Final Report
Economics
Discipline Workshop
MnSCU Center
October 23, 2003
(2 p.m. )
Metro State
University Minneapolis
Participants:
Robert Ley,
Jessie Martinez,
Shannon Marting,
Shawn Osell,
David O'Hara,
Raphael Onyeaghal,
Anne-Marie Ryan-Guest,
Lori Schroeder,
Darlene Voeltz,
Kenneth Zapp,
Rationale: This meeting was planned after an April Discipline meeting convened by MnSCU. The intent of that meeting was to have instructors in each discipline discuss barriers to transfer among the MnSCU institutions. The group of economics instructors that attended the April session wanted more time to talk about what kinds of outcomes we were looking for for students in a typical college-level principles of macroeconomics or principles of microeconomics course and to share course materials.
Summary of this meeting:
Dr. David O'Hara opened this meeting by presenting some enrollment information on the numbers of students who typically take an economics course in college. His numbers showed that of all undergraduates at 4-year institutions, about 40% complete at least one economics course, and only about 2% will eventually major in economics. Dr. O'Hara distributed an article entitled "Use it or Lose it: Teaching Literacy in the Economics Principles Course" (Hanson, Salemi, and Siegfried, AEA Papers and Proceedings, May 2002, pp.463-472), which (as the title suggests) makes the case that perhaps the objective of a college-level principles course should not be readying a student for upper division courses in economics or to train economists; instead the intent should focus on how we can best prepare students to use economics in their future personal, professional, and public lives. The term we (and the literature) use for this is "economic literacy" or "economic foundations". Since so few students go on to major in economics, should we consider the principles course as our one-time opportunity to help students understand the relevance of economics to their everyday lives?
As a group, I think that the participants in this meeting would say "yes!" to that question. The article that Dr. O'Hara circulated presents the Voluntary National Content Standard in Economics which provides 1.) a definition of economic literacy, 2.) statements that define the core of economic knowledge, and 3.) descriptions explaining what students should be able to do with that knowledge. In general, we agreed that we would like to help students learn to effectively communicate economics topics and to be able to critically read, understand, and critique economics in the popular press.
Among the group present at this meeting we found that we use a wide variety of texts. Within the Minnesota Transfer Curriculum, all of our courses (both macro and micro) focus on Goal #5 (History and the Social and Behavioral Sciences). Among the other competencies, some micro courses also focus on Goal #9 (Ethical and Civic Responsibility) and #2 (Critical thinking). Many macro courses focus on Goal #8 (Global Perspectives) also and at least one campus on #10 (People and the Environment).
The rest of the day was focused on a discussion of important topics in the Macro and Micro courses.
There was general agreement in the group that these
topics are important in both principles courses:
Scarcity, unlimited wants, choices, opportunity cost as the basis
for economics.
Supply and demand and price determination in order to discuss market
outcomes in all parts of the economy, including interest rates and exchange
rates.
Marginal analysis
Voluntary exchange, free trade, and comparative advantage.
The disagreements that occur among economists about appropriate use
of policy.
There was general agreement in the group that these
topics are important in the microeconomics course:
The outcomes that markets do and do not give.
The outcomes that come from government interference in markets. Market
structure.
Market failure (externalities, etc)
The rationale for government policy, such as antitrust and other regulation.
Market pricing of resources.
There was general agreement in the group that these
topics are important in the macroeconomics course:
Determination of interest rates, the role of the Federal Reserve
and the part that financial markets play in the U.S. economy.
Macroeconomic measurement (of GDP, unemployment, inflation, real vs.
nominal variables).
Budget deficits and debt (and the public vs. the economists' vs. the
political views on them).
Special topics that were mentioned: Social Security and Medicare.
Interspersed with the topics discussion was group discussion of classroom techniques, of the difficulty of teaching about some topics, of the challenge of trying to "cover all of the material", of how much math instructors try to use to support the economics concepts.
I believe that instructors in the 2-year colleges are eager to be sure that their students are fully prepared to move into the rigors of upper-division courses at a 4-year institution. However, if the statistics presented by Dr. O'Hara are true, we can breath a sigh of relief, stop worrying about all that content, and try to focus our efforts on making our principles courses "simple, memorable, and policy-oriented". (Hansen, Salemi and Siegfried, p.464).
Feedback:
Participant feedback on this meeting is positive. Comments from the evaluation forms indicate that the participants especially value the opportunity to meet with others who teach economics to exchange classroom techniques and ideas for class materials. The opportunity for interaction is important.
The group felt as though they would like to meet again to spend time sharing classroom materials, assignments and syllabi. We have asked for a session at the Spring 2004 Realizing Student Potential conference.