Emily Cao ’27 is an Economics major with a supplementary major in Applied and Computational Mathematics and Statistics (ACMS) and a minor in Korean and Asian Studies. Emily’s academic interests lie at the intersection of economics, politics, sociology, and broader social science fields. She is particularly fascinated by how social mechanisms operate—how individuals shape systems and how those systems, in turn, influence individual decisions.
Currently, Emily is beginning research with Professor Erin McDonnell, contributing to a project that analyzes and codes economics articles from the past twenty years to assess their contributions to scientific knowledge through a structured coding framework. Her coursework—including Political Economy of East Asian Development, Economics of Education, Modern Japan, Gendered Bodies in Islamic Tradition, International Economics, Business in America, Paris, Visual Capital Cinema, photography, media—reflects her commitment to understanding global and social systems from multiple perspectives. In addition, Emily has completed coursework in R programming and Python, and she hopes to gain hands-on research experience that integrates both qualitative and quantitative methods. She enjoys interdisciplinary analysis and is eager to explore how rigorous social science research can inform education, development, and personal growth.