|
|
|
PrincetonUniversity |
Department of EconomicsPrinceton University has one of the finest economics departments in the world. Many of the faculty have outstanding academic reputations. There are about 40 full-time faculty in the department, including those who have joint appointments in the Woodrow Wilson School. The departmental faculty have a variety of interests, which allows the Department of Economics to offer a wide range of courses. Economics at Princeton is regarded and taught as part of a liberal education, not as preparation for a specific vocation. However, it does provide an especially relevant background for careers in business and government and graduate study in economics, public policy, business administration, and law. The curriculum is designed to provide students with the skills and knowledge necessary to understand the operation of a modern economy, to think and write clearly about economic problems and policy issues, and to analyze economic data. Prospective concentrators should start by taking Economics 101 and 102 and Mathematics 103, which are prerequisites for entering the department and for most upper-level courses. Two core courses in macroeconomics and microeconomics (301 or 304) and microeconomics (302 or 305) continue to develop the foundations of 101 and 102. These courses are required of concentrators and count as two of the nine required departmentals. It is a good idea to take them early, by the fall of your junior year, because they are useful in other courses and in independent work. However, you need not postpone taking other upper-level courses until completion of the core courses. The other required departmentals are a two-course sequence in statistics (Economics 300) and econometrics (Economics 303 or 306). These are typically taken in the fall and spring of the junior year (and cannot be taken later than that), but you may opt to take them in your sophomore year. If you plan to study abroad in the fall of your junior year, you can take CIV 245 in the spring of your sophomore year as a substitute for Economics 300. Economics is, by nature, an analytic field. The only mathematics requirement for economics concentrators is 103, but students are encouraged to take additional math coursesfor example, up through Mathematics 200 or 201 or the equivalent. Students with the mathematical background can then take the higher-numbered versions of the core courses (304, 305, and 306), which make use of multivariable calculus and linear algebra. The remainder of the required departmentals are generally completed from among other upper-level (300 and above) courses. There are courses ranging from those directly related to business, such as Accounting and Corporate Finance, to others involving topics of more general interest, such as International Economics and the Economics of China, to still others more suitable for the theoretically inclined student, such as the Economics of Uncertainty. It is possible, with prior approval, to count one and sometimes two courses from other departments toward the total required number of nine. Economics concentrators are required to complete satisfactorily a year-long junior independent paper and a senior thesis. These are supervised by the faculty on a one-to-one basis. Applied topics are the most common, and many make use of econometric techniques. Examples of topics (which are selected by the student in agreement with the adviser) are medical care economics, the role of uncertainty in migration, an analysis of the steel industry and foreign competition, and the effect of the farm depression on the banking industry. Some of the economics concentrators participate in a complementary certificate program, such as the Program in Applied and Computational Mathematics, the Program in Engineering and Management Systems, and the Program in East Asian Studies. One program, the Program in Political Economy, is directly administered by the Department of Economics and is only open to economics concentrators. The Department of Politics has a similar program for its concentrators. The requirements of this program are two politics prerequisites (any level), three politics departmentals (300-level and above), and political economy content in the junior independent work. A significant number of departmental juniors are successful in finding summer employment and internships, especially in the field of finance, and Princeton economics graduates go on to a variety of careers. About three-quarters begin working immediately after graduation, most commonly in the business world. Examples of the type of companies that often hire economics graduates are investment banking, consulting, and banking firms. Others go to graduate school in law, medicine, business, and economics. Students contemplating graduate school in economics should meet with a faculty adviser as early as possible in order to plan a program of study that provides the necessary training in mathematics and quantitative methods.
|