Done with LSE!

I finished grad school this week!!

(Let's out screams of woo!!)

I finished my last exam on Wednesday, shortly before noon. As soon as I put my pen down, it hit me. After going to school for 21 years, I am finally done. It's been quite a long time. 

Pre-school, primary school, secondary school, undergrad, and grad school...

I love to learn, and I will always be a lifetime learner. But, the fact I no longer have to write papers or take an exam is a huge relief. I know in no time, I will most likely miss the assignments. I know I say I'm done with school forever, but since the future is unknown, I may end up back in a classroom someday! 

As for now, I'm enjoying my last few days in London while I begin packing.  

It still hasn't hit me that I'm done. Grades will begin to come with all of them being released in July. 

But, now...onward thinking to Las Vegas! 

Capstone Project is Officially OVER!

Yesterday, my capstone group finished our report! 

The past six months of research, writing, and copious amounts of stress are officially over! 

And, I will never have another capstone report for school, ever...again. 

While we still have our presentation to give this coming week, we were able to celebrate our victory!

First, Federico, Simon, and I joined some others to celebrate in the park that is technically on campus.

Following that, I went over to a Levo League event (more on that in another post!).

And, then the second years went out for a night of Latin dancing! 

It was a great way to "cap-off" the capstone report!

Final Summer Reading List

It's about that time of the year where my "fun" reading takes place either right before bed or on the tube. Grad school resumes this week, and while I still have a few books to try to finish before school takes off again...I wanted to share what I finished in the past few weeks. 

Have you read any of these books? What have you finished recently?

Three Exams Down, One to Go!

This week has been crazy so far.  I took three exams on back to back days. Economics on Monday, government and game theory on Tuesday, and management yesterday. To say that I was tired would be an understatement. They were some of the hardest tests that I ever taken in my entire life. But, they are over! Today, I start studying for my last exam which is next Wednesday. It's hard to believe that next Wednesday at 6pm, I will be done with my first year of grad school.  As I return to the textbooks, I'll leave you with some photos on how a lot of us celebrated yesterday!

It's June!

My exams finally start today. And by finally, I do mean that by the time most of you are reading this, I will be wrapping up my economics final exam. It's worth 100% of my grade. 

May the odds be ever in my favor. 

Tomorrow and Wednesday, I have my government and management exams. And, then one week later, I will take my last one- econometrics.

Thus, studying is what has caused a lack of blog posts. I've been doing a lot of fun things to try to balance out the studying. (See my post yesterday about the Sound of Change Concert)!

Once my exams are over, I'll officially be on break till October. Hell of a vacation, huh? My internship that is based in London will wrap up mid-July. I'm escaping to the US then! Get prepared, America!

For now, I'll leave you with some photos for what I have been up to besides studying! 

Celebrated a 'Bon Voyage' evening with my friend John- he's headed to Burma! 

Hung out at Portobello Road and ate this delicious sandwich!

And, yes...continued my way to eat every macaroon ever. 

Academic Purgatory

Exams are two weeks away from today. (eeek!) LSE has a six week summer term period for exams, and mine all fall within a week of each other. Three of them are back to back, actually.

I've labeled this post academic purgatory because I wake up studying, fall asleep studying, and I do believe I've been having dreams with economic theories.  I knew this summer term would be rough, but I've never experience anything like this before. Having no exams, quizzes, and hardly any graded assignments during the first 20 weeks of this year has placed a direct impact on my studying this term.
Truthfully, I stayed consistent with the materials that we were learning each week. I reviewed during the Christmas break. I completed my weekly STATA assignments due to the random grading of one of them. And, yet, I'm still nervous for what is coming.

Essentially, I feel that I am cramming as much material in my head as I can before these exams. We are given access to past exams, and I've detected the patterns of exam questions and topics. But, at the same time, I've reread so many textbook and articles that sometimes I feel my brain has turned into mush. Yes, at Syracuse, I did sometimes cram the night before a test, and I was fine. This is entirely different.

But, it's a learning experience. It's the UK higher education system. And, I signed on for it.

Just two more weeks...

Lent Term Begins!

Ahhhhh...the smell of a new semester! 

Or, term as they call it over here.

Lent Term officially begins today. While my schedule and courses stay the same for the semester, I'm looking forward to getting back into a routine. My day consists of my usual four hours of econometrics for Monday, but I'm actually really looking forward to dealing with STATA and problem sets today!  

One change that I will see with my courses this semester is that my economics class will begin to focus on macroeconomics until final exams. As for everything else, I will be interning with the internship that I landed at the start of the Michalmas Term. It was delayed starting, but I'm looking forward to having a few other things in my life besides math and game theory!

If you will excuse me now, I need to get coffee and get to work!

End of Michaelmas Term

As I sit here writing this blog post, I've got the last bit of laundry drying and trying to decide what I really need for three weeks at home. Honestly, I still cannot believe I've been done with my first term of graduate school since Wednesday. Time sure does fly when you were trying to balance the heaviest course load known to man, an internship, and a general life. But, here, I am...December 16th, and finished.

The last week of term consisted of a final STATA problem set of the term, government group project, economics homework, and a management working group outline for a project. All of that was on top of the usual reading for the week, final activities, etc. Yet, all of it got done. Monday night, I only slept four hours, and Tuesday resulted in a 30 minute nap at my desk around 6am. But, if you know me, that's usual. I'm the type of person to just stay up and putter through. 

As you saw from an earlier post this week, I got to go to the Mumford and Sons concert on Tuesday. Still on cloud nine...even though it is Sunday now. Wednesday evening, the girls and I grabbed drinks at the George celebrating our freedom for a month and then went for a quick bite to eat.  More to come on Thursday- Sunday activities...

Honestly, as I look back now, time flew by. I'm a new person with a new outlook on different career options,  math, and life, itself. Tomorrow, as I board my two planes to go home, I'm excited for a break, but already counting down the days till I'm back! 

Final Week of Michaelmas Term

Time flies when you are in grad school. 

I always thought that phrase was true for my four years at Syracuse, but I find myself wishing time would slow down even more now, that I'm at LSE.  I landed in London on September 17th, and next week, December 17th, I'm flying home for winter break. It literally feels like that I just moved in the other day- with lugging my numerous bags full of purchases to make my flat "me." Yet, here we are. The final week of the first term of grad school under my belt, well almost. 

I've been going to school for 12 weeks straight now. Most other programs have been only going for 10 weeks, but since we had our pre-semester math camp, life hasn't slowed down since September 24th. Hard work pays off. I find myself much more confident approaching math related solutions in my courses, econometrics has become my favorite course, and I'm not as stressed as I was at the beginning. Friendships have been solidified, the main bartender at the George knows me, and I have my usual daily routine worked out.  

But, I've got to say, I need a break. 

Over break, I plan on doing a lot of review for all four of the courses as well as begin to work ahead and look at past final exams. Without taking finals this semester, I've only had some work graded with much it being formative. STATA problem sets have helped me wrap my head around concepts of heteroskedasticity, collinerarity, B subscript zero, and omitted variable bias, but mastering still has to come. Break will also be good as I can see my family, attend a basketball game as an alumni, sleep, and just relax. 

Yet, before my head and body officially agree that it is break time, I've got to get through this week. Here's the schedule for the final week:

Looks fairly tame? Huh?

I've got two group projects due this week. One that is presented in class and graded on the spot. The other, we present, receive feedback, and submit the final project after making changes. I'm going to see Mumford and Sons this week, juggle a group dinner, attend two holiday parties, and get to one birthday bash. All of that is in addition to STATA, weekly economics homework, meetings and sleep. 

But, you know what? Why not finish with a bang?