Guanghua School of Management
Teaching and Supervision
This page sets out the courses I teach at Guanghua, the terms on which I supervise theses, and the procedure for requesting a reference letter. Students are asked to read the relevant section before writing to me.
Courses
The course opens with the facts about development, poverty and inequality, then works through the basic theories of growth and poverty traps before turning to the areas where most of the empirical work happens: education, migration, labor markets, health, credit and firms, agriculture, poverty alleviation programs, environment and climate, and gender. Running alongside is the econometric toolkit development economists actually use, applied in Stata: randomized controlled trials, difference-in-differences, and regression discontinuity. Graduate students also draft and present a research proposal.
For students in the Future Leaders international undergraduate program, and built to prepare you for your undergraduate thesis. It runs as a mix of short lectures and student presentations: turning an interest into a research question, finding your way around academic databases and existing literature, collecting and analyzing data, and writing, citing and presenting the result.
Thesis supervision
I supervise Bachelor, Master, and PhD theses. All supervision is conducted in English; I am not able to supervise a thesis written in Chinese.
Most of my students work on applied economics with a substantial empirical component. Recent theses have examined how provincial management of local courts shapes labor disputes and firm survival, how trade unions affect the distribution of corporate tax cut windfalls, the fiscal implications of extending Medicare coverage to GLP-1 drugs, the structure of the entrepreneurial training landscape in Kenya, and the prospects of the Renminbi as a global reserve currency. What matters is a question you care about and a credible strategy for answering it, not proximity to my own work.
Making contact. Write to me with an outline of what you would like to work on. A formal proposal is not required; a paragraph stating the question, why it interests you, and the data you envisage using is sufficient.
Prospective PhD students. If you are considering writing your doctorate under my supervision, please write to arrange an individual meeting. A doctorate is a long commitment on both sides and warrants a conversation rather than an exchange of emails.
Reference letters
Whom I can write for
I write for students I have taught or supervised and whose work I can describe concretely: those who took one of my courses and performed well, wrote a thesis under my supervision, worked with me as a research assistant, or belonged to a cohort for which I served as cohort mentor (班主任).
Where none of these applies, any letter I could write would be thin. A specific letter from someone familiar with your work will serve you considerably better.
How to request one
Write to lukas.hensel@gsm.pku.edu.cn with “Reference request” in the subject line, at least two weeks before your earliest deadline. State what you are applying for, the deadline for each letter, and the method of submission: a portal, an email address, or a file you upload yourself.
What to enclose
- CVCurrent version
- TranscriptAn unofficial copy is fine
- Letter of motivationA draft is fine; I need to see how you are describing yourself
- Anything to highlightA paper you wrote for me, a project, an award, or context the rest of the file does not show
What follows
I will respond within a few days as to whether I am able to write. If I do not believe I can write a strong letter I will say so rather than send a lukewarm one, which serves you better. Once I have agreed, a single reminder as the deadline approaches is welcome.