Concentrating on Econ

Harvard’s economics department hosts the largest number of undergraduates on campus, so when this mammoth concentration shifts position, everyone takes note. Thus, the recent changes to concentration procedures and requirements deserve special attention. This past month, the department revised its course requirements for incoming freshmen, increasing the number of required classes from 10 to 11 for non-honors concentrators and up to 15 for honors concentrators. Additionally, it added Math 1a as a basic math requirement (honors candidates must now take at least 21a). After cutting junior seminars in 2009, the department now has seven seminars in place this semester, serving 18 students each. And, finally, in an attempt to dispel the sense that it was “too impersonal,” Harvard’s undergraduate economics program brought on concentration advisors.

Impersonal interaction is hard to avoid in economics, which is the largest concentration and does not have a proportionally large faculty base. The college awarded 249 economics degrees in 2009, according to the Harvard University Fact Book. (For comparison, government, the next-largest concentration, awarded 177 degrees.) It is often said that these high student-faculty ratios are the source of the concentration’s low satisfaction scores: The 2010 senior survey, compiled by the Office of Research and Analysis in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, reported that economics received a 3.72/5 satisfaction score, the lowest of the five major concentrations. Indeed, Professor N. Gregory Mankiw, the course head of Economics 10: Principles of Economics, put forth this opinion, blogging last year, “If the student-faculty ratio is the ultimate problem leading to low satisfaction with the econ major, and I believe that it is, there are two ways to improve the situation: Increase the number of economics faculty or decrease the number of economics students.”

However, complicating the pinning of low satisfaction ratings on the student-faculty ratio is the fact that this year’s junior seminars—although recently reinstated—are not popular among concentrators. In fact, there were only 34 applicants for 68 junior seminar spots this past shopping period. The question remains: Why did so few out of approximately 250 concentrators want an intensive academic experience in their discipline?

Even taking into account the idea that some took one of the three fall junior seminars, the number of interested students is still small. After all, in many other concentrations, such as in Social Studies, students habitually take a junior seminar each term. If economics is truly a concentration full of students eager to be satisfied by their choice of academic discipline but unable to get enough personal faculty attention, why do these students seem to make such a weak effort at getting academic attention when they have the chance?

As to what Harvard can do in the meantime to ease the situation, it should continue adding more difficult quantitative requirements to economics, in keeping with those of peer institutions. Stanford, for instance, requires a five-credit accelerated calculus course in its own economics program. This would distinguish the students who truly care about economics as an academic discipline, and allow them to get personalized faculty attention. It would also be a gift in disguise to less dedicated economics concentrators, who may be forced to discover what truly interests them academically.

The surge in economics concentrators and lack of student enthusiasm for small class settings suggests that Harvard's admissions office should reconsider whether it's really admitting students with genuine intellectual interests rather than just with pre-professional ambitions. The economics department continually reinforces that fact that it is not a pre-professional concentration. The Econ Concentrator’s Guide, which is provided by the department, reads, “Economics is not business…Economics and business are related, but business is professional training ultimately aimed at making profits, while economics is a science that pursues an improved understanding of our social world.”  However, it seems that many students do not understand this and treat this concentration as a de facto pre-finance or pre-business major. Of course, every economics concentrator can’t be called “pre-professional,” but the parallel growth of the economics concentration and career  recruiting at Harvard over the last several years would suggest that pre-professionalism is nevertheless a problem worthy of addressing in the economics department.

Therefore, although the surge in economics concentrators could very well have something to do with the relevance of economics to the current political arena, the admissions office still must do what it can to make sure that pre-professionalism doesn't become too ingrained on the Harvard psyche. Harvard College is a liberal-arts institution, and it differs from peer institutions in that it emphasizes that, in the academic arena, at least, students should leave with broad-based critical thinking skills rather than a narrow practical specialty. The admissions office, in choosing future classes, would do well keep this focus and these students in mind.