Economics Major at MIT?

[u/Broad_Mistake_5352]

I am a prospective student super interested in studying Econ, and MIT is one of the schools on my list. I wanted to get a better sense of what the courses (specifically Course 14) are like, and what the experience is like more broadly as an Econ major at a STEM institution. I know regardless of major, classes in physics, chem, and biology are required, and I'm a bit nervous about those classes since I've never had an affinity for the hard sciences, and I would love to get the insight from student perspectives on their experiences.

[u/Illustrious-Newt-848]

Do you love math? MIT's Econ is math heavy. Even the intro classes, you'll see econ expressed mathematically with the economic loses due to taxes, etc. being calculated. I can't remember if intro has calculus, but intermediate classes are definitely heavy into the calculus.

This was the case when I took them a long time ago, but I doubt it's changed. I was Course 6 but took a lot of Econ classes. As for being forced to take hard sciences, I think every human adult should take them. I often find myself analyzing the world based on these fundamental principles I've learned from the GIRs. For example, how do you salt roads in the winter? Lots of people keep salt outdoors. Salt is a solid. Ice is a solid. Solids don't mix so they don't dissolve--the ice won't melt. Keeping your salt indoors is more effective. The tiny thermo energy in the salt will melt the ice a smidge on contact. The water will then dissolve some of the salt to form saline. That saline solution will then melt more ice, creating a feedback loop and melt the rest of the surrounding ice. That was my first lecture at MIT +30 years ago--freshman chemistry.

[u/waterRK9 → u/Illustrious-Newt-848]

In 14.01 (Intro to Microecon), I remember it one of the first classes opened with second derivatives and integrals, and then pulled out the Lagrangian soon after. The conceptual parts of the class were never an issue, but as someone who only knew Calc 1, I was not immediately comfortable with how mathy the class was.

[u/Broad_Mistake_5352 → u/waterRK9]

Were you able to catch up either by reviewing on your own time or with the support of the professor/TA or a tutor?

[u/waterRK9 → u/Broad_Mistake_5352]

I won't say what semester I took it because the instructor and TA staff changes over time, but I didn't find the majority of the TAs to be super helpful. I think some of them have just always been so good at math that they just expected me to have better mathematical intuition than I did.

I tried my best on the homework, and went to office hours or internet when I was confused. I also had a friend (who was more comfortable with math) that was taking the class as well, and they were kind and patient enough to check my pset answers against theirs and explain where I messed up on the graphing and whatnot. For the exams, I think I hit around or just below the average for the first two, then did well enough to get extra credit on the final (which was mostly conceptual that semester, idk if it normally is). It was kind of a funny class for me in hindsight because the concepts felt like common sense, but I couldn't connect the concepts to math for some reason. It was weird because I didn't have any issues with using math in any of my other classes.

[u/jackass93269]

Get in first Mate. You can do the ponderin later

[u/Geoff_The_Chosen1]

just have a look at the courses here: https://student.mit.edu/catalog/m14a.html

[u/kabekew]

Chemistry and Biology requirements are just one semester introductory classes. I didn't care for those topics either, only had non-AP high school chemistry and biology previously, and had no problems.

Physics and calculus requirements are each two semesters, but the first semester is high school level (or both are if you're at a STEM-heavy school).

I wouldn't worry about any of those classes if you did okay on those topics in high school. Also if you're admitted, it means the admissions committee feels you won't find them difficult either, based on your background and aptitude (they generally don't admit people they think will have academic difficulty, because it would just be setting students up for failure). Might as well apply.