The Department of Economics has expanded its graduate program options, and next year will offer two degree opportunities - one focused around class work and the other based on research.
Under the department"s new plan, the current one-year Master of Arts in Economics program has been renamed the Master of Science in Economics Program, and will offer students either a one-year, course-based program or a two-year option geared toward research.
The program accepts 18 out of about 150 applicants per year, according to Lynne Pepall, dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. It will allow current students to choose either of the new tracks next year, or to continue with the Master of Arts program.
In the one-year track, students must earn a total of eight credits, while the two-year track requires the completion of 12 credits and a master"s thesis.
"We wanted to strengthen the graduate program," Economics Department Chair Enrico Spolaore said.
Under the current program, graduate students enrolled in the Master of Arts program have been able to remain for a second year to write a masters" thesis. But those who choose to do so are not formally distinguished from students who stay for one year and do not write a thesis.
"There was no differentiation. They would all receive the same Master of Arts degree," said Associate Professor Marcelo Bianconi, director of the graduate program in economics.
The change will institutionalize the difference between the two groups. "This way, we provide a structure and we give recognition to the work, and we facilitate the additional work," Spolaore said.
Marina Gorsuch is currently a graduate student in the one-year Master of Arts program and plans to stay a second year at Tufts to write a thesis. She said the restructuring of the graduate program will differentiate between students who write theses and those who choose not to.
"If you"re having a group of students doing more work than another group of students, they shouldn"t get the same degree," she said. "I think it"s especially useful for students who want to get a PhD to have done a second year of research," she said.
Bianconi said that the course-based and research-based tracks provide separate forums for students with different academic interests. "The main idea is to make it more accessible for students and give more choices to students," he said.
Spolaore said the restructuring will not have a detrimental effect on the department"s finances.
"Overall, we don"t expect a net loss of resources. If anything, we think that this is going to be beneficial," Spolaore said. "This is not going to take away resources from other activities that we have."
Pepall agreed that the change to the program did not present a financial strain.
"We had all the ingredients; it was just a question of structuring them in the right way," Pepall said. "We have the capacity to be doing this, so we don"t actually see it as having an additional cost to the university."
The change also has the potential to benefit the undergraduate community. Under the new plan, the department will jointly run the seminars for undergraduate students doing senior honors theses and graduate students on the research-based track writing masters" theses. The two groups will meet together in a seminar to discuss their work.
"We have a lot of undergraduates who want to do a senior thesis, so we"re hoping that by having this research track, we"ll have a stronger community of students working on thesis projects," Pepall said.
Spolaore agreed that the Master of Science program will have effects beyond the scope of graduate students.
"Many of the undergraduates who write senior honors theses have said that they benefited from interacting with the graduate students," Spolaore said. "The undergraduates will benefit from seeing the work of the graduate students and getting comments on their own work, and they will also benefit more generally from interaction with the graduate students."
Pepall said that students partaking in the program would benefit from the new structure. "This offers a nice level of advanced training, specialization and depth that I think will be very much rewarding to those who do it," she said.
Pepall and Bianconi hope that research-track students will benefit from the opportunity to work with a faculty member on individual projects.
"Graduate students are very impressed with the quality of faculty, and they come here because they want to work with faculty," Pepall said. "Increasing opportunities to work with faculty on research projects is something that"s going to benefit the students."
