Professor of the Year, the most recognized national prize for undergraduate teaching, is awarded by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The first award was given in 1981 with one annual winner until 1994, when winners started coming from each of four institutional categories; two-year, baccalaureate, master’s, and Ph.D. Each year about 300 to 400 are nominated through their institutions for the $5,000 prizes.

One judge noted that winners must be smart, articulate, must care about students, and must have a passion for teaching. The focus is less on teaching philosophy than on teaching results. The committee looks for evidence that professors are doing what they say they are doing. For example, if the objective is for students to write better, the application should contain writing samples.

The 2004 winner for master’s institutions is Rhona Campbell Free, an economics professor at Eastern Connecticut State University and only the second economist among the 57 winners so far (an economist won the two-year college prize in 1995). Professor Free told The Hartford Courant that since she was never a dedicated student herself, she recognized that students are often interested in other campus activities, such as drama or sports. To compete for students’ attention, she tries never to have a boring class. For example, she often links her teaching to popular culture, such as The Apprentice. She has also used field trips. Visiting an old textile mill transformed into a museum, students learn of ancestors who worked at that mill generations ago.

Carl Wieman, a physicist at the University of Colorado and the 2004 Professor of the Year among Ph.D. institutions, told the Chronicle of Higher Education that he approaches teaching like he does scientific research—by discovering what works and what doesn’t. He has found that formal, abstract presentations don’t work, but engaging demonstrations that involve students do work. For example, he asks students to predict how a cannonball will react in a microwave oven compared to a CD. He then demonstrates the difference in class (the cannonball is so dense that nothing happens, but sparks fly from the CD). In 2001 he won the Nobel Prize for physics. I watched his Nobel lecture (http://nobelprize.org/physics/laureates/2001/wieman-lecture.html), which he began by noting the challenge of explaining his research to an audience that ranged from Nobel physicists to his mother. His down-to-earth delivery supplemented by clarifying PowerPoint slides shows why he is a winning teacher.

Good teaching has many faces. One recent winner was described as preacher-like with a dramatic flair. Another was more soft-spoken with an oddball sense of humor. A third had a conversational teaching style. Trying to spell out the best way to teach is like trying to spell out the best way to sing. It can’t be done.

Of the 57 Professors of the Year awarded so far in the program’s 24-year history, English has claimed the most, at 8, biology has won 7, philosophy, 6, physics, 5, chemistry and fine arts, 4 each; computer science, history, languages, and psychology, 3 each; anthropology, economics, engineering, political science, and math, 2 each, and nursing, 1. The yet-to-win list includes communications, education, geography, geology, linguistics, sociology, statistics, and the business fields of accounting, finance, management, and marketing.

Men have won 37 of the 57 awards, including all those in physics (6), chemistry (4), history (3), anthropology (2), and political science (2). Women have picked up the awards in economics (2) and in math (2). Not surprisingly, more than three quarters of awards (44 of 57) went to full professors, including all awards after 2001. But thirteen winners, eight women and five men, were less than full professors at the time. What has since happened to this group of early achievers? One woman moved from associate professor at one college to endowed professor at a university. Six other women moved up at least one rank at their own institutions and three of the six became department or program heads. It’s unclear whether the eighth woman was promoted at her community college, but she has since been appointed program head. So all eight women moved up. The men didn’t fare as well. Only one of the five has since been promoted and none has become a department or program head.

TEACHING AWARDS FOR GRADUATE STUDENT

The Teaching Econ online discussion list had a thread recently about teaching awards. Someone wrote they had heard of new job market candidates being warned not to list any teaching awards on their CVs so as not to signal an interest in teaching that might detract from a research focus. I heard as much years ago. Is there any truth to this, or is it a recycled folktale? Are some job candidates suppressing their teaching laurels to improve their market prospects?

To get some answers, I reviewed all online CVs offered by job candidates from a sample of 32 departments (a master list of CVs by economics department can be found at http://www.nber.org/candidates). At least one job candidate in each of 24 departments listed at least one teaching award. Northwestern had the most, both in the number of CVs listing teaching awards, 10, and in the proportion of CVs listing awards, 42%. Next was Stanford with six CVs listing awards, or 33% of Stanford’s CVs. Illinois had four, or 22%. MIT had three, or 11%. At two each were UC-Santa Barbara (33%), Minnesota (12%), UCLA (11%), Harvard (8%), and Columbia (8%). These 24 departments averaged 14 candidates in the market and an average of two CVs listing awards.

Of course, even if some job candidates list teaching awards, some others from these same departments could still be suppressing such information. Another way to get at this possibility is to identify a winner independent of the CV (such as through a department or university announcement), then check with the winner’s CV to see if that award is listed. In those cases where I could learn of an award independent of the CV, I found the award listed on the winner’s CV.

The eight departments with no CVs listing awards averaged only five CVs in the market, and most departments had four or fewer. Were awards suppressed on CVs in these departments, or were there simply no teaching awards available? I reviewed department and university material for these eight departments, but found no evidence that any offers teaching awards to graduate students.

We would expect job candidates to list their teaching experience, and they do, but many non-winners seem to be making the most of their teaching credentials by listing teaching evaluation data, responsibilities for training or coordinating TAs, and even nominations for teaching awards (as the Oscar crowd crows, simply being nominated is an honor).

I am now more skeptical that job candidates underplay evidence of good teaching. The job market for most is so competitive and intimidating that applicants seem to be listing every scrap of evidence that might boost their employment prospects.

With most departments offering graduate students a chance at some kind of teaching award, departments without such laurels may be depriving their job candidates of a useful signal. Teaching awards also carry other benefits, such as creating a positive reason to (1) observe graduate students who are teaching (2) ask students to evaluate the teaching performance of graduate students. Incidentally, a teaching award seems to have more cachet if it has a name, such as the Demarest at Illinois, Howard at UCLA, Wueller at Columbia, or Saunders at Indiana (named after teaching legend Phil Saunders).

DID ECONOMISTS GIVE MORE TO DEMOCRATS IN 2004?

Surveys suggest that college teachers are more likely to be registered as Democrats than as Republicans, and are more likely to contribute to Democratic candidates. For example, the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics (http://www.opensecrets.org/) reports that employees from the University of California System and from Harvard were the top two contributors to John Kerry’s campaign in 2004 (followed by Time Warner, Goldman Sachs and Citigroup). Those university workers gave about 19 times more to John Kerry than to George Bush.

Does this matter? Mark Bauerlein, a professor of English at Emory University and research director at the National Endowment for the Arts argued recently that “Any political position that dominates an institution without dissent deteriorates into smugness, complacency and blandness…Groupthink is an anti-intellectual condition” (The Chronicle of Higher Education, 11/12/04).

What’s the record of campaign contributions among economists? To identify patterns, I used the online search engine at http://www.fundrace.org/neighbors.php, which reports contributions to presidential candidates or national parties between January 1, 2004 and October 13, 2004. Let’s look at some academic economists, beginning with Harvard. Five of the 56 economics department members made contributions in 2004, reflecting a participation rate of 9%. Four gave a total of $4,700 to Democrats and one gave $1,500 to Republicans. So the number of contributors favored Democrats 4-to-1, and total contributions favored Democrats 3-to-1. This 3-to-1 ratio, which also holds just for Kerry-versus-Bush contributions, is well below the 19-to-1 ratio reported for Harvard employees more generally.

How about the California University System? Focusing on just one campus, such as Berkeley, is more manageable than working through the ten campuses in the system (though Berkeley is arguably among the most liberal of campuses). Sixteen of the 60 Berkeley economics department members made contributions in 2004, for a participation rate of 27%. All $73,285 went to Democrats. Without Republican contributions, ratios make no sense. Not only is Berkeley’s participation rate triple that of Harvard’s, so is its average contribution.

What about contributions by those in a more market-oriented department, such as the University of Chicago? A search shows that only one of Chicago’s 28 department members contributed in 2004, giving $2,000 to Democrats. This participation rate of 4% was less than half of Harvard’s and one seventh of Berkeley’s. Incidentally, all contributions from Berkeley, Harvard, and Chicago came from full professors.

Let’s look at contributions from some other influential economists. As of December 2004, I counted 20 living presidents of the American Economic Association. Six of these, or 30%, gave to presidential candidates or national parties in 2004. Four contributed a total of $3,400 to Democrats, and two contributed a total of $3,500 to Republicans. Democrats had twice the contributors, but Republicans held a slight edge in total contributions.

As of December 2004, there were 26 living American Nobel Laureates in economics. Five of these, or 19%, contributed in 2004. Four gave a total of $6,200 to Democrats in 2004, while one gave $2,000 to Republicans. So Democrats benefited 4-to-1 in contributors and about 3-to-1 in contributions.

How about contributions from the 55-member American Economic Review editorial board? Three, including the Editor, contributed a total of $3,300 to Democrats. None contributed to Republicans. Thus, the participation rate was about 5%.

Among the 25 living John Bates Clark Medal winners (awarded every other year to the best American economist under the age of forty), eight, or 32%, contributed a total of $12,700 in 2004. Five gave a total of $7,650 to Democrats, and three gave a total of $5,050 to Republicans. Democrats had two thirds more contributors and got about half again more in total contributions.

Among the elite groups of economists examined here, Clark Medal winners had the highest participation rate, at 32%, and were most balanced between parties in total contributors. In total contributions, AEA presidents were the most balanced.

Finally, let’s consider contributions from some award-winning teachers regardless of discipline. Among the 57 Professors of the Year discussed in the opening section, a chemist, a historian, and a professor of public and environmental affairs gave a total of $1,300 to Democrats in 2004. None contributed to Republicans. Again, this was about a 5% participation rate. Among annual winners of the University of Connecticut’s Excellence in Teaching Award over the last 40 years, a psychologist contributed $1,062 to Democrats in 2004 and a mathematician contributed $315 to Republicans. This, too, was about a 5% participation rate. By way of comparison, among all UConn faculty living in Connecticut within a 30-mile radius of the main campus (that’s one way the search engine works), I found that 43 faculty members contributed a total of $17,174 in 2004, for a participation rate of about 4% (none came from economists). Forty-two of the 43 gave to Democrats, and the other contributor gave $2,000 to Republicans. UConn’s award-winning teachers reflect a similar participation rate in 2004 as Professors of the Year and as UConn faculty as a whole, but the political split among UConn’s winning teachers was more balanced than it was among the other two groups.

THE GRAPEVINE

Cell phones have become such an annoyance in the classroom that more instructors are restricting use. To see how economists are addressing the problem, I surveyed 60 online syllabi that address cell phone use in class. Here are the restrictions I found, beginning with the loosest: 1) students shouldn’t initiate calls, and must take any calls in the hallway; 2) phones must be set on vibrate mode, with any calls taken in the hall; 3) vibrate mode only and emergency calls only; 4) a student expecting an important call must clear it with the instructor before class; 5) all cell phones, pagers, and PDAs must be shut off (as Jeff Bauer of the University of Cincinnati puts it: “Consider this class to be a call-free, beep-free, vibrate mode-free zone of silence”); and 6) a ringing phone will cost you dearly. For example, Teresa Riley of Youngstown State warns: “If your cell phone rings during class, I will subtract 5 points from your final grade for each time that it rings.” Some policies aim to elicit the cooperation of other students in enforcing restrictions. For example, Glen Waddell at the University of Oregon notes: “I reserve the right to award points to students assisting me in the control of cell phone usage during lectures.” And Burcin Unel of the University of Florida threatens: “If I hear a cell phone ring during class, there will be a pop-quiz given. These quizzes will be in addition to the pop-quizzes I give during the semester.” Nothing like a little peer pressure. So far, few syllabi mention text messaging, though that appears to be a growing distraction. According to one college freshman quoted recently in The New York Times, “Everybody does it in class” (1/9/05).

While exploring cell phone policies, I noticed that a surprising number of syllabi no longer list an office phone number or other contact number. Instructors seem to be steering students toward email. But at the other extreme, one instructor lists his cell number on the syllabus. The course in question was principles of microeconomics taught last fall by Don Rudow, a graduate student at the University of Georgia. I asked him how this policy has worked out. He said he received more calls after providing his cell number, but the semester total was still only about one to two calls per 10 students. Most come a day or two before an exam. Students still communicate more by email because they know he won’t answer his cell phone if doing research or otherwise engaged. He says providing his cell number makes him feel less guilty if he has to miss office hours. He will continue to provide his cell number in the spring semester, when he teaches 300 students.

Dennis Coates of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and three colleagues examined learning differences between online and face-to-face instruction in college level principles of economics courses. In a simple framework, they find face-to-face sections averaged 3 to 6 more correct answers (out of 33 possible questions) on the Test of Understanding College Economics (TUCE) than did online sections. This difference is statistically significant. But they conclude this result is biased because of the self-selection of students into online and face-to-face sections (poorer students tend to choose the online course). After employing an “endogenous switching model,” the authors find that students who select online classes perform better than they would have, other things constant, in a face-to-face class. Results are reported in “‘No Significant Distance’ Between Face-to-Face and Online Instruction,” Economics of Education Review (October 2004): 533-46.

Does financial aid affect college retention? Larry Singell of the University of Oregon considered the impact of financial aid on student retention after accounting for student characteristics and unobserved attributes. Overall, his findings suggest that increasing reliance on merit-based aid by governments and universities versus aid based on need has lowered the relative graduation rates of needy students. These results are reported in “Come and Stay a While: Does Financial Aid Effect Retention Conditioned on Enrollment at a Large Public University?” Economics of Education Review (October 2004): 459-71.

ODDS AND ENDS

On December 5, 2004, Gary Becker and Richard Posner introduced their new blog (http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/index.html). Every Monday one of them opens a topic and the other responds. Follow-up comments appear later in the week. Issues discussed so far include tort reform, pharmaceutical patents, global warming, and student loans. About the same time the new blog was announced, Professor Becker gave up his monthly Business Week column—a sign of the times, migrating from hard copy to the Web.

Years ago, toward the end of a two-hour final exam, by which time most students had already finished, campus police told me they needed to talk to a student still taking the exam. I asked if the matter could wait, but they insisted it was an emergency and would say no more. The student spent five minutes with them in the hallway and returned to the exam. Later she told me that the encounter had upset her so (she was accused of theft by her roommate) that she wanted to retake the exam. At UConn only the dean can authorize a make up of a final exam. She received authorization and took another exam, doing about the same. In retrospect, I don’t think the matter was an emergency. But the police were also in a bind; they could not reveal the facts of the case without violating the student’s right to privacy. Still, I thought the police could have waited the fifteen minutes for the exam to end.

What economist has had the most impact on an economy since, say, 1990? Alan Greenspan is one possibility. My nomination is Manmohan Singh. In 1991, when Singh became India’s finance minister, the government deficit had reached 8.5% of GDP (twice the current U.S. level). A current account deficit nearing 3.5 % of GDP left only two weeks of foreign exchange reserves on hand. At this time of crisis, Singh addressed the parliament. Quoting Victor Hugo, he said, “No power on earth can stop an idea whose time has come.” Manmohan’s reforms encouraged competition, rationalized and simplified the tax system, and made risk-taking more attractive. India’s economy turned into one of the world’s fastest growers, at 6 percent per year. In May 2004 Singh was sworn in as India’s Prime Minister and is widely regarded as the most honest politician in the country.

Last spring Harvard University released the first comprehensive report on its curriculum since 1978. A notable finding was that undergraduates needed more direct contact with faculty members, especially through small classes and seminars. The policy recommendation is that “the faculty should grow significantly in size” over the next decade (http://www.fas.harvard.edu/curriculum-review/report.html). But that won’t help much if senior faculty avoid teaching undergraduates.

How often does one have the opportunity to critique a Nobel Prize winner’s delivery? Videotapes of Nobel lectures in economics since 2000 are available online at http://nobelprize.org/economics. The best deliveries are by those who use some visual aids. For example, Daniel Kahneman and Vernon Smith offer contrasting styles in 2002. Although both more or less read their lectures, Kahneman’s use of slides brightened his presentation and broke up the monotony of his reading. Smith was so tied to his text that he didn’t seem to be thinking that much (for example, he mispronounced words he would be unlikely to mispronounce in a normal conversation). As Peggy Noonan says, “A speech should be a text in which, ultimately, the speaker and the audience are thinking, together.” In the 2004 deliveries in December, my nod goes to Finn Kyland, despite too many “aah”s, because his use of a laptop forced him from time to time to depart from his text. Edward Prescott, on the other hand, pretty much stuck to his script, and I thought he was the worse for it. See for yourself.

“Tell me and I forget, teach me and I remember, involve me and I learn.” Ben Franklin

“Learning from a teacher who has stopped learning is like drinking from a stagnant pool.” --Indonesian proverb.

“That is what learning is. You suddenly understand something you have understood your whole life, but in a new way.” --Novelist Doris Lessing

 Return to Contents of Issue 28, Fall 2005