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Course choice advice
You will be assigned to an Academic Mentor during Welcome Week with whom you must discuss your course options, to ensure you are making an informed choice. You can also seek course choice advice from your Programme Director.
Academic Mentors
Prior to the start of Welcome Week you will be asked to communicate your top 5 preferred mentors from the staff associated with your programme, via the International Development Moodle site. You will be able to see your assigned mentor early in week 0 and they can advise you on course choices, help you to settle in and navigate your journey at LSE and support you with any other queries or issues you may have. Keep in mind that you are not limited to speaking only with your mentor; the Department has an 'open door' policy, and you are welcome to seek advice from other ID staff by setting up an office hour appointment. Your Programme Directors are also a very useful source of advice and support.
Specialisms
There are three specialisms in the department - African Development, Population Studies and Applied Development Economics. If you are choosing a specialism, you must do so at the beginning of your programme by applying to the appropriate courses. Then towards the end of the programme, each specialism lead needs to verify whether your dissertation is aligned with the specialism. Subject to the approval by the specialism lead you will be eligible for a specialism. Students will then have their specialism attached to their degree certificate and transcript.
- For the African Development specialism you need to take DV418 African Development and DV435 African Political Economy.
- For the Population Studies specialism, you need to take DV444 Population and Development: Global Health and Population Change, and DV456 Population, Health and Development: Evidence and Projections.
- For the Applied Development Economics specialism you will need to pass a test looking at your economic background in order to take the required courses for the specialism, and you will need to take DV490 Economic Development Policy I and DV492 Economic Development Policy III.
The pre-test is not on quantitative methods or statistics – we do not require any knowledge in advance, and do not test that. It is more a test of analytical thinking and understanding, so there is nothing to prepare in advance or study for.
Please note: that doing a specialism is entirely optional. While a specialism has certain advantages, it does have a disadvantage in that it constrains your course choices. Students have the freedom to opt out of taking a specialism at any point of time. It is entirely voluntary and a vast majority of students do not take a specialism.
Courses in other departments
Although most students take all their courses within the department, you may apply to take a course in another department, subject to their conditions and permission and that of your Academic Mentor. You can browse all postgraduate courses by departments at http://www.lse.ac.uk/resources/calendar/.
International Development students are advised that different departments have their own rules. The International Relations Department, for instance, specifies – as indicated in the Calendar – that students from outside the department may take only one IR option. We cannot guarantee access to courses outside the Department even in those cases where the programme regulations specify that these courses are approved options to take as part of your degree. Conversely, students who are not International Development or joint degree students are not guaranteed access to our courses.
Withdrawn courses
A full list of withdrawn graduate courses from around the school can be viewed here.
Timetables
Each course will typically have one lecture and one seminar each week. Lectures will be common for everyone taking the course. Seminars are in smaller groups and you will be able to choose a suitable seminar timing. The timing of the lectures and the various seminars will be published online. You may want to take a look at this once it is published to ensure that your preferred courses don’t clash with each other. Timetables often clash between courses of different departments.
Course choice timelines
The timeline for International Development course selection is as follows:
- Graduate Course Selection opens for browsing on Course Finder at 10am Monday 13 to Thursday 16 September 2021.
- Graduate Course Selection opens fully on LSE for You at 10am Monday 20 September 2021.
- You should make your request to take ID courses LSE for You by 10am Wednesday 22 September 2021. Please note that the department does not operate on a first come first served basis.
- Instructors will review requests to take courses and make offers by 10am Friday 24 September 2021.
- Offers that have not been accepted within 48 hours of an offer being made, will automatically time out. Any remaining places will then be offered to students on the waiting list.
- The Graduate Course Selection will close for Michaelmas Term at 10am Monday 4 October.
The course choice system will re-open between 10am on Monday 17 January 2022 and 5pm on Friday 28 January 2022. You will be able to make changes to Lent Term half units only. It will not be possible to change full unit courses or half-unit courses that were taught in Michaelmas during this period.