ECON 3720

If you are someone who is dreading econometrics, not especially passionate about the econ major, or maybe only taking this class because you didn't get into the comm school and just need to complete the major requirement, Rafi is an excellent choice. The course is structured in a way that makes doing well very achievable. The curve is extremely generous (90 = A+, 85 = A, 70 = B, 50 = C), and there are three exams (two midterms + final) with one drop, plus you get cheat sheets (two pages for the first exam, four pages for the second exam, and six pages for the final)! I am personally very passionate about the econ major and I am planning to enter a field where econometrics will be essential. With that in mind and given that other professors have big projects in their classes, I expected a little bit more emphasis on applied econometric methods. While Rafi is very smart and knowledgeable, his lectures focus heavily focus on proofs, derivations, and the theoretical underpinnings behind econometric concepts. The problem sets include some applied questions using R (which I like), but they also contain a lot of proof-based exercises (so make sure to brush up on your algebra, calculus, STAT 2120, and series/summations). I know there are other econometrics professors who take a more application-oriented approach, and in hindsight I do wish I had taken the course with someone who focused on real-world application cases more. This isn't a criticism of his teaching ability (I think he's actually a great lecturer), but I would say to just consider your learning goals before registering for this course. If you want to pass econometrics with significantly less stress, Rafi is excellent for that, but if you want to learn econometrics well to the point where you feel like you could confidently use the content in real research or industry work, you might get more out of a different professor's class.

I think the cheat sheets are what saved me in this class (for context, I currently have a 98 in the class after receiving my score for Midterm 2). For Midterm 1, I condensed all the important content from the lecture slides onto the front side of my cheat sheet, and then used the back side to summarize the practice exam. For Midterm 2, I followed the same strategy, and I also added the problems he worked out during lecture and the problems from discussion section on the remaining 2 pages. Don't skip discussion the week before an exam!! The practice exams are also very very helpful, so make sure to do them and time yourself.

The problem sets are 20% of your grade and they can be lengthy (the first one took me around 12 hours total), but they are manageable if you work on it chunk by chunk. Rafi is very responsive to feedback and adjusted the problem sets after seeing how we all struggled a lot with the first one. He is also just a genuinely kind, personable, and fun professor to talk to. If you are an econ nerd, you'll definitely enjoy chatting with him outside of class!

I have a few qualms with the way Rafi teaches this class and I'll try to give examples to explain things better. The class consisted of 6 problem sets, 20% of your grade, and 3 total exams, including the final, where he took your two best scores to average the remaining 80%.

The first issue is how difficult Rafi sets up the class. Firstly the grade boundaries were >90 = A+, >85 = A, >80 = A- and 5 point deductions going down to a C just being above a 50. On top of this, for every exam he curved all scores under 70 massively. For example, my friend on the first exam received a raw score of a 34 and it got curved to a 58. This looks like a very forgiving thing, which it is, but why in the first place are exams so difficult to the point where you have to add TWO separate curves to create a balanced grade distribution. Like at that point, I don't understand why you don't just make the class easier or alter content because very clearly the majority of students would be receiving something around C/C- assuming the class has a b average (70-75). Of course I have friends who also are acing this class well into the A/A+ threshold, but it just doesn't make sense to me why this system is in effect in the first place.

However, the main issue I have with the course is how useless lectures and problem sets feel in preparation for the exams. Firstly, Rafi comes from LSE (London School of Economics) and the LSE professors here are known to be well into the nitty gritty of whatever subject their teaching and Rafi is no different. I have many friends in both sections he taught this semester and the resounding opinion is that lectures are so complicated and stat/math related that its impossibly hard to follow and interpret what he's teaching. As for the problem sets, each problem set has a mixture of extremely hard/long algebraic proofs/problems which I truly do not understand or expect some student coming fresh out of calc 1 or Intermediate Micro to even begin to understand. The rest of the problem set would then include an R related dataset problem which more or less rarely affirmed anything that was being taught in class. And the craziest part of all this is even if you are able to understand everything in class and not use an AI to help with the problem sets, they don't even prepare you for the exams!!!!!!!

Everyone I've talked to has agreed wholeheartedly that until he posts the practice exam about a week prior to the actual exam, you will have essentially ZERO idea of what will be on the exam. Now granted, the practice exam reflects the actual exam DEEPLY. I made this analogy to my main study group and its that if you had two students where one took all notes in lecture and studied extremely hard through the problem sets and the other never showed up to any lecture or did any problem set and just studied the practice exam through and through, the second student would almost certainly outscore the actual hardworking student. It truly feels like there is some large disconnect between what is tested and what is taught.

The saving grace of this course is discussion. Discussion is where you actually learn what is necessary to succeed. It's still conceptually hard and you may have to reteach yourself some parts, but I'd say 90% of attainable content in this course was taught through discussion and not through lecture or problem set. Now that the course is wrapped up, I can't say I learned essentially anything meaningful and if I were to go into the higher level econometrics courses, I'm certain I would not be prepared for it. I recommend using a different professor and genuinely hope Rafi restructures how he teaches the course. And to make a disclaimer, I will be ending with a 76 which is just barely a B+ to highlight this isn't some 'I failed this course and am mad the professor' type of situation.