A Guide To The Economic Meltdown For Grad Students

If you're a graduate student and worried about how the recent economic turbulence effects you, fear not. The good folks at PhdComics.com have put together a handy guide (click on the picture for a larger version).

Part-Time Ph.D. Programs

I've had a number of emails asking if it's possible to go to a reputable finance Ph.D. program on a part time basis. Unfortunately, the writers probably won't like the answer. To the best of my knowledge, it's not possible -- and a program that offers a part time doctoral program probably isn't worth it.

Getting a doctorate in Finance isn't like getting a "Super MBA" - it's a totally different animal. First off, the level of material is both more difficult and much less structured. Second, it's geared towards producing future scholars. So, a big part of the doctoral process involves "acculturation" to the academic world. The (very) strange world of the finance academic scholar is generally best learned by a) seeing how academics arrange their day-to-day lives, and b) being able to ask frequent questions of faculty or peers on an irregular basis. These are best done by living with the natives. After all, An anthropologist usually ends up living with the people he's studying (at least for a while), and a doctoral student should too.

Finally, writing a dissertation is extremely difficult when working full time. At the front end of the process (determining the research question and working toward a proposal), it's important to have access to faculty (I shudder to think how many times I imposed on one committee member or another with "just one LITTLE question").

Then, when you're in the writing phase, you need regular blocks of uninterrupted time. It's hard writing while working. This is why so many students who take a visiting teaching position while writing their dissertation take so much longer to finish (if they finish at all).

I realize that taking a few (i.e. 4-5) years off to get a Ph.D. is a huge committment. In a perfect world, you could do it part time so people wouldn't have to pay such a price (3-4 years of lost income and a lot of studying). Unfortunately, doing it that way probably wouldn't do the job in the same way that the current system does.

As a result, a program that offers a "part time" doctoral program wouldn't be well respected, and it's graduates would have an impossible time getting jobs in academia. I could be mistaken, but it's true as far as I know.

Advice to First Year Ph.D. Students

I came across this a while back, tagged it, and immediately forgot about it. So while I spend my day torturing the English language (my coauthors are both internationals and I'm in charge of "englishizing" the paper), this might keep y'all busy. It's written by Matt Pearson, a UC-Davis econ grad student, but there's so much overlap between econ and finance at "good" programs, that it's worth reading the finance PhD students, too. He starts out with a few running themes:

• You'll spend a lot of the first year studying things you think are useless, silly, or off point. Expect it. But realize that you really don't know yet what's needed and what's not. So, keep slogging - it does get better, and learning the foundational stuff is essential.
  
• You'll often feel like an impostor - particularly when one or more of your classmates is a star that seems to coast through things. In my case, we had a student who was ABD in physics, and he could run rings around some of the professors when it came to high-level math chops. In contrast, I struggled with basic real analysis. I got through it, but it wasn't pretty.
• You'll want to give up - often. In fact, this is a running joke with some of the students. Avoid the temptation.
  

Following these observations, he gives some very practical tips that seem painfully obvious, but are often ignored. Read the whole thing here.

Luckily, My Grad Assistant Hasn't Seen This

How Often Should You Meet With Your Advisor?

Like in most things, corner solutions aren't optimal.

Grad School Rules

Fabio Rojas (a Sociology professor at Indiana) has compiled a truly impressive collection of advice for graduate students that he calls Grad School Rulz. Here are the topics he covers, listed along with my take on each piece:

1. Get the (official) rules - know the actual requirements for your program. This keeps you from doing things you don't have to, and makes sure you dot all the necessary I's and cross all the essential T's. Don't rely on your faculty - go to someone who has the responsibility to know the correct rules -- like the graduate chair or the director of the program.
2. Get the unwritten rules - most of the "really" important information you need to survive (like how to approach certain classes, who to work with (or not), and where to get help with technical issues) isn't on paper. Make sure you tap the experience of the student who've gone before you.
3. Choosing a graduate program - different schools have vastly different profiles. This can be anywhere along the continuum from "survival of the fittest" to ""we look after our own" (luckily, mine was of the second kind). Try to figure out the profiles of the programs you're considering, and make sure it's a good fit for your strengths/weaknesses.
   
4. How to make the best of course work - some very good rules of thumb on what types of courses to take (and how much effort to put into them). In the short run, they're important. But in the long run, keep your eye on the prize - focus on your research, and use courses to help you in furthering your progress towards it.
5. Grad school exams - Exams are a "hygiene issue (i.e. you don't get noticed unless they're bad). For "sit down" tests, get copies of old exams, and talk to previous students. For take home exams, also get copies of old exams, but prepare beforehand by having good written summaries of articles (you should be doing this during your seminars in any event).
6. Why friends are important - While over-socializing can hurt you, don't be a hermit. Friends can offer emotional support, provide technical assistance or comments on your work, and generally help you in your weak areas. It's likely that grad school peers will become your first non-faculty coauthors. And in addition, no one else will really understand what you're going through like the other people in your program. That's why many of them will become life-long friends.
   
7. Picking your advisor - no advisor is perfect, but yours should have at least one strong suit. Some of the factors to consider are: record in placing students, reputation for competence in the profession, record of coauthoring with grad students, accessibility, ability to offer helpful criticism, expertise, and intellectual style
8. Choosing other (non-chair) members for your dissertation committee - The end goals of your committee are to facilitate your getting the dissertation done and to help you get a job. Most of the responsibility for both jobs lies with your chair. But as for the rest of the committee, make sure they have complementary skills, get along, and aren't jerks that will put you through unnecessary hell.
9. Why you shouldn't pay for grad school - it can be expensive. Luckily, b-school professors make good money. But in the humanities, that's not often the case. This piece makes some suggestions on how to minimize your debt load coming out.
10. Choosing a dissertation topic - should you go with the "big obvious problem", come up with your own new problem, or take a topic from your advisor? Each has pluses and minuses. Whichever you choose, make sure it's something you feel passionate about (you'll likely be working on it and related pieces for several years). Also think about issues of compatibility with your intellectual style, strengths, and weaknesses, the popularity of the topic, and where the topic is in the research life-cycle (too new or too old both have risks).
11. What to do while you are working on the dissertation- the short answer is, "as little of non-dissertation activities as possible." It might not be possible (depending on finances), but try to minimize teaching responsibilities. Also, be very leery of moving away from campus - it's much harder to finish your dissertation when you're in another city (to a great extent, it's "out of sight, out of mind" from your professors' viewpoints).
12. Writing your dissertation (parts 1 and 2) - part 1 discusses how the different models for how the dissertation fits into your larger career (i.e. is it intended to be drafts of future books.articles, a job marketing tool, etc...). The more interesting (and potentially helpful) material is in part 2, which gives some very useful advice: dissertations are NOT "masterpieces, and the best ones are FINISHED ones. So do good work, but realize that the key thing is to "get er done".
    

All in all, Fabio's individual pieces of advice are all well worth reading. Follow them and you'll save yourself a lot of unnecessary work and grief.

More Resources For Grad Students

Ph.D. programs are fundamentally different than undergraduate or masters programs - mostly because they're preparing students for careers as researcher and teachers. A significant portion of my traffic comes from people either looking for information about Ph.D. programs in finance and economics. A second, smaller group of readers are looking for info on one or more particular grad-school issues. So, whenever I come across things that might be useful to these groups, I try to post them here. So, here are some of the latest things I've come across:

Eric Rasmusen is one of my favorite economists. His text on Games and Information was an invaluable resource during my time in the Ph.D. program. He also has a very well written short piece on writing. He aslo has a blog here that touches on economics, law, and faith (and a pretty broad span of other topics).

Along those lines, Kwan Choi (at the time, the editor of the Review of International Economics) has put together a pretty good collection of pieces on the academic publishing process at How To Publish In Top Journals. Note: it also contains helpful suggestions on dealing with referee comments, being a good referee, and so on.

Finally, assuming you get into a doctoral program, here are some things you probably shouldn't say at your dissertation defense.

Enough blogging - back to work. I have data to torture.

Not a Smart Move

For those of you who are A) writing a thesis, B) married, and C) want to stay that way, here's a good tip for your dissertation:



Compliments of phdcomics.com.

More Resources For Those Considering a Ph.D. in Business or Economics

A lot of visitors find this site when they're searching for information on Ph.D. programs in business (there doesn't seem to be all that much easily findable and usable information out here on the topic). So, I try to post resources on the topic whenever I find them.

While web-surfing the other day, I came across another one - Testmagic.com. While their bread and butter seems to be test preparation for standardized tests like the SAT, GMAT, and GRE, they also have a couple of forums that might be of interest if you're considering a Ph.D. in business or econ.

Here's a link to the forum for those considering a Ph.D in Business and here's one for those looking at a Ph.D. in Economics.

A lot of the posters on the Business forum have GMAT scores north of 740 or so, so the discussions seem to be geared towards candidates trying for admission to "top-tier" programs. But even if your aspirations are more modest, there's still a lot of information that's useful.

update: Welcome to all the folks who stopped over from TestMagic - I'm glad you stopped by, and I hope you find it useful. You can find the Financial Rounds FAQ here, and a couple pieces I've written about the teaching and research sides of a finance professor's life here and here.

Questions From Ph.D. Students - Present and Future

I started Financial Rounds over two years ago mostly as an experiment, and as a way to keep track of all the good stuff I came across while wasting time on the Net. It's been fun, has made me some good friends, has helped me keep up to date with the "real" world", and has given me some laughs.

But one unexpected and very pleasant outcome has been the number of emails I've gotten from students considering a Ph.D in either finance or economics. At last count, I've had over 40 this last year alone. Some of them found this site through google, searches that led them to one of my posts about academic salaries, what's involved in getting a Ph.D., or what a professor does all day. Others found it through links from related websites.

However they got here, it's been a pleasure answering questions about the graduate admission process, what it takes to succeed in a Finance Ph.D. program, job prospects, and so on. One of the best parts of being an academic is the chance to leave a legacy. Having students go on to become professors themselves is a pretty cool way to do that. As a professor, I've had between one and two of my own students a each year eventually go on to a doctoral program, and it's been surprisingly fun to play a small part (through this websits) in other students' academic careers as well.

If you've gotten into grad school or are seriously considering it, and anything I've said on the blog (or in private emails) has been helpful, drop me a line and let me know where you're at (I'll keep things confidential unless explicitly instructed otherwise) . And I hope that you'll keep in touch. You're not exactly "my" students, but I'd be interested to see how things come out.

And who knows - I might get more fodder for blog posts.

Seminar Bingo For Ph.D. students.

If you're a Ph.D. student (or faculty member) and are bored in a seminar, here's something to keep you busy


Compliments of PhdComics. It's a good thing I hadn't found their site when I was in grad school or I would have wasted even more time.