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There is a metaphor that I think of relatively often that roughly goes, “How does one eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” Despite the bizarre framing, the intended message of this aphorism is that when one is approaching a large or challenging task it is best to focus on small and attainable goals that will, ultimately, add up to a satisfactory resolution of the task at hand. There is truth to this general line of thinking, but it is necessarily reductive and can oversimplify daunting tasks – especially when so-called small steps can appear monumental.

Since my last post, I have spoken with a lot of students who are encountering challenges in their education (many for the first time). I found myself referencing the aforementioned elephant metaphor a number of times. I believe in the merit of this approach. Finding the validation that comes from meeting a goal, even a small one, can help to build the momentum that is needed for a productive and successful work session. For some students, it was apparent that they appreciated the advice to work a little bit each day in order to overcome their obstacles. For others, there were clearly obstacles to taking on even the most introductory stages of their project. I am not talking about students who are resistant to putting in time and effort to their education but the increasing number of students who experience a mental block when they are faced with a challenge that is new to them – especially those who are highly capable and intelligent but unused to adversity in their education. To students who fit this description, there is a propensity to become paralyzed by the anxiety of trying to do something and failing to meet the expectations they have for themselves.

In such circumstances, the metaphor of taking on a large task “one bite at a time” appears a hollow and inappropriate comparison. An alternative might be to approach the task via “giant steps” – John Coltrane style (I took a jazz history class in college and some things stuck, I guess). The eponymous track of Coltrane’s album “Giant Steps” takes off at a breakneck pace from the start and does not let up. Adopting this approach can be useful when working on a big project, especially for students who can get held up in the early stages by trying to find the perfect phrasing. One exercise that I like to use in these cases is to task a student (or, in all honesty, myself) to write for 20 minutes without any editing or second-guessing – after all, one can always go back and make edits to clarify or strengthen arguments. I recall a dear friend and mentor sharing that, “The greatest obstacle to good work is a blank page…”, well diving into writing while listening to Coltrane is one route around that.

Obviously, whether a student is better suited to incremental progress or rapid activity (followed by editing) will depend on the circumstance. I believe that both can work. Indeed, I have utilized both practices to positive ends. I think that part of the challenge is when one or the other option is not obvious to the student and it is a matter of trial-and-error. When I can identify those cases, maybe I will throw on some John Coltrane and see how the student responds?

I aspire to be good teacher. When I graduated from college, I chose to enter graduate school because I liked studying economics but more-so because I enjoyed working with people who wanted to learn. I still question the existence of altruism because of the personal satisfaction I enjoy when I perceive a student learns something purely for their own benefit but I had something to do with it. Am I a “good teacher”? The most direct evidence that I have access to, student evaluations, could suggest that I am. Students are satisfied with my classes and believe that they know more than they did before taking one of my classes. Many of my students have gone on to do things that I believe were facilitated by our interactions. Whether or not I am a “good teacher”…could I be a better teacher? Undoubtably. I believe that part of being good at my job is by identifying opportunities for improvement and then making measurable progress toward that goal.

Recently, one of my classes took an exam and many students earned failing grades – around 42% of the class earned less than 60% of the available points. When I see an outcome like this, my immediate thought is, “What was wrong with the test?” or “Did I not each this material well enough?”. I am more concerned that I did my job poorly than the students did their jobs poorly (assuming that a student’s job is to understand concepts well enough to demonstrate so on an exam). I looked at the exam carefully and critically. I reviewed the questions that I wrote and compared them to the material covered in class, how the wording could have been interpreted in ways other than I had intended; I tried to envision all the ways that this exam was an inappropriate assessment of the material that I wanted students to understand. Following a sincere and critical analysis of the test, I found that none of the questions were inappropriate or unfair. Many of my students performed poorly and there was no obvious evidence that it was my fault. This is one of the curious things about education as a marketable service; students cannot hand over a specified number of dollars per credit hour and receive information directly into their brains – to enjoy the full benefit of education requires effort in addition to expenditure. So, how can I do a “good job” when the metric for performance is not necessarily a function of my own effort.

The process of offering educational services should not be equated to spouting off information with the expectation that students will digest it perfectly and then be able to reproduce it. I understand that. As I allude to above, my favorite part of being an educator is working with individuals and seeing their development. With that in mind, when students perform poorly I do not take that as a sign that I have done the job poorly but that the job is not yet done. What I have been thinking about more recently is how to approach the next step of my job. Do I tell my students that many of them failed to meet my expectations and it is incumbent upon them to do better next time? Do I lower my expectations so that the students are more likely to meet them with the level of effort that they are already putting forward? I do not like either of these options and I think that they ignore many of the nuances that accompany working with college students.

The approach I have adopted takes more work than either of the highly simplistic options identified above, but I hope that they make positive progress toward being a “good teacher”. I do not change my expectations of students but I want to offer more support and guidance to meeting those expectations. Following the exam, I offered incentives for students who performed poorly to arrange one-on-one meetings with me and I asked them about how they approached learning the material and offered feedback on opportunities I saw for improvement. I viewed this to be constructive for multiple reasons: I learned more about how students are learning and can try to adapt to fit this process better, I was able to provide advice that was specific to each student, and I hopefully established a connection with high-needs students that will facilitate their learning for the rest of the semester.

I do not know if the approach I have taken is what a “good teacher” does. I am still trying to find a good definition for what a “good teacher” is. Here is what I do know following my many meetings with students: each of the students that arranged a meeting with me has at least a cursory commitment to learning, these meetings have given me an opportunity to learn more about what is working in my presentation of material, I have more to learn about being a “good teacher”. The last part of the preceding statement is a cop-out, but it is still true. Maybe a better statement would be that I am still conflicted about what I should expect from student, but that is just as much of a cop-out as before.

While it would be convenient for there to be an obvious lesson and solution, that could contradict my previous position that being good at my job is to continuously improve how I am performing it. This is an exhausting proposition as it will be present throughout the length of my career, but also a fundamental part of why I believe this is a fulfilling career. Perhaps it comes down to the appropriate discount rate? What a fitting conclusion for economics….

I had the pleasure of sitting down with Alan Elrod of the Pulaski Institution to chat about a recent publication on ecosystem services valuation as well as some thoughts on carbon capture/storage. Listen here!

The paper referenced in the podcast was published in the journal Nature: Sustainability and is found here.

As Hendrix College begins a new fall semester, I am excited and nervous about a new teaching opportunity. This semester I will be teaching a special first-year course that focuses on emphasizing engaged citizenship as a fundamental part of the college education experience. The breadth of this topic is underscored by the interdisciplinary approach that is taken to instruction of the course; two teachers from different disciplines choose a topic that can be approached by either perspective and design a class that brings the methods and perspectives together. For my part, I am teaching a course we call “The Quantified Citizen” with a computer science professor that examines how personal data and information is a growing part of modern economies and why that matters to engaged citizens. Our general strategy is that the computer scientist will discuss the “hows” of data collection and visualization while I cover the economic “whys” that businesses might seek out this data.

Preamble aside, this post is actually more focused on the relevance and value in teaching the history of economic thought to novice economics students. It is my observation that the phrase “the economy” is bandied about so frequently and in so many different contexts that folks are often talking about different things. The vocabular inconsistency has become so common to me that when new students express an interest in “the economy” to me, one of the first things I ask them is to explain what they mean when they use that term. Indeed, it is a common practice in many economics courses to begin the first-day lecture by defining the term – often as some iteration of “a system for allocating scarce resources”. In preparing lectures for The Quantified Citizen, I found myself wanting to provide more context to this definition rather than just slapping it on the board and demanding that students take it for granted. Reflecting upon the evolution of economic study explained both the variance in how people think about “the economy” as well as the unifying theme that links all of these different perspectives (interactions between agents in pursuit of efficient resource allocation). The history of economic thought is an interesting and engaging topic that often gets eschewed in favor of setting students upon math problems as quickly as possible. Math is essential for modern economics, but so is establishing appropriate context for study and practicing critical thinking – both of which figure prominently in the history of economic thought. When students are given the opportunity to think about how the technical details fit within the broader applications of economics while still holding true to the core analytical process then they will learn more fully and be better prepared to use those lessons in the real world.

WHC

It is invasive species awareness week. This article from the National Park Service provides some information about the consequences of invasive species and how it may impact your experience when enjoying the great outdoors.

Invasive species present a real environmental and economic threat. Whether that is through crop predation, biodiversity loss, or reductions in ecosystem services. Human activity, whether travel, adoption of exotic pets, or international trade, is a primary vector of invasive species dispersal and as such it is our responsibility to try and reduce the impacts of these harmful non-native species.

What  happens in economics class… doesn’t stay in economics class. It travels with you in your life to provide a fresh and useful perspective on world and life events.

Check out the syllabi for a couple of economics course to see what happens in economics class.

 

ECON240 SP2017 Syllabus Haden Chomphosy

ECON 440 SP2017 Syllabus Haden Chomphosy

Hello, my name is William Haden Chomphosy. I am currently a PhD student in the economics department at Colorado State University. This blog will feature insights about economics, the environment, education, and much more. In this first post I simply want to provide some background on the roundabout way that I came to find a passion in economics.

People frequently get caught up in the work or activities that seem to dominate our everyday lives. This can be a good thing, especially if you are happy and enjoy the work that is being done. However, there is also value in reflecting on the experiences that lead us to our present endeavors.

If nothing else, taking some time to think about the past may be nostalgic, humorous, or fun (and the marginal cost of taking a fifteen minute break from work to think about your past is near zero). You might surprise yourself, as I often do, to find that your life today is nothing like what you would have expected ten years ago.

On one hand there is a lot of uncertainty in life and it should be no surprise that plans made a decade ago may not come to fruition, but that is not my point. What I find most valuable about these brief moments of introspection is that it can help reveal the things that you care most about in life; things that are all too easy to take for granted when focusing on meeting deadlines, preparing for future commitments, or any of the other things that occupy racing minds. I will briefly share my recollection of the path that took me to truly value and appreciate economics.

Just about ten years ago I was entering high school in Fayetteville, Arkansas. I will admit that I was far from a model student. In fact, I was frustrated with a public education system that I felt did not care about actual education as much as it did so-called “evidence” of learning.

I found myself enrolled in an AP Macroeconomics course, with no real reason for selecting the class beyond a casual suggestion from a friend while I was filling out my schedule. What I found was that economics was a very intuitive approach to examining the world around you. I enjoyed the class sessions and even began exploring economics on my own time, joining extra-curricular economics clubs, and even reading some popular economics (Freakonomics by Steven Levitt).

When I entered college at Hendrix College it had been a few years since I took that first economics course in high school. I decided to enroll in the survey-level economics course to see if I was still interested in the field. I was quickly reminded of why I enjoyed studying economics so much.

To restate something that is taught the first day in almost any principles of micro course, at its core economics is really just the study of human decision-making. This gives economics a unique position in that it can be applied to almost any interest. Whether you want to determine the best way to grow a business, combat wildfires, or assess the social impacts of wealth inequality, economics provides powerful tools to address these questions.

While I am somewhat ashamed to admit it, this simple but powerful fact about economics took me years to fully appreciate. Today I think about this characteristic of economics frequently and do my best to communicate it to my students. As such, I expect that this will be a recurring theme of this blog.

I look forward to sharing this blog with my readers and welcome any questions, comments, or suggestions. I hope that that the posts made here prove to be informative, entertaining, and fun.

William