Teaching
I use a hands-on activity to introduce diminishing marginal product of labor and other production concepts in a way that allows students to organically discover what to expect.
E201 Introduction to Microeconomics (Spring 2017, Spring 2018)
Introduction to Microeconomics (E201): This course is designed to give the student a familiarity with the language common to economics, an elementary ability to analyze various microeconomic problems common in our economy and society, along with being able to think through everyday microeconomic problems. Models and theories studied will help the student to understand how producers could best allocate scarce resources to produce goods and services. Likewise, the student will gain insight into what drives consumers to give up resources to obtain goods and services produced by others. Upon completion of this course, the student should be able to apply economic modeling tools to both business situations and to problems and situations from everyday life. The student will find that the tools of economic reasoning are extremely useful in a multitude of everyday situations that require decisions on how to allocate time and resources.
As part of a project, students were asked to design a cartoon to help explain one major concept from the E202 curriculum.
E202 Introduction to Macroeconomics (Fall 2015, Spring 2016, Fall 2016, Fall 2017)
E202 students will begin by studying the ways in which economists measure the three primary macroeconomic variables: output, prices, and employment. We will study the macroeconomics of business cycles and economic growth. Students will learn how to illustrate macroeconomic fluctuations using the Aggregate Expenditure model and the Aggregate Demand and Aggregate Supply model, discussing short-run, long-run, and dynamic features. Students will learn how the government can influence the economic environment via fiscal and monetary policies. Finally, we will discuss the economics of international trade and foreign investment in the open economy. Throughout the course, we will relate our topics to historical and current events as well as real world data.
E321 Intermediate Microeconomics (Summer 2016)
Intermediate Microeconomic Theory is expected to deepen students’ understanding of basic microeconomic concepts using both graphical and calculus approaches. The course will introduce further tools of economic analysis and equip the student to apply theoretical concepts to economic problems. The course pays special attention to problems of consumer choice, theory of the firm, and basic general equilibrium and efficiency problems. It forms the basis of further economic studies in applied disciplines such as industrial organization, public economics, labor economics, the economics of education, game theory, the economics of information, etc.
P155 Public Oral Communication (Fall 2018, Spring 2019, Summer 2019, Fall 2019)
Public Oral Communication is one of the great foundational courses in a liberal education. Grounded on the relationship between public performance and critical reflection, it is an instruction in the power of the spoken word. By cultivating the liberal competencies of speaking and listening in public venues, you will develop an attunement to language in the constitution of community, in the formation of an ethical comportment, and in the formation of civic and cultural identity.
As a required foundational undergraduate course in of one of the great liberal arts colleges, P155 introduces you to the close inter-relation of theory and practice. It does not resemble the simple skills-only versions of “basic public speaking” that you may be familiar with. It is not Toastmasters. Although you will be rigorously trained in all the formal skills and techniques, oral communication is not merely technique; it is a human art of the highest distinction. P155 is also not training in strategic manipulation, but in how to use the spoken word for good. We will look closely at why speech is capable of manipulating, deceiving and seducing, and how to spot, avoid and combat these uses.
Students who successfully complete Public Oral Communication will:
· learn how to construct and deliver a complex argument extemporaneously;
· develop the ethical, rational, and emotional competencies of speaking and listening;
· develop techniques for reducing speech anxiety and becoming excellent audiences;
· learn how to use the spoken word vividly, fittingly, precisely, and movingly;
· learn how speech genres serve as resources of invention;
· learn how to form the spoken word out of and in response to the audience and the occasion;
· distinguish between the instrumental skills of speech and its role in cultivating and our deliberative wisdom, our membership in community, and our humanity;
· cultivate the reciprocity of theory and practice in public speaking;
· begin to cultivate a dialogic ethos of discursive community;
· discover the power of speech to motivate, clarify, inspire, correct misunderstandings, advance a cause, exercise tact, speak truth to power, expose fallacies and presumptions, and work through problems collectively.