PHD Economics Personal Statement Egypt
I will graduate from my MBA Program in Egypt in April of 2012. These were heady times of optimism for our Middle Eastern economies; hope that had been generated by our Arab Spring. I was pleased and proud that my nation had the privilege of an especially critical role. XXXX University is my first choice for graduate study for its rigor as well as its reputation. I feel that I have proven advanced analytical and mathematical skills and I want to exploit them to the fullest extent possible. The invaluable help and guidance that could be provided to me by your distinguished faculty is unparalleled, and your progressive program is uniquely suited to guide me through the complexities and challenges that I face. i look forward to chronicling and analyzing unfolding events throughout the Middle East in the -post-Arab-Spring era, helping to shape economic developments for decades to come. Studying with top notch graduate students from all over the world, my colleagues at XXXX, would bring out the best in me and contribute to my own spring of fresh, novel thinking since your academic and research environment is ideal for cultivating the creative processes that the writing experience requires.
My especially keen interest in economics was sparked by the enormous harm caused to the Egyptian economy by sustained, high interest rates. I am very much immersed in the debates surrounding the contention that contemporary global economic crises have resulted primarily from high interest rates, from the Great Depression through our current economic recessions. I also have a special interest in the recent history of monetary stability and instability in Southeast Asia. I find it most intriguing how budgetary imbalances, excessive monetary expansion, a large balance of payments deficits, insufficient foreign aid, and inadequate international cooperation, all are related in some way in the literature to high interest rates, which are often portrayed as the root of the economic crisis in question. I very much look forward to studying on a graduate level the way that communist/socialist economies have transitioned to market economies, and the kinds of crises involved, especially in the early stages, and the reasons why inflation often occurs as a result of a fast growing economy. I wish to dedicate my life to the study of the way that monetary policy might be able to offset inflation, especially in Egypt as well as the Middle East in general. I am also very much concerned with the way that increases in interest rates often lead to heightened levels of unemployment.
When I began college, I was torn between studying engineering and the faculty of fine arts, as I was most talented since childhood in drawing, especially cartoon characters, and I won awards in painting contests over the years at primary and secondary levels. My name was the first on the list of those high school students accepted to the faculties of fine arts and architecture. At the same time, however, I also became very much enamored by Commerce and thus I decided to pursue this area as a concentration.
My studies in commerce suffered, however, by the fact that this was the first time that I was asked to be a full time student only in English, and it took me a while to adjust to full time use of English as a vehicle of academic expression. After my first year of adjustment, however, I was especially inspired by a lecture by one of Egypt’s greatest scientists of human development, Dr. Ibrahim El-Feki. He helped to inspire a complete revision of my sense of professional purpose and helped me to more clearly identify my goals, causing me to reevaluate my professional life. I began to take much more interest in my studies and to devote myself almost entirely to my academic preparation and my grades began to improve dramatically. By my fifth and sixth semesters, I received the second best scores in my class, and by the seventh and eighth terms I had the highest scores in my class.
Throughout my studies leading to my undergraduate degree in commerce, I came to more fully realize that I had a natural affinity with economics and many related areas, especially accounting and administration. I have been impressed most of my teachers, who serve as role models. And I can think of nothing more satisfying that a life devoted to the explanation of economic theories and the education of new generations of thinkers and administrators that are so sorely needed in Egypt and elsewhere. At some point I would like to have a share in helping to create greater levels of solidarity between academic institutions in the Arab World, especially concerning Economics. As an economics professor in Egypt, I would be well placed to make a modest contribution to debate and dialogue concerning the economic hurdles and challenges that are faced by the Arab World, especially as a result of the sweeping changes sweeping the region this year. By my final year of college, I had become an academic leader, leading study groups of as many as twenty students who sought my help in the preparation for our final exams. Many of my colleagues referred to me as “the Doctor.” Despite receiving the highest scores in my final year, because of my poor performance in my first year, I failed to graduate in the top four students in my class and, thus, was not one of the four of my colleagues that was appointed assistant professor.
I remained undeterred in my determination, however, to continue to advance academically so I decided to work in order to save money so that I could bear the costs of studying at my own expense, searching for an international scholarship that would enable me to realize my dreams of study abroad. I worked as a cashier in a hotel, then as an accountant for an exhibition of electrical devices, and later won a local scholarship to study graphic design. I completed a one year program and soon found work in the advertising field. I also earned three international certificates as an expert in Adobe and Autodesk. I worked for a period with XXXX, an animation studio based in Victoria, Canada, as a freelance 2d animator. I also had the privilege of teaching accounting at a private educational center. Following my experience in Canada, I began working for the XXXX Bank of Egypt (CIB), and enrolled as a student in the Arab Academy for Financial Sciences to earn my MBA. I will be graduating this coming June (2012) and I have also completed a Diploma in Accounting and Auditing at the University of the South Valley, where I did my undergraduate work.
Graduate study at XXXX would prepare me for a lifetime of struggle to bring the study of economics into fuller engagement with the Arab world at this critically important time. Since last January 25, I feel that I want more than ever to help my country, Egypt, to develop and achieve progress and prosperity, someday having a seat at the table of the world's most advanced nations.
PHD Economics Personal Statement Egypt
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