As I have mentioned before, one of my students is particularly bright. I am bound by various confidentiality rules to not give identity or say too much, so forgive the lack of details. Many UF athletes speak English in a curious dialect, whether they are foreign-born or home-grown. Although this student does not have a […]
Archive for the 'Education' Category
This article discusses why athletes go broke, and it seems to mirror our standard criticism of education in America generally — as a reason for increased foreclosures and general economic discontent based on perception alone.
On Awkward Utopia, we have recently discussed how robust the results have been from the so-called science of monetarism. I think that as far as it goes, the jury may still be out, though some authors on this blog would concur with the Austrians that the science of monetarism will only be whole once the […]
Breaking up Teachers unions is apparently the main reason behind success in New Orleans’ public education resurgence.
AEA: Understanding School Performance
Published by May 11th, 2008 in Policy and Education. 0 Comments[Note: I started typing this post in January but lost interest in it; so I am pushing it out now.]
From several potentially very interesting sessions on the early morning of the first day of AEA 2008, I picked the “Understanding School Performance” discussion because it related to the UES summer mission of working on a […]
Free Rice - Build Your Vocabulary and Feed the Poor
Published by January 1st, 2008 in Miscellaneous, Education and Healthcare. 0 CommentsOn October 7, 2007, Free Rice was brought into the internet to help feed the poor. It features a vocabulary building game where you match increasingly harder words with their synonyms. For every word you get correct, 20 grains of rice are donated to the UN World Food Programme. The money for the […]
Tolerance is a concept that requires balance. Taken to its extreme, the doctrine of tolerance can encompass any act, no matter how heinous. We don’t want a society that tolerant. Rather, in the United States, we want tolerance of viewpoints, ideas, discussions. Our tolerance doesn’t mean we have to like those viewpoints. It doesn’t even […]
Controversy Regarding “Radical Islam”
Published by December 4th, 2007 in International Affairs, History and Education. 6 CommentsAlthough not strictly an economics issue, or considered to be economics-related, I wanted to post some of the important documents that you may not have read regarding the “Radical Islam” controversy at the University of Florida. You know the basic story: the UF administration has requested that we apologize to the entire campus, not just […]
Meeting Overview 11/06/07
Published by November 9th, 2007 in Miscellaneous, Education and Meeting Records. 4 CommentsThis week’s topic: college loans.
AB: The increasing interest rates will have an impact on the economy because, for example, less people will be able to take low-paying teaching positions, and more people will have to wait before purchasing a home. The cost has far outpaced inflation.
JN: It’s not that big a deal. Sure, it delays […]
Professor Harrison, who is my coach on the International Commercial Arbitration Moot Court team, writes on the Class Bias in Higher Education blog about elitism and its many facets in higher education. It’s an interesting read, sometimes based on anecdotal evidence, sometimes based on research. Yesterday, he wrote about the law schools of all the […]
The Opposition to School Vouchers
Published by November 1st, 2007 in Miscellaneous, Economics, Policy and Education. 4 CommentsA couple days ago, Megan McArdle launched a fusillade against voucher opponents on Asymmetrical Information, a blog now attached to The Atlantic (a real credit to this magazine’s intellectual honesty). She named the best arguments that voucher opponents were coming up with and responded. In sum:
1) Vouchers don’t work
2) Voucher advocates are total […]
This is the first post in a ridiculously pro-market series I am introducing. Robert Nelson wrote a book called Economics as Religion, suggesting that Economics has become a religion (with Chicago as a church and economists as priests). Well, perhaps he was right, and we should bow down to the free market.
So, on to the […]
Florida’s school districts
Published by October 8th, 2007 in Miscellaneous, Economics and Education. 2 CommentsDuring his lecture, Dr. Dewey and a student had the following exchange:
Q: Are spinoff districts a possible solution?
A: Sure, small unfunded districts are probably preferable to large unfunded districts. However, the people in power have an incentive to keep their domains as large as possible.
As a brief follow up on this topic: Florida’s school districts […]
Meeting Overview 09/25/07, Part II
Published by October 5th, 2007 in Policy, Education and Meeting Records. 5 CommentsNow that we’ve seen what the state is hoping to do in the realm of property tax reform, and why, let’s turn our attention to just exactly how these changes will impact the funding of our schools. This past Tuesday, Dr. Dewey took time away from grading tests to speak with me about this problem. […]
Meeting Overview 09/25/07, Part I
Published by September 28th, 2007 in Policy, Education and Meeting Records. 1 CommentThis week, UES welcomed Dr. Dewey of UF’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research to our meeting. He spoke on the topic of Florida’s proposed property tax reforms and their relation to education financing. With his permission and in lieu of our usual meeting minutes, I’ve decided to turn this topic into a pseudo-scholarly project […]
