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Research, Feedback, and Confidence: A Stay at Yale

4 May, 2026

As part of our Places You’ll Go series, CERGE-EI PhD student Margarita Pavlova reflects on her research stay at Yale University. The experience helped her advance her job market paper, engage with leading scholars in labor economics, and gain confidence in her own academic voice.

For Pavlova, the decision to go to Yale was closely tied to her research goals. Her main objective was to make substantial progress on her job market paper, and Yale offered an ideal setting for that work. Its labor economics faculty is among the strongest in the field, and several scholars there had produced research that directly shaped the questions she is now exploring herself.

The opportunity to discuss her work with academics she had been reading for years was a major draw. “I knew that engaging with them would not only strengthen my paper but also deepen my understanding of the broader research agenda in the field. It turned out to be an invaluable intellectual experience,” Margarita says.

The process of arranging the stay began quickly. After mentioning her interest in visiting Yale to her advisor, she learned that he had colleagues there. Within a week, she had received an invitation letter. What followed, however, was a more demanding administrative phase. Securing funding and completing the visa process involved delays and uncertainty, making the path from idea to departure less straightforward than the initial invitation might have suggested. In the end, everything came together in time, and she was able to begin the visit as planned.

Once in the US, Pavlova found herself in an academic environment that exceeded her expectations in both intensity and energy. She arrived focused primarily on research and faculty discussions, but what stood out most was the sheer vibrancy of the department. Workshops, seminars, and informal research meetings created a constant flow of intellectual exchange. With multiple events often taking place in the same week — and sometimes at the same time — the environment was more dynamic and stimulating than she had anticipated.

What suited her especially well was this intensity. Compared with smaller academic settings, Yale’s large and active economics department created momentum: ideas were continuously tested, refined, and challenged through conversation. For Pavlova, being surrounded by that level of activity meant thinking more rigorously and developing her work more quickly.

The diversity of perspectives among fellow students also played an important role. Interacting with peers from different academic and national backgrounds showed her how differently similar problems can be framed. Questions of identification, theory, and policy relevance often looked different depending on a student’s training and intellectual environment. These exchanges pushed her to articulate her assumptions more clearly and made her more aware of alternative ways of approaching the same economic question.

Looking back, Pavlova says the most important development during her time in the US was not a new technical skill, but a shift in confidence. CERGE-EI had prepared her well academically, and being at a top department helped her see that the gap she had once imagined between herself and students there was much smaller than she had thought. She became more comfortable presenting unfinished ideas, asking questions in seminars, and participating in discussions without feeling that every contribution had to be perfectly polished.

On a personal level, that change was equally significant. Observing how research develops in practice helped dispel the idea that successful scholars begin with perfectly formed ideas. Instead, she saw that many promising projects begin in rough form and improve through persistence, openness, and repeated feedback. That realization reduced the psychological barrier of speaking up and made her more willing to pursue ambitious questions.

Her advice to younger CERGE-EI students considering a research stay is to think strategically. Prestige alone, she suggests, should not be the deciding factor. More important is finding a place where scholars work directly in your area and where you can receive meaningful feedback on your research. She also encourages students to consider the intellectual culture of a department — “whether it is collaborative, seminar-driven, policy-oriented, or more theory-focused — and how that matches your own working style.”

“Finally, I would encourage students not to underestimate the value of reaching out,” she adds. “Academic networks often make opportunities possible much faster than one might expect.”

Pavlova’s experience at Yale shows that a research stay abroad can offer much more than a line on a CV. It can sharpen a project, expand intellectual horizons, and, perhaps most importantly, strengthen a young researcher’s confidence in her own ideas.

Read the full interview here.