Welcome to BU Economics Peer Advising

Hi,

I am Michael and currently serve as the Economic Department’s peer advisor.

You can reach me via email at msiemer@bu.edu. Feel free to get in touch with me.

First of all some  answer to general questions you might have about the departments peer advising. This website will be updated shortly.

Who is peer advisor and what does he do?
The peer advisor is a current Ph.D. student who been appointed by the department to help incoming students with orientation to different aspects of living in Boston, including housing and visa/immigration question. Although I might not be able to answer every question I can always get you in touch with the people who have the answers like the International Students & Scholars Office when it comes to immigration questions.  Most of the communication between the peer advisors and new students is via email in the form of questions and answers. Of course, you are very welcome to stop by your advisor's office when you arrive to Boston. Note that your peer advisor does not have the responsibility to find the housing for you. His or her primary duty is to provide you with information and answer your questions.

Where do I start with orientation and housing?
Start by reading the housing page of this website. The Graduate Survival Guide is extremely useful collection of information. It is written by graduate students for graduate students. It has information about many aspects of your life in Boston including housing, temporary housing, banking, health insurance, and other. The Graduate Survival Guide is written by people at SAGE (the organization of graduate engineering students) and GSO (the organization of the arts and sciences graduate students).

Very useful is also the Graduate Economic Associations (GEA) where you can sign up for a mentor if you’re interested.

Sign up for the BU Economics Google Group                                     http://groups.google.com/group/bu-economics-peer-advising        Throughout the summer there will be new information about housing and peer advising. To communicate the new information faster to new students I have set up a google group to which you can subscribe below. Note that this group is for peer/housing advising purposes only. The administration compiles its own email list. You can control how you participate in the list. For example, you can choose to receive any new postings via email or to only read them online. Receiving new posting via email will give you faster access to new information, though. Your email will only be used for peer advising purposes only. Once you joined the group you can email your posts to bu-economics-peer-advising@googlegroups.com

Would you like to get in touch with your classmates before the start of the school year?
You can help each other with housing and share tips. Perhaps you can rent an apartment together (which is generally easier than finding a room). If you would like for your classmates to contact you, post your your name, a way to contact you (such as e-mail or phone) and anything you would like to be known about yourself on the Google Group above. Of course whatever you post there will be public so do not post anything you want to remain private. Indicate if you are male or female.

Team up with other new or current students
When looking for housing a good strategy is to team up with several other people first and then look for an apartment together. This way you separate choosing of roommates from choosing of apartments and you will have greater choice of places to rent. Teaming up is even possible to accomplish if some roommates are in Boston and some in their home cities/countries. Of course, any housing agreements reached between roommates over the phone or email should be taken seriously and should be backed up by monetary deposits and signed lease agreements when possible.