Major advisors
Please click here for the list of economics major advisor assignments for the 2024-2025 academic year.
Information on how advising works in the Williams Economics Department
Advising during the first 3 semesters at Williams
All new Williams students are assigned a faculty adviser during the summer before their first year, and this person should be your first point of contact for advising questions. At this stage, you are of course encouraged to also reach out to economics and political economy faculty for advice when that would be helpful, especially if your assigned advisor is not knowledgeable about economics or political economy.
Major declaration advising
Students first declare their majors during spring semester of sophomore year, in late April. At that time, students declaring a major in economics should schedule a meeting with a faculty member in economics to discuss your progress to date and plans for completing the major. Faculty members set aside special advising hours for this purpose, and we will share the schedule of those advising hours with you in mid-to-late April in the Economics Department Newsletter, which gets emailed to all students taking economics or political economy courses. Whether a member of the department is or is not your formal faculty advisor, you are welcome to meet with anyone in the department for the purpose of declaring a major. Worth noting: some faculty prefer that you schedule a specific time slot during those advising hours for this purpose, while others are fine if you just stop by to see if they are free. Either way, emailing ahead is helpful, especially with so many students likely declaring economics as a major this spring. The deadline to declare a major is usually May 1, and requires completing this form — but you must meet with an economics professor for advising and approval before submitting the form.
You must bring the following to your major declaration meeting:
1. A copy of your transcript
2. A list of the economics courses you have taken, and a tentative list of all the economics classes you plan to take in the future in order to complete the major. (You can find econ courses offered next year here).
For those considering a major in Political Economy, you may discuss this with a faculty member in economics OR email the chair of Political Economy to set up a meeting or inquire about the process.
Advising for junior and senior majors
In early May, we send a survey to all newly declared sophomore economics majors, as well as junior economics majors, asking them to rank their preferences for professors who could serve as their economics major advisor for the next academic year, and we use that survey to help us match students to major advisors. So please be on the lookout for the survey and complete it when it’s available. We will do our best to take your preferences into account when matching students with advisors, subject to the constraint that we need to allocate students across advisors equitably. You are of course free to make an appointment to meet with any faculty member for advice — the official adviser is just meant to be the preferred first point of contact, especially for official required meetings where an advising hold must be released. You don’t necessarily have to do your sophomore major declaration meeting with the professor who will be your advisor the following academic year.