An Evaluation of Collaborative Problem Solving for Learning Economics

The use of student evaluations of courses and professors has been examined by Professor Kelley in an effort to learn more about the factors that appear to be associated with “good” or “poor” ratings. Using student evaluations of the Principles of Economics course at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Kelly investigated two dependent variables: measures of course evaluation and measures of professor evaluation. Eleven independent variables were included in the analysis, and two different regression models were used. The results are tentative, of course, but the study reveals some interesting findings on the impact of teaching assistants, the student's expectation of his course grade, and the professor's propensity to be generous or niggardly in awarding high grades.     

A Comment on “Grade Inflation: A Way Out”

The authors develop an original measure of learning in higher education, based on grades in subsequent courses. Using this measure of learning, they show that student evaluations are positively related to current grades but unrelated to learning once current grades are controlled. They offer evidence that the weak relationship between learning and student evaluations arises, in part, because students are unaware of how much they have learned in a course. They conclude with a discussion of easily implemented, optimal methods for evaluating teaching.     

A Statistical Interpretation of Student Evaluation Feedback

This article deals with the same basic subject—student evaluation of teaching—covered by Marlin and Niss in this issue. Dilts's approach is quite different, however. Readers will want to compare the model he used with that suggested by Marlin and Niss. One of Dilts's major findings is that “student course evaluations are directly associated with grade expectations and inversely associated with the degree to which the course is required.” In his paper he proposes a method that should help “to control for factors that distort evaluation.”     

Imagery,Affect, and Financial Judgment

Traditional theories of finance posit that the pricing of securities in financial markets should be done according to the quality of their underlying technical fundamentals. However, research on financial markets has tended to indicate that factors other than technical fundamentals are often used by market participants to gauge the value of securities. This phenomenon may be quite prevalent in markets for initial public offerings (IPOs), where securities lack a financial history. The imagery and affect associated with securities can be a powerful basis upon which to judge their worth.

Advanced business students in a securities analysis course were asked to evaluate a number of industry groups represented on the New York Stock Exchange in terms of a set of judgmental variables. After providing imagery and affective evaluations for each industry group, the participants judged the likelihood that they would invest in companies associated with each industry. Imagery and affective ratings were highly correlated with one another and with the likelihood of investing. Judgments of performance correlated poorly to moderately with actual market performance as measured by weighted average returns for the industry groups studied. The results suggest that imagery and affect are part of a coherent psychological framework for evaluating classes of securities, but that framework may have low validity for predicting performance.     

Teaching Marginal Cost,Supply, and Efficiency with an English-Auction Experiment

Using a discrete time control model, the authors suggest that faculty may be able to improve their teaching effectiveness by a reallocation of the inputs devoted to teaching (e.g., using student evaluations early in the course), by increasing the level of the resources used in teaching, or by changing the characteristics of the inputs (possibly through such things as teaching practicums, seminars, or sabbaticals). Alternatively, reducing the instructor's opportunity cost of the resources devoted to teaching may increase teaching effectiveness (i.e., reducing the research requirements for promotion). Empirical estimates of the effectiveness of these strategies are not presented.     

Diversity,effort, and cooperation in team-based learning

Student and team performance in 17 sections of an introductory microeco-nomic theory course taught using team-based learning are analyzed to determine what measurable characteristics of teams influence team and individual outcomes. Results suggest that team performance is positively influenced by the grade point average of the top individual on the team as well as the percentage of females on the team. While the level of cooperation within a team does not significantly influence team outcomes, it positively influences individual performance by females while having no statistically significant influence on male performance. Individual success also is positively and significantly influenced by gender diversity and individual effort in team activities, as measured by peer evaluations. These results are robust to a variety of measures of gender diversity.     

A comparative study of slave societies

This essay focuses both on theoretical issues and empirical evidence concerning the inevitability of slavery as an economic stage over the course of development. Different types of slavery are described and a number of common hypotheses about the determinants of slave societies and/or slavery are discussed. Several new hypotheses are also proposed which focus upon family and social-structural variables and also upon political factors. The major hypotheses are tested, using a worldwide sample of 60 primitive and peasant societies arranged according to level of economic development. The various older theories are found to explain poorly the presence of slavery while the data give some support to the newly proposed causal relationships.     

Correspondence to what? Coherence to what? What is good scenario-based decision making?

This paper provides a framework for the evaluation of scenario planning and other strategic decision making methods or techniques. If scenario planning is useful, we should be teaching it in schools and we as individuals should be using it to cope with the uncertainty inherent in modern life. A prerequisite to this is the need to identify why, where and how (in what way) scenario planning and other methods or techniques are useful. Here, I review evaluations of scenario planning. Taking a Brunswikian perspective, I highlight the issues that have failed to be addressed in this evaluation. I demonstrate that there are many ways in which scenario planning could be useful other than those that have appeared in previous discussions. These multiple routes are dependent upon the interaction between the individual organisation, the environment in which they are operating and the method being followed.     

The estimation of a hedonic asking and offer rent equation model: An EM algorithm approach

In this paper we claim that modeling housing markets, specifically the rental housing market, should be based on some sort of disequilibrium framework. We posit a model of asking and offer rents in the spirit of a sample selectivity model. This approach allows us not only to test whether landlords and tenants agree upon the marginal evaluations of unit attributes, but also to estimate the impact on rental demand of tenant specific attributes such as family income and race. Since estimators obtained from this procedure are consistent, but not efficient in this two equation context, we employ an EM algorithm in our estimation in order to obtain MLE equivalent estimators. We have found that our data support the use of this disequilibrium approach in that the coefficient estimates for the asking rent equation, under the assumptions of a sample selectivity model, are not coincident with those obtained from an uncorrected equation.     

The Use of Course Evaluation Scores to Influence Teaching and Research Activities

The issue of course and teacher evaluations is one which continues to engender great interest. In this article, Paul Kipps comments on the Hansen-Kelley model as presented in the Fall 1973 issue of this journal, and then presents his own modifications and extensions of the model. These modifications deal mainly with the shape of the indifference curves and the slope of the output possibilities curve. The Kipps analysis casts doubts on the effectiveness of efforts to make significant improvements in the teaching output of research-oriented professors, and in the research work of teaching-oriented faculty members through voluntary incentive systems.     

公司治理评价指数:解析中国公司治理现状与走势

良好的公司治理质量是利益相关者利益的保障,而公司治理质量的好坏需要采用科学的方法予以评价。在中国公司价值评价中导入公正与系统的公司治理评价,对引导中国公司价值取向和公司治理的积极变革具有深远的影响,也反映出中国公司治理与价值评价已走向与世界接轨之路。     

SYSTEMATIC INFLUENCES ON TEACHING EVALUATIONS: THE CASE FOR CAUTION*

In this paper, we examine eight years of Quality of Teaching (QOT) responses from an Economics Department in an Australian University. This is done to determine what factors, besides the instructor, have an impact on the raw average student evaluation scores. Most of the previous research on student ratings has been conducted in the US. One significant difference between US and Australian tertiary education is that, on average, the number of foreign undergraduate students in Australia is ten times the number in US institutions. We find that cultural background significantly affects student evaluations. Other factors that have an influence on the average QOT score include: year level; enrolment size; the quantitative nature of the subject; the gender of the student; fee‐paying status by gender; course of study; the differences between the course mark and previous marks; the quality of workbooks; the quality of textbooks; and the QOT score relative to those in other subjects taught at the same time. In addition, average QOT scores for instructors who have taught in a mix of subjects are similar to those based on scores adjusted to account for subject and student characteristics.     

THE EFFICIENCY IMPLICATIONS OF USING PROPORTIONAL EVALUATIONS TO SHAPE THE TEACHING WORKFORCE

We examine the efficiency implications of imposing proportionality in teacher evaluation systems. Proportional evaluations force comparisons to be between equally circumstanced teachers. We contrast proportional evaluations with global evaluations, which compare teachers to each other regardless of teaching circumstance. We consider a policy where administrators use teacher ratings to help shape the workforce and define efficiency in terms of student achievement. Our analysis shows that proportionality can be imposed in teacher evaluation systems without efficiency costs under a wide range of evaluation and estimation conditions. Proportionality is efficiency enhancing in some cases. These findings are notable given that proportional evaluations offer a number of other policy benefits. (JEL I20, J48)     

Intertemporally Consistent Population Ethics: Birth-date Dependent Classical Principles

This paper shows that, in a partially welfarist framework that permits discounting, perperiod social evaluations can be consistent with a timeless social ordering only if social principles lead to the repugnant conclusion . The same result applies if per-period social evaluations are replaced by forward-looking evaluations (social orderings that, in a given period, depend on present and future utilities only). This is the case because geometric classical generalized utilitarian principles are the only social principles satisfying these intertemporal consistency conditions together with some basic assumptions. The conclusion to be drawn from this paper is that history must matter to some extent if social-evaluation principles are to be ethically acceptable.
JEL Classification Numbers: D63, D71     

Statement of Purpose

With humor, as well as wisdom, experience, and insight, Ben Lewis conveys an “evangelical message” admonishing college economists to give “top priority” to the introductory courses. Deploring the lack of concern about the beginning course, he calls upon us to make it so attractive to students that few will want to miss it. A policy-oriented course with opportunity cost as “the great recurrent theme” is proposed.     

End-of-Course Evaluations as Indicators of Student Learning and Instructor Effectiveness

There are two aspects of this article that readers should find particularly interesting. First, Marlin and Niss provide additional data on the question of student evaluations of professors and courses. Second, they suggest the use of canonical correlation as an ideal way of facing the problems confronted in analyzing the educational production function. The authors assert that “canonical correlation would seem to answer many of the problems encountered in previous single-equation models….” Their research suggests that student evaluations can be used as surrogates for direct evaluations and that the former “do indeed measure the level of teacher input.”     

Endogenous Transport Coefficients: Implications for Improving Water Quality from Multi-Contaminants in an Agricultural Watershed

The effectiveness of imperfect pollution control instruments is examined for a diffuse source, multi-contaminant problem in which the transport coefficients for sediment-bound residuals are endogenous. Similar evaluations fix the percentage of sediment deposited and optimize either for a single firm managing the whole watershed or on a firm by firm basis. This study shows that ignoring the dependence of the transport coefficients on intervening land uses creates a positive externality. The filtering potential of activities conducted by firms close to the receptor permits firms further away to undertake more profitable but erosive practices. Optimizing management choices, and consequently endogenizing the transport coefficients, for all firms simultaneously removes the externality. An empirical application combines hydrological simulation models with an economic optimization model for nutrient pollution of surface and ground water within an agricultural watershed. Although firms are homogeneous in abatement costs, differences in spatial location leave uniform instruments unable to achieve the water quality goal efficiently. An ambient tax/subsidy scheme can achieve the water quality goal efficiently but the informational requirements will be excessive in most situations where the transport mechanisms for residuals are dependent upon the practices of independent decision making units.     

Cost-benefit rules in general disequilibrium

The consequences of imbalances in markets for goods and factors are the prime issues in many project evaluations. This is so in evaluations of measures like migration, manpower training programmes and plant locations. In the present paper a general disequilibrium model of a small open economy is used to generate evaluation rules to be used when markets do not clear through price adjustments.     

政府绩效考核、地方干部行为与地方发展

文章旨在考察中国政府绩效考核对县乡领导干部行为产生的影响。在介绍中国农村地区地方政府考核体系的基础上,文章依据作者的实地调研和所收集的文献资料重点分析了地方干部对考核的行为反应。文章发现,尽管不同的干部群体之间存在很大的差异,但绩效考核体系和考核目标显然已经成为影响地方干部行为的一个重要指挥棒。最后,文章为研究中国农村地区的政府绩效考核提供了一种新的视角:一方面,考核对地方干部行为起到了引导作用,建立了一种激励机制,并由此成为政治沟通的特殊渠道;另一方面,考核激发了地方领导干部的社会反应,尤其是激发了他们的群体性动力,而群体性动力对激励机制的影响也许要大于考核本身所体现的激励作用。