In addition to research skills, more familiarity with Excel (I spent many an hour staring at spreadsheets), and exposure to economic research articles, the one important thing I've taken away from AidGrade is an increased passion for developmental economics. Economics is divided into a bunch of disciplines such as econometrics, finance, international economics, or economic history. Going into most fields involves taking the same broad range of math courses in graduate school, but development economics is apparently a little special. Those who go into development specialize a little earlier and not every school has a strong development program. The work developmental economists do is also different in flavor from that of typical economists. Development tends to be more hands on, with a little more field experiments and work with NGOs operating on the ground. I'm glad that I was exposed to the field early on so that I can think about whether it's something I want to pursue.
I hope to stay connected with AidGrade going forward. I think a club centered around effective altruism could really have a place at K. The students tend to have a very international and socially conscious focus, so I imagine they'd be interested in the kind of work AidGrade does. I'm also trying to connect K's career center with AidGrade so that more students can learn about the organization's internships and possibly get some funding through the school (if only I'd been so lucky!)
I encourage you to check out AidGrade's website in the next couple of months. As the work I was helping with wraps up, it should become available online so that you can use the web tools to build your own meta-analyses and compare aid programs.
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