If you’ve completed the first year of an Econ PhD, many of these reflections may seem obvious. But these reflections are what I wish I could go back and tell myself prior to starting.

My first year was unlike anything I’ve experienced before. The program was more rigorous than the work and schooling I had done before and required a lot of discipline and focus. Despite the intensity, after some adjusting, I was able to learn what worked for me to be academically successful and create a sustainable work-life balance.

Academic Reflections

Going back to school was hard. I did not have a Masters degree, did not do a pre-doc, and had worked for 3 years after undergrad prior to the start of the Econ PhD.

The academic twin goals of first year are to build a strong math/econ foundation and to pass preliminary exams.

Although first year is a lot of school, it is also important to remember that first year performance is not directly indicative of being a successful researcher. Therefore, while I was motivated to do well academically, I felt extra-motivated to get through first year by dipping my toes into research (attending seminars, talking to upper-year students, talking to professors etc.). It was always helpful to remember why I wanted to be here.

Pre-Math Camp

I gave myself a month off between my last day at work and the beginning of math camp. I moved in with my parents and spent time with family and friends. I tried to get myself set-up for school: I bought an iPad and set-up Notability (which I highly recommend!!). I read a few books, skimmed some notes I made in undergrad for my math and econ classes, and watched some random youtube videos. So I wouldn’t say I “studied hard” before math camp - rather, I familiarized myself with some core concepts so that I wasn’t lost with the basics. I am actually glad I did and wish I knew how I could have focused my review better.

In hindsight, I think the most important concepts to refresh before math camp are:

• Matrix algebra and the definiteness of matrices
• Proof methods
• Constrained optimization
• Convexity and concavity

Math Camp

Despite math camp being challenging, I am really happy we had it. Firstly, it was a good way to get to know my peers. We all ate lunch together in the shade outside. I brought a frisbee and threw it around with some folks. I found trying to get to know everyone to be really important - making friends as an adult can be hard!

Secondly, I think math camp made me internalize the reality that I will definitely be “stuck” on problems throughout the PhD. In undergrad, when I was stuck, I would think, take a break, and look at textbook examples, which were similar enough that I could figure out how to solve the problem. That was absolutely not the case for some problems during math camp, and subsequent PhD coursework. There are some problems you can’t just “Google” or “ChatGPT” your way to solving. At math camp, I was forced to start thinking about what to do. I went to office hours and compared problem sets with people in my cohort - two tools that I would later use.

Lastly, I enjoyed math camp because it gave me an opportunity to try out different routines to find what would work best for me. I figured out my sleep schedule, how long it took me to commute to class, how I should review what we did after class, what worked for meal prep etc. I also had some time to continue setting up my room, do a Costco haul, and get fully ready for the school year.

Classes

The first day of each class felt great! I felt like I understood what was going on and concepts were familiar. What a false sense of confidence I gave myself… The slow-start was short lived because we immediately began learning at a very quick pace.

A few things were different compared to how I learned in undergrad: applications, problem set breadth, predictability, optional work, and the quarter system:

• Applications: There was less of an emphasis in class on solving problems than what I was used to. We had a lot of material to cover and it was completely understandable that professors went through the theory in class and leveraged problem sets and discussion sections to give us opportunities to apply the concepts we learned. For me, this was a bit challenging because I did not directly compare the general notation/definitions to specific applications/examples, so sometimes struggled to understand the purpose of the theory we were learning at the time.
• Problem set breadth: There were some elements of problem sets that were extremely challenging. In undergrad, I was used to problems being somewhat adjacent to problems we covered in class. In this program, there were some problems I saw that I had no idea how to even start or attempt since they were so different from the examples in class or textbook problems. This made me realize that understanding core concepts was more important than solving problems – you can’t just learn how to regurgitate a solution to a problem similar to one you’ve seen before, you need to understand the concepts well enough that if you see something completely new, you have the foundations to solve it.
• Predictability: In undergrad, I felt that it was a pretty sure bet that we would be tested on specific concepts. There would be one problem on each topic covered, so while I studied every topic and tried to ace all parts of a test, I knew that if I was a little stuck on one part, I could still do well overall. The models we learned in the PhD were so complex that in a test, we could only be tested on one or two concepts, but expected to know all - which made it difficult to study for tests.
• Optional work: In most of our classes, our grades were solely based on a midterm and final, though some classes incorporated problem sets. There were sometimes optional problem sets that were ungraded. I would always attempt the optional work assigned to us, but initially, I would not spend as much time/effort on them or go out of my way to find additional practice beyond what professors recommended. In later quarters, I figured out how to prioritize optional work and tried to be more efficient about getting the most out of it.
• The quarter system: The quarter system was such a shock for me. Coming from a school that ran on semesters, I was not used to the lack of breaks within each quarter. For example, there was no time to “catch-up” during Spring break - just a break in between two quarters.

These differences made it difficult for me to be academically successful at the start of my PhD, but over time, I learned how to adjust and felt more engaged and confident as the year progressed.

Studying

The first test I ever took made me think I would completely fail out. I studied the way I had done in undergrad - I read through notes, re-did some homework problems, skimmed the textbook, and reviewed a few past exams. But when I took the exam, questions had unfamiliar twists that I was not able to understand - I bounced around and tried my best, but felt terrible. When the results were posted, I saw myself at the lower end of a whisker, nowhere near the box with the scores from the majority of the class.

I then completely pivoted my approach to studying and figured out that for me, an organized and structured approach to studying was most useful. When I studied in a more organized and intentional way, I saw a massive improvement in my understanding of the course material (which materialized in improved grades and confidence).

The main tools I used to study (pretty standard…) were: class notes/lecture notes, problem sets, textbook questions, past exams, papers:

• Class notes & lecture notes/slides: I took notes separately from lecture slides to capture the explanations professors gave in class. I then compared my notes to the lecture slides in case I missed anything.
• Problem sets: I found it useful to re-do homeworks and problem set problems, whether optional or not.
• Textbook questions: For the classes with associated textbooks, I found it helpful to skim/attempt some additional questions.
• Past exams/prelims: If a professor had taught the class before, they often shared past exams (or if they didn’t, sometimes students from older cohorts had them on a Google Drive). I always found it useful to solve these past exams and compare my solutions with the answer keys (if available) or solutions from my peers.
• Papers: Sometimes it was helpful to read the papers that defined the models for ideas on how the model can be applied or altered in different contexts.

Everyone has their own way of studying that works! For me, my previous approach to utilizing these study tools was not conducive to mastering such a wide breadth of material. Therefore, organizing my studying became extremely important.

The main techniques I used to stay organized while studying were having a thematic study plan, making study guides, forming study groups, attending office hours, and employing “what-if” thinking:

• Thematic study plan: I realized that for me, studying by themes was most useful. Before each test, I would go through all the resources I had and organize concepts and practice problems by concept/model/theme. Then, I would study everything I could and do all the practice problems I could in a topical manner (as opposed to a chronological manner).
  • For example, let's say I am reviewing past exams chronologically. Suppose I study the 2022 final, which asks about model #1 and model #2. When I move to solving the 2021 final, I might get two different models, model #3 and model #4, since not all models are tested each year. But what if I suddenly see that in the 2019 final, there is a different type of question about model #1? I may be unsure how to solve the problem when the context is different or the question is asking something else.
  • In contrast, I could study model #1 first - study my notes, do practice problems, and solve past exam questions on model #1. This will help me fully understand the core of model #1 and allow me to compare/contrast different applications of the model. In this way, I am not memorizing how to solve specific application problems, but really trying to understand all aspects of the model.
  • Example - this was the mapping I used to organize practice problems by themes, which I used during prelim exam preparation.
• Study guides: After we finished learning each topic, I would work on making a study guide to capture the basic, foundational ideas of what we learned. I mainly focused on including simple definitions, formulas, intuition, and problem-solving approaches. I found the act of making them to be very useful in ensuring I understood the basic foundations of each model and was able to compare and contrast different model features. They also served as “refresher resources” I could use months later while studying for prelims.
  • These study guides are foundational in that they do not include deep-dives into every single way each model/topic can be applied. They aren’t pretty or typed into Latex. They’re just basic notes to understand basic concepts.
  • All of my study guides can be found in the resources post!
• Study groups: I utilized studying with my peers when I could and formed a study-group with others who were interested in group studying. Here’s how it worked for us:
  • About 2 weeks before each exam, I would make a spreadsheet of some past exam questions that would be good practice. Example
  • We would each “sign-up” to be responsible for certain past exams/questions, solve the exam, and upload our solution to a Google Drive.
  • The benefits were two-fold. (1) As we were studying at our own pace, we could check our solutions against each other’s and ask questions/discuss differences. This was especially helpful when there were not any provided solutions from the professor. (2) We had a dedicated time to chat about things we were confused about or wanted to highlight as tricky/interesting.
  • As the year progressed, we did not meet all too frequently or discuss things for each class, but some folks continued the practice of uploading solutions and we all were available to discuss challenging questions/compare solutions in a more fluid manner in our offices.
  • As much as I wanted structured study groups, the reality is that everyone studies at their own pace and at different times - and that's ok! At the end of the day, everyone should do what works for them! For me, it became important to just have a platform to share work and some peers I could reach out to with questions.
• Office hours: I loved going to office hours. I was intimidated at first that my questions were too silly/basic, but after not doing well on my first test, it sunk in that it’s better to ask and be honest about what I don't understand than to not. I strategically would go to our TA’s office hours when my questions were more minor/specific to a particular problem and to our professor’s office hours when I had broader questions. I also benefited from others being in office hours who had similar questions or asked questions I could ask follow-ups to.
• What-if thinking: By utilizing the techniques above, I began to get more excited about the concepts we were learning and tried to implement some “what-if” thinking to see how problems changed in different contexts/under different assumptions. I would ask myself (or a peer), “what if instead of ___, we had ____?”
  • Solving problems in a thematic way made me more cognizant and interested in ways in which the concepts we learned could be applied. Group studying (when it happened) gave an audience to these questions. Reading papers also helped me discover new applications and appreciate the concepts we were learning better.
  • Asking these what-if questions while studying helped me check that I understood the core concepts. When we are tested or doing our own research, we will be solving something new and contributing to the field. “What-if” thinking helps immediately with solving problems on tests we’ve never seen before and prepares us better for doing research in later years.

Prelims Preparation

A lot of the second year students and other faculty instilled in us confidence that we would pass prelims. But it is easier to retrospectively say that after they had all passed themselves! Prelims are tough and I don’t want to downplay the hardwork and stress that comes with studying for them. If we didn’t pass them, we’d need to retake them, and if we didn’t pass the retakes, we weren’t qualified to continue in the PhD. So the pressure was on.

We had about 5 days between our last final exam of the quarter and the month of preliminary exams, so the entire Spring quarter was truly a grind as we were balancing prelims preparation with the quarter’s coursework/exams. I’ve never worked harder in my life - I was dreaming about solving problems in my sleep. It was a cycle of eat, econ, sleep, repeat.

I began preparing for prelims over Spring break, around 10 weeks before our first prelim. My strategy encompassed:

• Studying: I utilized the same five techniques as described above to study.
  • Over Spring Break, I drafted a prelims plan (the “Timeline” tab here) in which I divided up, week by week, which topics I wanted to focus on. Then, I would get to it and solve past preliminary exam questions, past midterms/finals, and past problem set questions. Since we still had coursework for the Spring quarter, I studied for the content on Spring exams by doing past prelims on those topics. I wasn’t always able to stick to my plan (which you can see from the empty checkboxes in the plan I shared), but I tried my best and prioritized where I could.
  • I found the thematic plan for each subject to be very useful and it ensured that I was indeed covering my bases and not skipping reviewing any concept. Since the material on the prelims covered the entire year across all three subjects, it was very important to me that I knew exactly what could be covered and how I could practice. See the (“Micro - List”, “Macro - List”, and “Metrics - List” on this prelim planning sheet I used as an example).
  • The planning also helped illustrate which models were emphasized more. Any time I tried to guess the topic of an exam, I was always wrong, so I did not expect that preliminary exams would be any more predictable. But it was still useful to see which models did show up more frequently.
  • I'd like to emphasize that this type of planning is just an example of what I did. Other people in my cohort were very successful with prelims as well by creating their own tools like printing out past prelims and organizing them in binders, going through notes and problems chronologically, creating flashcards etc. By Spring, I think most people had a grasp on knowing what worked for them to study and stuck to it when studying for prelims!
• Mock exams: I found it extremely helpful to do “mock exams” to simulate what a prelim would look like. I did 2 mock exams before each prelim. For each mock, I would choose a past prelim exam that I thought was difficult/I had not done before (so it would be the first time solving those problems for me!). Then, I would go to the exact room we would take the exam in at the exact time of our exam, and take the exam in the time limit we would get. I brought a sheet of paper with me to take some random notes on my experience taking each exam.
  • I took note of the following:
    • The temperature of the room (this would help inform how I would dress on exam day)
    • Where the clocks were located (and if I should bring my own)
    • How noisy the room was (were people walking by frequently? Was the AC noisy? Would ear plugs be useful?)
    • How my body was reacting (when did I get hungry? Should I bring more snacks than I did for the mock? How far were the bathrooms? Was I drinking enough water?)
    • How to manage my papers (each question was roughly 10 letter-sized pages for me, so I needed to figure out how to manage those pages. I learned through a mock that I should bring paper clips for each question and binder clips for the full exam).
    • How much space the desks had (I learned from a mock that carrying a bunch of pens and pencils was overwhelming! I learned to bring a cup to keep all writing utensils in so I wouldn’t have to worry about them rolling off of my desk or taking up space)
    • Time management (How long did I take on each question? How did I utilize the reading period?)
    • Chair comfort (Could I sit for 5 and a half hours comfortably or should I bring a cushion?)
  • From a content perspective, the mock exams forced me to solve problems without any references. While practicing outside of mocks, I would always try to solve problems without resources, but I did occasionally look at my notes or the answer keys when stuck so that I could save time studying. Taking exams without references let me practice solving problems realistically and practice adding notes about my intuition if I did not feel very strongly about a result. This in turn gave me the confidence that I could solve challenging problems independently and even if I got stuck, I could write something to show what I knew.
  • The mocks were extremely useful in helping me feel confident and comfortable on exam day. I was prepared with what I needed to bring, how I should manage my pages, how I should spend my time, and how my body would feel.

I can’t describe it, but I observed that as we were all studying for prelims, beautiful moments happened where concepts “clicked.” Some of the content we learned across classes started to intertwine in a way that helped us all understand what we were learning more clearly.

Prelims

We had 3 preliminary exams (Macro, Micro, Metrics), which were cumulative and spaced out by one week in between each exam.

• Day before: The day before the prelim, I did not do any intense studying. I just reviewed my study guides and the past prelim solutions I had made. I shut off all studying by 7pm, ate a hearty dinner, and then got a good night’s rest.
• Day of: I got to the exam early. For some exams, our seats were assigned, and for others, we had free seating. Since I had done mock exams in the rooms, I had a pretty good idea of where I wanted to sit for the exams with free seating. So it was nice to get to the exams early. Our exams were all anonymous and the department provided the paper we were supposed to write on. Getting there early allowed me to set up my desk (and cup of pens!), lay my snacks out under my seat, and put my unique identifier on each page (so I wouldn’t have to worry about it later!).
  • During the exam itself, I tried to execute everything I learned from the mocks and stayed confident throughout.
  • After the exam, I tried to not talk about it. It was done and there was nothing I could do to change what I wrote. There was no point in worrying or overthinking.
  • The exams were a lot more physically demanding than the mocks (probably because of the pressure and brain power used on the test), so I took the remaining time of the day to rest and recover.

After going through the stress of studying for hours each day, I felt a great sense of confidence after passing prelims and am now really looking forward to the next year of classes.

Social Reflections

Everyone is different and values socializing in different ways - to each their own! Prior to the start of the PhD program, I led a pretty social lifestyle. I wasn’t going out and partying all the time, but I definitely found a lot of joy in being an activities-oriented person: traveling, hiking, playing board games, going to museums, going to parks/on walks, going over to other people’s homes, going out to eat etc. I knew that I would not be able to stay as socially active since my priorities were to study, learn, and pass prelims, but I wanted to find ways to do activities I enjoyed as well. While the quantity of these social activities did decrease substantially, I was able to find ways to begin building social connections at Davis, and hope to continue to grow these next year. Below are a few things I did to help me build connections with others in the community.

Department Bonding

I tried to attend every student-faculty and all-department event I could.

I think networking is extremely important and sometimes undervalued in PhD programs. I strove to meet all the professors and students I could to begin laying the foundation for friendships and collaborations in the future!

I also just found everyone very interesting, so I was very excited to get to know everyone better (inside and outside of academia).

Below are some of the opportunities we had to bond with other students/faculty in the department:

• Department parties: The economics department hosted two main department-level events: a welcome party in the Fall and a spring party towards the end of the year. I really enjoyed meeting some professors and students from other years in the program.
• Coffee-Donut-Bagel: The Graduate Students Association representatives from the economics department would host bi-quarterly morning events in which we could have breakfast and mingle with students and faculty. Some were for students and faculty, and some were for just students. I enjoyed attending these to meet new upper year students and begin to hear about what some professors were interested in researching and doing for fun!
• ARE-crossover events: One of my fields of interest is development economics, so I actually was very excited about these crossover events as I knew I would interact with the ARE department in the future. We had two such events: one was a soccer tournament (the Cournot Cup) and the other was a bowling tournament.
• Department IM sports: I did not participate in any intramural sports, but I know that many people enjoyed playing on intramural sports teams with faculty and students across different years. Our Economics department IM Soccer team even won last year!
• Holidays: I tried to celebrate holidays with other people across all years. I specifically enjoyed celebrating Diwali and Lunar New Year with friends. Although I traveled during Thanksgiving, Winter break, and Spring break, I still was able to have some meals with other students at the beginning/tail-end of these breaks, and I know that people who stayed in Davis set up chats to meet up with each other.
• Camping trips (UC Davis specific): Every year, students in the economics department host a camping trip in Lake Tahoe. This was honestly one of the first ways I came to know some upper year students, who I later spent time with. There were other impromptu trips planned and mass-emails were sent out whenever someone had booked a campsite and had openings for others to join.

Cohort Bonding

I absolutely loved meeting people in our cohort. People were from all over the world - Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, India, Japan, Paraguay, Turkey, South Korea, USA. We set up a WhatsApp group so that everyone could stay connected and organize events.

Some notable things we did were:

• Birthdays: At the beginning of the year, we set up a Google sheet where everyone could note down their birthdays. We all tried to message the WhatsApp group on people’s birthdays and for those that wanted to celebrate, they’d drop an open-invitation to celebrate at a restaurant.
• Yosemite Trip: The majority of our cohort went on a trip to Yosemite National Park. We rented a house that could accommodate everyone and had a blast hanging out in the house and park (people split up doing different activities).
• Studying: We were too many people to all study in a large group, but we had an active Google Drive where people posted resources and study tools, which we shared with one another. I really value how collaborative and willing to support one another everyone was.

Community Friends

From my experience working, I knew that for me, it was important to make friends outside of the program as well.

The outlets that I found easy to tap into were:

• Sports team: I joined an Ultimate Frisbee community-pick-up team composed of graduate students from different departments, adults, and some undergrads here and there. I found them through Google! I love playing with them and have been able to meet up with a few people outside the field!
• Roommates: I chose to live with non-econ-PhD graduate students so that I could make more friends outside of the department. While everyone is studious and respects/understands the studying we all do, we occasionally interact via watching movies, playing board games, and having dinner together.
• Extracurricular courses: I know many people who took pottery classes, photography classes, yoga classes, rock-climbing courses, zumba classes etc. I did not join these classes during my first year and stuck with Ultimate Frisbee, but I am interested in trying some moving forward.

Why I love UC Davis

I am very happy to be studying at UC Davis. Since I am interested in migration economics, I think it is a great fit academically. Since I love the outdoors, I think it is a great fit location-wise. And since I really value team camaraderie, I think it is a great fit emotionally.

I was pleasantly surprised by how collaborative the environment was. All of the professors I know are extremely qualified, very knowledgeable, incredibly passionate about their research, and truly thoughtful in their teaching. I constantly felt encouraged and really appreciated the enthusiasm of everyone in the department. Students from other years shared resources and advice with our cohort. And our cohort tried to build on those resources to iterate for the next year. I always felt I could message a peer if I needed help understanding a concept or problem. I always felt that the professors were interested in how we were doing both academically and emotionally. As an added bonus, I LOVE living in California – I am able to ride a bicycle to commute 30 minutes a day and live in a place extremely accessible to nature (40 minutes to Napa, 1.5 hours to Tahoe, 1.5 hours to Yosemite!).

Despite all the all-day, every-day studying in first year (which was very stressful!), I am very happy that I was able to find small joys in everyday life.

Contents

Jump to the next parts:

• Routines: This post shares some examples of routines I found were important to develop and maintain.
• Resources: This post includes all the study guides I made and organizational tools for streamlining studying.

Return to the landing page of this series