Issue 37, Fall 2009

William A. McEachern, Editor

THE GRAPEVINE

Since I last reported here on the use of clickers in the classroom (Fall 2008), a study has appeared that looks at their effectiveness in some economics classrooms. Marianne Johnson and Denise Robson of University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh wanted to see if clickers affected student engagement and performance. They surveyed students and tracked test scores in four sections of microeconomic principles taught by two instructors. Each instructor had one section randomly assigned as the control group and one as the clicker group. Sections enrolled 45 to 55 students each. Students had no prior knowledge about the possible use of clickers in the course and could not easily transfer between sections (to reduce any selection bias). In clicker sections, the devices were used in two ways. First, the instructor asked questions during the lecture that students answered with clickers. In the non-clicker section, students responded with a show of hands. Students earned no points in either case but were strongly encouraged to participate. Second, students were given a ten-question quiz each week. In the clicker sections, after students answered a question, the instructor identified the correct answer and displayed the distribution of responses. Students could then ask questions and discuss results. In the non-clicker sections, students got their corrected quizzes back the next class, and at that point they could ask questions and discuss results. From university resources and student surveys, the authors gathered information on each student's gender, race, age, university status, study habits, attendance patterns, math background, GPA, entrance exam (ACT) scores, and more. After controlling for these factors, the researchers found no significant differences between the clicker and non-clicker sections in student attitudes toward attendance, class participation, or class engagement. Nor did they find any difference in exam performance. They acknowledge that clickers might be more effective in larger sections, where something like a show of hands is less practical. Still, they conclude that instructors should be cautious about plugging new technologies into traditional lecture courses, and universities should be cautious in mandating technology use. See "Clickers, Student Engagement and Performance in an Introductory Economics Course: a Cautionary Tale" Computers in Higher Education Economic Review, Vol. 20, 2008 at http://www.economicsnetwork.ac.uk/cheer/ch20/johnson.pdf.

William Walstad of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and William Becker of Indiana University have reprised their earlier studies of U.S. economics graduate programs. In 2008 they mailed questionnaires to the 123 Ph.D. granting departments and got 68 responses, including 65% of programs ranked in the top third based on quality, 61% of the middle third, and 38% of the bottom third. The average responding program had 67 graduate students in a typical year (103 students in the top third, 49 in the middle third, and 30 in the bottom third). The number of entering graduate students ranged from 3 to 40 (averaging 21 for the upper third, 11 for the middle third, and 8 for the bottom third). Programs in the top third averaged 14 Ph.D. awards annually, the middle third 6, and the bottom third 4. Professors Walstad and Becker were particularly interested in the teaching load and teaching preparation of graduate students. Those with recitation sections taught an average of about seven sections per year. Those offering their own courses, which typically occurred the third year, taught an average of 2.1 courses per year with 55 students per course. Less than a third of departments required those with recitation or teaching responsibilities to take a graduate credit course in undergraduate teaching. When such a course was offered by the department, 89% of economics graduate students took it, compared to only 17% who took it when the course was offered outside the department. The typical in-department course was three credits and pass-fail. About half the departments required students to take a non-credit course in teaching. "Preparing Graduate Students in Economics for Teaching: Survey Findings and Some Recommendations" was presented at the 2009 AEA meetings. A copy can be found at www.aeaweb.org/annual_mtg_papers/2009/retrieve.php?pdfid=398.

Conventional wisdom holds that choosing economics as a major is often viewed as an alternative to choosing business as a major, and vice versa. Hirschel Kasper of Oberlin College used national data from 1975 to 2003 to examine substitutability in the choice of majors over time. When the percentage of economics majors was compared with the percentage of majors in other specific disciplines, Professor Kasper found a sharp inverse relation between the percentage of graduating majors in economics and the percentage in biology. No relationship between any other two disciplines was closer. When economics majors dwindled year to year, students were most likely picking biology instead of economics; when economics majors swelled year to year, students most likely were picking economics instead of biology. He notes the similarities of the majors: Both majors have similar math prerequisites. Both approaches focus on the individual unit and how it relates to the whole. And both rely on similar reasoning such as causality, equilibria, and allocative mechanisms. See "Sources of Economics Majors: More Biology, Less Business," Southern Economic Journal, Vol. 75 (October 2008): 457-72.

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