Week 0: My Data, Economics, and Development Policy MicroMasters Journey
I’m currently enrolled in the Data, Economics, and Development Policy (DEDP) MicroMasters Program. I decided to take it after completing a course on Evaluating Social Programs, and watching few lectures from Principles of Microeconomics and The Challenge of World Poverty courses. They addressed some of the issues I personally struggled with using simple mathematical formulations!
I first stated looking for other learners experiences. I wanted to know the expected workload and the level of prior knowledge I’m supposed to have. I found very few posts that addresses my questions on MIT Open Learning Forums, among them was this post. I then joined the DEDP Linkedin group, but the group wasn’t active, but I guess it was there where I found a link to a WhatsApp group. Despite the large number of members in that group (exceeds 200), I found it extremely helpful! Unfortunately though, new members can’t access old messages, and they end up asking questions that were answered previously. The questions are:
- How many hours should I commit to each course?
- Can I take all 5 courses at once?
- What is the best order to take the courses?
The DEDP team team had already answered these questions in their FAQ page. For example, it’s stated that each course requires 12–14 hours. But many learners believe this number is overestimated, and except for very few posts such as this one, I couldn’t find the exact number of hours learner with my background would spend on each course per week.
In this blog, I plan to do exactly that. I will be documenting my learning journey in an attempt to answer the three questions above. I will also be using this platform to share all the interesting things I learn throughout the semester 🤓.
My background
I have an engineering background. My economy and probability foundations aren’t strong. My programming skills are good, but I never used R. Many learners recommended taking this Statistics and R course. I completed the first two weeks of it, but I realized that wasn’t necessary after the DEDP program has started. Each DEDP course has an “introduction to R” module, and I think it is sufficient for a person with a good programming skills. Those with no prior programming experience may want to take it.
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I currently have plenty of free time, and I plan to dedicate it to complete the following courses.
- 14.100x Microeconomics
- JPAL102x Designing and Running Randomized Evaluations
- 14.310x Data Analysis for Social Scientists
- 14.73x The Challenges of Global Poverty
- 14.740x Foundations of Development Policy: Advanced Development Economics
I might take 14.750x Political Economy and Economic Development next fall. I’m currently auditing it, and it is very exciting!
To learn more about the courses, you can audit them. You may also check the courses previews which can be found after expanding the “More about this course” on edX. You can also find a similar version of each course on MIT OCW. This page maps each MITx course with its MIT OCW version. Some of the OCW material are outdated but still helpful.
I’m super excited to share my journey with you! If you have any questions or comments, feel free to write them below or shoot me an email at blog@hayaalsh.com.
