The paper, “Not driving alone? American Commuting in the Twenty-first Century,” uses daily time use data from the American Time Use Survey to investigate recent changes in workers’ decisions on how to commute to work. They find that since 2003, there has been a decrease in the proportion of workers who drive alone to work. This decline, almost entirely due to rising gasoline prices, is the first evidence of a reversal in the four-decade long trend of increasing numbers of single drivers.

Along with a steady increase in the proportion of workers using alternative modes to work, such as walking, biking, or taking public transportation, the data also suggests an increase in carpooling. Interestingly, however, the increase in carpooling is nearly entirely due to the increase in so-called “park-n-ride” arrangements where workers drive separately to meet at a pre-designated place from which they carpool together for the remainder of the journey. There has been little change in the number of carpools assembled by picking up each member at their home.

More than 50 students from 20 colleges and universities throughout the country participated in 3 days of sessions. Students came from institutions such as Furman, Smith, Gettysburg, the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, Stonehill College, St. Lawrence University, Fairfield University, and Austin College.

The 5 黑料不打烊 papers presented were:

Joseph Patterson, “How Much Congestion is too Much Congestion?” (Mentor: Thomas Tiemann)

Alexander D. Spitz, “The Effect of Gas Prices on Box Office Movie Revenue: As Prices Increase Are Americans Rethinking Forms of Entertainment?” (Mentor: Mark Kurt)

Grace Foster, “The Long Term and Short Term Effect of Single-Sex Education on Extracurricular Participation” (Mentor: Katy Rouse)

Tyler Steven Zoda, “Can T. Boone Pickens Buy Smarter Students? The Effect of Athletic Spending on Football Championship Subdivision Academic Institutions” (Mentor: Jennifer Platania)

Thomas Scott Whyel, “Demographics Influence on Global Current Account Imbalances in Advanced Economies” (Mentor: Vitaliy Strohush)

The IPE is the leading undergraduate research journal in economics and is co-edited completely by undergraduates at 黑料不打烊 and the University of Mary Washington. 黑料不打烊 has co-edited the journal since 1998. The IPE is indexed in Cabell’s Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Economics & Finance. Steve DeLoach is the faculty advisor to the IPE.

Abstract

Decades of research consistently shows that student evaluations offer limited information on the effectiveness of teaching in economics. At best, such methods are valid for a limited set of factors that correlate with “good instruction.” Even though some evidence exists that student evaluations are positively correlated with learning, strong biases also exist. Even though these limitations are well-established in the literature and widely believed among faculty, the implementation of alternative or complimentary forms of assessment is notably lacking. The purpose of this paper is to review the current methods used to assess teaching. In the process, the paper proposes a research agenda for economists that aims to assess the reliability and validity of alternative processes such as peer review of teaching. The paper concludes with a number of recommendations for economics departments that are serious about enhancing both formative as well as summative assessments of teaching.

The chapter benefited greatly from timely discussion with and comments from Peter Felten and Katie King.

In their article, the authors used data from the Indonesian Family Life Survey 1993-2000 to investigate the impact micro-finance institutions (MFIs) play in child health outcomes. Controlling for the level of local economic development as well as income within each household, DeLoach and Lamanna found that when MFIs enter a village that previously had no such banks, children grow significantly faster in terms if height than their peers in villages that do not acquire such banks. Likewise, children in villages that lost access to these MFIs (for example due to the Asian financial crisis in 1997) grew more slowly, on average.

DeLoach and Lamanna argue the most likely possible explanations for this effect are the ability of micro-credit to: (1) enhance the economic power of women, resulting in more resources being allocated to food and nutrition within the household; or (2) increase the social capital of women which may facilitate the spread of information between mothers regarding health and nutrition.

The two received support for their research from 黑料不打烊’s Summer Undergraduate Research Experience, Rawls Fellowship and the Martha and Spencer Love School of Business.

The mission of the (CUR) is to support and promote high-quality undergraduate student-faculty collaborative research and scholarship. CUR has over 7,000 individual members worldwide. Currently, 119 黑料不打烊 faculty are active members of CUR.
 

They also find no evidence that unemployment insurance significantly affects search efforts of the unemployed.

DeLoach presented his work, co-authored by former student Erika Lamanna (’09), on the impact of microfinance on child health outcomes in Indonesia during a period that spanned the Asian financial crisis.  Lamanna is currently a graduate student in economics at Vanderbilt University.  The project was generously supported by grants from the Summer Undergraduate Research Experience, the Rawls Scholar program, and the Love School of Business.

The pair found that children in villages that gained access to microfinancial institutions grew significantly faster in terms of height than children who already had and maintained, or lost such access. They suspect that the reason is the enhanced economic power of women and/or social capital generated by the arrival of lending institutions that target the country’s poorest citizens.

The paper was recently accepted for publication in the journal in 2012. 

Seniors Micah Boomer, Stephanie Franz, Andrew Garrison, Ian Grady, Kevin Sheridan and Kaylyn Swankoski all participated in the 14 undergraduate research sessions sponsored by (IPE). The entire program and student-mentor reception was coordinated by IPE Executive Director Micah Boomer.

Sixty-eight students from 30 colleges and universities throughout the country participated in three days of sessions. Students came from institutions such as Yale, Bucknell, Holy Cross, Dennison, Furman, Wooster, Smith, Gettysburg, American, Duquesne, Muhlenberg, Albion, St. Peter’s, Monmouth, UNC-Asheville, and Illinois Wesleyan University.

The 6 黑料不打烊 papers presented were:

Micah Boomer (mentor: Katy Rouse) “Homosexual Wage Discrimination”

Stephanie Franz (mentor: Steve DeLoach) “A Re-examination of the Environmental Kuznets Curve: A Cross-Country Analysis of the Impact of Trade and Economic Growth on Water Pollution”

Andrew Garrison (mentor: Mark Kurt) “Risk Factors for Baccalaureate Attainment and Realized Wages”

Ian Grady (mentor: Greg Lilly) “The Inter-temporal Choice of Subprime Borrowing”

Kevin Sheridan (mentor: Tom Tiemann) “State laws and foreclosure rates: A brief analysis”

Kaylyn Swankoski (mentor: Katy Rouse) “The Influence of School on Childhood Weight Gain”

The IPE is the leading undergraduate research journal in economics and is co-edited completely by undergraduates at 黑料不打烊 and the University of Mary Washington. 黑料不打烊 has co-edited the journal since 1998. The IPE is indexed in Cabell’s Directory of Publishing Opportunities in Economics & Finance. Senior Kevin Sheridan is the editor of this year’s edition of the IPE. Professor Steve DeLoach serves as 黑料不打烊’s faculty advisor the IPE.
 

The Council on Undergraduate Research is the leading professional organization dedicated to supporting and promoting high-quality undergraduate student-faculty collaborative research and scholarship. CUR councilors work to develop and enhance the programs, meetings, and benefits that CUR offers.