Syed Muhammad Ishraque Osman Graduated with a doctorate in Economics in 2018

For my MS degree, I attended Barcelona School of Economics (BSE), a top-ranked economics department. If my memory serves me correctly, BSE had at least 10 Nobel Laureates on its scientific council at the time. Going to that school inspired me to pursue a PhD at a top-ranked US university. I applied to top-ranked economics departments and a couple of good schools for my PhD, and Texas Tech (TTU/Tech) was one of them. I received only partial funding from one of the top-ranked schools and full funding from TTU. To be honest, I wasn't thrilled with my options, but little did I know that selecting TTU would turn out to be one of the best decisions of my career. I felt at ease at Tech from the first day, from my first courtesy visit to Dr. Al-Hmoud's office. Not only that, but I was pleasantly surprised to see how hands-on and enthusiastic faculty members are when it comes to teaching a highly technical graduate level topic. Later, I discovered that I was often better trained as an economist than many of my peers at "top" schools, and one of the main reasons was the hands-on teaching style of faculty members at TTU's econ department, even at the PhD level. This teaching style, believe me, made a huge difference going forward. With the help of that training, I was able to land two economics internships that led to a full-time offer as an economist at Amazon, one of the top (if not the top!) tech companies in the United States. During my first few years, I was equally interested in monetary economics and labor economics, and it wasn't until I passed the qualifying exam that I decided on labor economics. To be more specific, I was trying to understand the relationship between immigration and crime. The econometrics and coding training I received while conducting this research prepared me well for internships at tech companies.

Later on, the breadth and depth of my research expanded to include a more machine learning-based approach to causal research questions. I entered academia as an Associate Professor in the data analytics program at Long Island University in New York. Applied Machine Learning, Causal Inference and Machine Learning, and Business Data Science are my current research interests. I enjoy teaching, and my students seem to enjoy my “fire-side chat” style teaching as well. Again, TTU prepared me in such a way that I had an advantage when competing for a faculty position in the job market. Very early in the PhD program, econ department commendably allows graduate students to teach a full class as an instructor. TTU econ graduates have nearly three years of teaching experience in their wheelhouse by the time they go in the job market. To recruiting universities, a freshly minted PhD with that many years of teaching experience can be a deal

breaker. Also, I like living in Lubbock for its simple living and great study cafes! Lubbock is a hidden gem with a plethora of amenities, and believe me, the town grows on you. TTU will always be home and from here it’s possible.