered in the spring semester.  If you are a junior who is planning on graduating early (either in your junior year or fall semester of your senior year) then you must take 4950 this spring. You must have completed all of your core requirements (W3211, W3213 and STAT W1211) prior to taking the seminar.

• Students in the Econ-Statistics joint majors must take the econometrics seminar, W4918, which will be offered in both semesters. It will be assumed that students registered for this seminar have a strong background in econometrics and statistics.  This joint seminar is open to all students.

• Padma Desai will teach G4421 Topics on Problems of Emerging Market Economies this spring. This seminar is open to SIPA students as well as Columbia undergraduates. To register for this course you must contact Prof Desai to get her approval. You may take this course to fulfill your seminar requirement in the economics department. You do not sign up for this seminar during the seminar sign-up period.
   
• Students interested in Prof. Gulati's seminar (4911, sec 1, Sports Economics) in the fall should follow the regular procedure for seminar sign up (sign up in person at 9 AM in the economics department on the first day of classes). However the registration cap for in-person sign up will be 10 students. The remaining 5 students will be chosen by Prof Gulati from the wait-list. To be chosen from the wait list you must meet with Prof Gulati that morning (the first day of the semester) between 11:30 am and 12:30 pm in his office. Be prepared to tell him what topics you may be interested in researching for your seminar paper.

• The following fall seminars will fulfill the seminar requirement for the Financial Economics major:

Senior Honors Thesis - Departmental Honors

All students who are interested in writing a senior honors thesis during academic year 2012-13 should have spoken with me during the spring 2012 term.  Regardless of whether you did or did not speak with me in the spring, you must send me an email by August 27^th (se5@columbia.edu).  In your email you must include a one paragraph description of your proposed topic and the paragraph must contain at least one economics question that you would like to address in your thesis. In a second paragraph, tell me what in your background (either class work or work experience) that qualifies you to work on your proposed topic (e.g. if your topic is Russian exchange rate movements you might want to tell me that you have taken international monetary theory). Finally, you must include in your email the name(s) of faculty members that you believe would be interested in working with you. If you do not know a faculty member who would be interested, then you should look at the department’s website for information on their research interests.

After I have received your email, I may contact you to set up a meeting to discuss your proposal.  My role is to both select students for the seminar and to help match students with an appropriate faculty member who will serve as the student’s thesis advisor.  If I have approved your proposal, Laura Yan will register you into W4999 Honor Thesis.

W4999 will run as a year long course for 3 points per semester (students will be automatically registered again in the spring), with a grade reported only at the end of the academic year. Writing a thesis will substitute for the departmental seminar requirements. Students who wish to drop out of the honors program at the end of the fall semester may do so. In this case he or she will receive a grade of R for the fall semester. The student will then have to take a senior seminar to satisfy the seminar requirement. Please see the Honors and Prizes page on the department website for more information regarding the senior honors thesis and for a list of those students who have received departmental honors in the past.

In addition to working one-on-one with your faculty advisor the senior thesis candidates will meet on occasion as a group to discuss their research and to present their final results. In the fall these meetings will be held on Thursdays from 9-10:50 with Prof Edlund. You must be able to attend the Thursday meetings if you would like to write a senior thesis.  The first meeting will be in late September. Once you are registered for the seminar you will receive a meeting schedule

Journal of Economic Perspectives

Students interested in current research in economics should consult the Journal of Economic Perspectives which is now available free online at http://www.aeaweb.org/jep/index.php.  The JEP is a general interest journal written for economists. Journal articles are surveys of current research in a wide variety of topics and are written for knowledgeable non-specialists in a given field. For example recent issues contain symposia on gender and test scores and another on financial markets. The archive is searchable back to 2002. All students (juniors and seniors) thinking of writing a senior thesis should use the articles in the JEP to help them shape a thesis idea and I will expect that students who meet with me regarding senior thesis will have already consulted the JEP prior to our meeting.

Rules for Transfer Credits, AP/IB Credits and Barnard Electives

The department sets a minimum number of lecture courses that you must take in the Columbia economics department to fulfill your major requirements. The remainder of your credits may come from a combination of AP credits, transfer credits and Barnard elective course credits.

The following table outlines the rules for each of the majors and joint majors in economics.

Notes

1. Lecture courses do not include seminars which must be taken in the Columbia department. The lecture course counts are counts of economics courses only, so the counts do not include math, statistics or courses in other departments. There is also no change on the rule that no more than one course may be taken at the 2000 level.

2. There is no change in the rule that at least 2 of the 3 3000 level core courses must be taken in the department and no corresponding Barnard courses will be accepted. The two V courses (V3025 and V3265) will continue to be counted as departmental courses regardless of the instructor.

3. Outside courses include AP (IB or GCE) credits for Principles (1 class), transfer credits for Principles (1 course even if it was a two semester sequence), Barnard 2000 and 3000 level elective courses and transfer credits from other universities.

Information regarding transfer credit approval can be found on the departmental website in the Transfer credit information page. You must read this material carefully before seeking approval. To apply for transfer credits for courses taken prior to registering at Columbia, you must speak with your CC or GS advisor.  To apply for transfer credits for courses taken during a study abroad or summer session, you must speak with Dr Gulati prior to taking those courses to seek preliminary approval. You must speak to him again when you return to campus to get a final approval.

Requirements

• Each year a few students fail to graduate on time because they fail to complete their major or joint major requirements. Most often they simply did not know what their requirements were. You can find all of your major requirements information on the website on the Requirements page.
   
• The on-line degree audit report (DAR) is a useful tool for looking at the classes that you have completed in an organized manner (organized by subject and not semester as a transcript is). However, for a variety of reasons, the DAR’s check of major requirements is sometimes erroneous. Hence you should not simply conclude that a check on the DAR indicating that your requirements have been fulfilled (or the lack of a check indicating that they are not) means that you have in fact completed your major requirements. You should always compare your completed courses including your department approved transfer courses to the requirements listed on the economics department website (at the website above).
   
• The department will shortly send you a checklist that you can use to check on your progress in the major. These checklists are also posted online. You should take a minute to fill it out.  If you would like to go over your major requirements with a graduate student advisor, then you must bring a copy of your checklist and your transcript to that meeting.

Undergraduate TA Positions

This fall the department is hiring undergraduates to work alongside our graduate students as teaching assistants in several courses. Each assistant will be paid $1800 per semester. An announcement will be sent shortly advertising the positions that are available.

Fed Challenge

The College Fed Challenge is an economics competition sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in partnership with the Eastern Economic Association.  Five-member teams from colleges and universities in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York district make 20 minute presentations, concluding with a monetary policy recommendation, and respond to the judges' questions on current macroeconomic and financial conditions, monetary policy, and the Federal Reserve System. The judges are economists from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, universities and private firms. District winners will travel to Washington, DC to participate in the National Competition held at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, with the opportunity to win a significant monetary prize from Moody’s. 

The Fed Challenge is a great way to learn more about macroeconomics, monetary and financial economics, and central banking as well as an opportunity to polish your presentation and networking skills. The workshop to prepare the team for the competition will meet on Wednesday evenings from 6:10 - 8:00. If you are interested in participating, you should contact Sally Davidson (sjm7) in the Columbia Economics Department.

Undergraduate Research Assistants

The department will send out on the major listserv the names of faculty members who are looking for undergraduate research assistants. You will also find the latest information on jobs, internships and other opportunities for undergraduates on the wiki space, http://econinfoforstudents.wikispaces.columbia.edu/.  Alternatively, if you know of a faculty member who would like to hire you as an assistant, then please have that faculty member contact me so that I can arrange it. Please note that to register for research credit, you must have my approval. We usually grant 2 credits for approximately 5-7 hours of work per week and students may register for W4996 for up to 3 semesters.  Please note that while students may receive credit for this course, it may not be used as a substitute for elective or seminar requirements in the major.  Finally, if you are a student that pays tuition for individual credits, then you will be required to pay for research credit. You may choose to work with a faculty member without receiving credit (and so incurring no cost), but the research credit will not appear on your transcript.

Graduate Study in Economics

Students interested in pursuing graduate work in economics are encouraged to read the admission guide on http://econphd.econwiki.com/index.htm.  In addition, we have information on our website in the FAQ page. If you are considering graduate work you should speak with either your departmental advisor or me. Our advising hours will be posted on the Advisors page.

AfterCollege

AfterCollege is a free Job Resource Center that advertises positions targeted specifically at our students. You can link to the service from the department website at:

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/economics/undergraduate/s5_4_6.html

Click Job Resource Center

There is also a link on the Career Opportunities page where you will also find some general information regarding career paths for economics majors.

Prizes

All prizes are open to majors and students in the joint majors.

The Parker Prize is awarded each year to the top CC economics major that will be pursuing a Ph.D. in economics.  The prize committee will consider applicants who are not planning to immediately start graduate school the next academic year, although preference may be given to those students who are entering a Ph.D. program in 2013-14.  Please be sure to let me know in the fall semester if you are applying for graduate study in economics for academic year 2013-14, or else plan to pursue a Ph.D. in economics within the next few years. 

The David Estabrook Romine Prizes in Economics are available to both CC and GS students: one prize will be awarded for the best paper written in a senior seminar, and one prize will be awarded for the best senior honors thesis (the two prizes may not be given to the same student).  Faculty will be asked to nominate students for these prizes and I will make the final choice in consultation with the faculty.  All prize winners will be announced at the end of the Spring term. If you are taking a senior seminar in the fall of your senior year and you want to be considered for the Romine Prize then you should speak with your instructor before the first week of April. At that time your instructor will be able to tell you when the deadline is for submission of a paper to be considered for the Romine Prize. For more information about the prizes please refer to the Departmental Honors and Prizes page on the website.

The Parker Prize for Summer Research provides financial support for CC students who take unpaid summer internships that focus on research. By introducing students to original research, a summer internship can provide the foundation for an honors thesis or develop an interest in pursuing a graduate degree.  We are looking to support up to five underclassmen (juniors preferred but it is open to all economics students). We will provide each student with a stipend of $2500.  All economics major, financial economics major or joint major in CC are eligible for these prizes.

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