Course Grades Uploaded

Both in Moodle and in Banner.

Course Grades Posted Later This Afternoon

I am waiting on a student who had a conflict and couldn't take the final quiz the normal way.  I would like to post these all at one time.

Reminder - Final Quiz becomes available at 11 AM tomorrow

And it will run till 11 PM Thursday night.  My intention is to post final grades in Moodle and In Banner on Friday.   I will make another announcement then when it is done.

Grade for Comments Second Half have been uploaded

I will grade the project tomorrow and see if I can get the final quiz into Moodle (making sure it is not invisible).   I will also post the elevator speeches to Moodle tomorrow.  For those of you who have still to submit your elevator speech, I you can get it to me by then.

Thanks.

Grades for Blog Posts - Second Half Now Posted in Moodle

I need to take a break now.  I will get to the grading the comments after that.  I would expect those to be posted by late afternoon or early evening.

Comments Matrix/Moral Hazard with Music Selection

I have just uploaded the Comment Matrix - Second Half into Moodle.  Here I would like to explain what is there.

1.  For each post the alias is credited with a comment if that person made a comment.  Two or more comments don't give any more intensity in the recording.  Neither does a very long comment.  When I get to the qualitative assessment of the comments, which I still must do, it might come into play then.

2.  For the last post I only counted the comment by the author of the post.   I did previously announce this.  One of my broader issues with the class is knowing if an intended message gets through.  Often it seemed it didn't.

3.  There are aggregates, by post and by alias.  Unlike the last time where I did those manually, this time I used formulas in Excel to do the counting.  While mistakes are still possible, surely that makes them less likely.

* * * * *

The virtual elevator speeches have been trickling in.  I launch each one to see whether it will play.  So I get a sense of the music chosen.  In all cases the music appeals to me.  Why is that?  These pieces were supposed to be for students like you who were getting exposed to the subject matter for the first time.  Do you actually listen to classical music and/or jazz?

I won't hold it against you.  I'm just noting it here.  This is another one of those things that didn't happen last year.

Incidentally, another of those things is that the teams actually never chose a name.  They stayed with their letter only.  I wonder if that impacted team performance in any way.

Update on Where I Am with the Grading

There is a lot to track! I've posted the last Excel homework on the Shapiro-Stiglitz model and the last two blog posts.  I am in the process of tracking comments and reading through them (two separate activities).  I am not quite halfway there.  This is going slow, plus my arthritis is acting up doing this (I wonder why) so I need to take regular breaks.

The upshot is that I probably won't have the grades for Blog Posts and Comments Second half till Saturday.  I will let you know that as soon as those are posted.  I will get to the projects immediately after that.  The virtual elevator speeches have been coming in, but some are still pending.

Good luck on your finals.

We seem to have lost Internet at my house

If it doesn't come back on by the morning, I may be slower responding to your posts.  Apologies in advance if that occurs.

Our last class session is Tueday

We will review the blog posts due tomorrow and discuss what students report there.  Following that, I will answer any and all questions students might have about the last quiz and material that might be covered on it.  We will reserve some time at the end for administering the ICES forms.

I observe the following without comment.  Today we had the lowest attendance of the semester.  I believe there were 7 students and because of that  I forced those sitting in the back to come nearer to the front.  Also, among those who were not present, two submitted the Excel homework during the class session and one submitted it after.

I could not get the projector to work today, so much of what I had planned to do went out the window.  I will make a brief video to show some thoughts about the Excel homework - further implications.  However, I am not up to doing that today so I will do it in the morning and post it to the class site when I'm done.

Second Quiz Grades Hidden

Some students alerted me that they couldn't see their grades on the second quiz in the Moodle Gradebook.  So I checked and sure enough, those grades are hidden.  I then spent about a half hour trying to figure out how to unhide those grades, but I couldn't do it.  So I sent a message to tech support (see below).  I apologize for the inconvenience.  I hope the issue is rectified soon.

About Grades

Here are some facts about the course grades to date and also moving forward.  Recall that the course was designed to have 1000 points.  So far 415 points have been allocated and then there was an extra 10 points for that early quiz just to verify that the functionality worked.   I've looked at students performance to date and it is running okay now, so I will not make any adjustment to the grades at this time.  Also note that in spite of prior warnings, I declined to give students penalties for submitting work late.  Treat that as a gift.

There are still 585 points to allocate.  10 of those are on the last Excel homework.  The rest are for the Class Project, worth 150 points, Blog Posts and Comments for the second half,  worth 150 points and 75 points respectively, and the last quiz (the final) which is worth 200 points.

You will note that the points are "rear loaded" which means that while most of the semester is behind us most of the points are still forthcoming.  That is by design.  In class today we'll talk about seniority pay.   The concept is essentially the same here.  In the next paragraph I will  critique the approach as it pertains to grades.

I have tried in the class to separate out giving you feedback, which I think is important for learning, from giving you numerical awarding of scores on your performance, which doesn't help much and can block things especially since you learn by failing and I wanted to encourage that.  But some of you are so wound up to be aware of grades that by being less forthcoming about them I may have hindered your motivation in the class.  The rear loading of points assumes you have the rationality to figure out the rewards possible at the end of the course.  Maybe there needs to be some shifting of points to earlier in the semester just to keep students in a good frame of mind.

Personally, I'd prefer the class just to be pass-fail.  If wishing would make it so.

As to the final, since it is worth a big chunk of points and some of you might otherwise freak out about that, my plan is that between 50% and 75% of the points to come from questions you have already seen on the two quizzes (with the points in the graphs relabelled so you can't simply copy your answers from previously).  There will be some new stuff.   Exactly how much is to be determined.  Also,  the final won't be that much longer than the previous quizzes.  I will just amplify the points per question.

Update to Moodle Gradebook

I have finished the exercise of tracking your performance with the Excel Homework and the Blogging.  I have transferred those results to Moodle.  You will find 4 new grade entries for the Excel homework.  They are:
Insurance under Asymmetric Information
Bargaining
Principal-Agent Model
Bonus - 10 points.

There is still one more Excel homework on the Shapiro-Stiglitz model.  I expect that you will do that when you return from holiday.

I also made entries for 4 blog posts, those the most recent ones, with the last on the Triangle Principal-Agent model.  There is one more blog post on personal reputations, due at the end of the holiday, and then a wrap up post to review the course.

As the quiz is ongoing now and when it closes I will have been asleep for a couple of hours, in the morning I will look at those and see how the class is performing point-wise.  So there may be a message about that tomorrow.  I will also discuss this in class.

Second Quiz

I just uploaded the second quiz into Moodle.  It will be available starting immediately after class tomorrow (12:20 PM) and will go till 11 PM on Wednesday night.

The format is slightly different than the first quiz.  There are two matching questions like before.  Each of those is worth 20 points.  And there are two multiple choice questions.  Each of those are worth 5 points.  This gives a total of 50 points.

Update on Review of Papers

I had some health issues yesterday and only started to look at the papers today. It has been going slowly.  I hope to have them all done by end of day on Tuesday.

Here is a little general reaction on everything I've read so far.  Jargon from the paper under review gets introduced without giving a definition of it in plain English.  I've already encourage one team to produce a glossary as a prior exercise to writing the paper.  Perhaps each team should do that.  Whether you include your glossary as an appendix or just do it for you as a first step in the writing, I leave to your judgment.

The other big deal issue is giving reasons why as you say what the author argues.  The reasons why are the heart of the paper.  Then you illustrate those with examples.

Some people are doing this a bit better than others.  Nobody I've read yet is doing it really well.  Part of the reason why my reviews are taking a while is that I have to determine what sort of feedback will get you to do this reasonably well in the second draft.

Some things I forgot to say in class today

You will note that I teach without notes.  This is an old habit that encourages me to be mindful in what I am saying during the live session.  When I used to teach with notes I would go way too fast for the students.  This helps to regulate the pace.  But my memory isn't what it once was.  So I miss saying things I had planned to say.  Also, sometimes things occur to me only after the session that didn't come to mind during the preparation.

On determinants of risk aversion -

Some diversification happens over time.  You try one venture now.  A few years later you try something else and then again a few years after that.  When you are younger, there are more possible episodes, so a greater chance to diversify these things.  This gives one simple explanation for why younger people maybe tolerate risk more than older people, something we mentioned in class.

Risk attitudes almost surely correlate with personal wealth.  People of modest means typically can't diversify their wealth, which may be tied up entirely in just a few assets (home, car, perhaps one bank account).  Wealthier people can have a more balanced portfolio and thereby make themselves immune from idiosyncratic financial risk.

On economic forecasting - 

Don't say I didn't warn you.

The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable. - John Kenneth Galbraith at BrainyQuote via kwout

On the class project - 

There are currently two posts on the class site that give instructions about how to proceed.
This one gives information on structure and formatting.
And this one gives information about timing and process.

Also let me say that co-authors argue and that arguing is a good thing.  That doesn't mean being rude or intolerant.  It means offering up your view based on your current understanding of what is going on.  Disagreement in this setting can happen and when it does it is a good thing.  It means there is a tension that needs to be resolved.  Coming to a resolution in a reasoned way is a way to learn.

However, sometimes the learning gets cut short because there are deadlines to be met.  That's how it goes.  Dealing with deadlines is an important life skill.

Finally on Econ in the News - 

I normally would not link to a piece like this because it has a bit of a political angle and I am trying to keep national politics outside our course.  However, in the section that discusses the work of Jason Furman, there is mention of monopsony in the labor market.  As we mentioned that in class while reviewing the Excel homework with transfer pricing, I thought it worth noting here.

Grades Updated - Including Blog Posts First Half

I am sorry this took so long to do, but it is now done.  Let me explain where we are:

1.  The Excel Homework scores are now all correct.  There were a maximum of 40 possible points here for the tutorial, efficiency and equity concepts, strategic approach to efficiency, and coordination mechanisms.  Each submitted homework gives 10 points.

2.  For the quiz that was just to try out Moodle quizzes, for everyone who did them I gave the full 10 points, even if you got something wrong.   The content was not relevant to the course, so I rewarded doing it.

3.  The actual quiz was auto graded in Moodle.  That had a 50 points max.

4.  The last thing I did, which took quite a while, was to assign points for the blog posts and to give comments on how to improve your blogging in the second half.   There were 150 points max.  Nobody got all the points but I believe I was pretty generous overall.  The average was not quite 125 points.  In coming up with this I relied more on getting the work in regularly (or not) than on the quality of what you posted.  Truthfully, it is too early to grade your on quality.  You are still getting your feet wet with the blogging.  Post quality will matter more in the second half allocation of points.

Do note that this.  In the second half I will not accept any posts that I do not see by Sunday evening at 6 PM, unless the student has contacted me ahead of time to explain some issue of why the post is late.  As I said in class yesterday, it is just too hard for me to track the late posts and keep up with the class.  I hope with this to encourage everyone to get their posts in on time.

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The upshot is that 240 real points have been allocated and then 10 points more for that one little quiz in Moodle to test out the functionality.  So that is almost one quarter of the points in the course.  Based on that you should be able to track how you are doing.  I know you care about grades, a lot.  Though I am definitely not as wise as King Solomon, my hope with this approach is to encourage all students to put in their best effort in the second half.

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Now let me conclude with an ethical dilemma, which is about comments on the blogs and what it says about that in the syllabus.  Some of you have done that with some energy.  Others have not done it at all.  I am not sure why.  What I'd like to encourage is that people do comment with energy for the rest of the class.  So for the time being, I have not assigned these grades.  (It says 75 points in the grade book.)

If I graded by the book the people who haven't commented at all would get zero, meaning they'd really get slammed.  I see little good in that.  However, I don't want to ignore the effort of those students who have been commenting in earnest.

So I've been thinking about giving every student some base level of points, B, and then awarding the remaining 75 - B points on a performance basis.  Doing this is NOT IN THE SYLLABUS.  So it should be considered by the class.

I do want to point out that I don't grade on a curve.  Your own grade is not impacted up or down by the performance of your classmates.  I hope you understand that as you consider this alternative approach to grading the comments for the first half.

I made a small error in the grade upload to Moodle

This is why I hate clerical work.

In uploading the scores for the Excel Homework on Coordination, I mistakenly called the homework by a name for a previous assignment.  So the Excel grades need to to be changed to have the right entries in the proper columns.  Once that is sorted out, I will get to work on assigning scores for the first half blog posts.  That will almost surely be tomorrow rather than later this evening.

I apologize for the delay.

Please look at this before you start the next Excel homework

Each of these should be reviewed before doing the next Excel homework, which assumes that such a review has been performed.  They should be familiar already, based on what you've been exposed to in Econ 202 and 203. There may be some new stuff on risk preference. I'd be curious to learn what is old hat and what is new for you. Note that there is a bit of overlap between each of these. Nonetheless, I strongly encourage you to review them all, so you have a firm understanding of the fundamentals. The second one emphasizes an algebraic approach. The third, a graphical approach. You should be familiar with both.

Notes on the Math and Philosophy of Probability  (This is a pdf file.)  There is a slight error in this - a line I attributed to Keynes actually comes from Mark Twain.  Otherwise, it is pretty basic stuff.

Increasing Risk and Risk Aversion (This a video in YouTube.  You can find a link to the PowerPoint file on which it is based in the description of the video.)

Expected Utility and Jensen's Inequality (This a video in YouTube.  You can find a link to the PowerPoint file on which it is based in the description of the video.)

You should be able to get through all of this in under 45 minutes.  Of course, the less familiar it is to you, the longer it will take to get a good understanding.

To do list

This is meant to assist you in organizing your own efforts for the course.  These are ordered by importance/immediacy. Also note that there is no Excel homework for next week, in part to help you accomplish the third and fourth items.

1.  Take the Quiz in Moodle. It is available now.

2.  Write the blog post due tomorrow evening.

3.  Read the paper your project team was assigned.  This may be a challenge.  These papers are for the most part not intended for an undergraduate audience.  So if you have questions on what you are reading write those down.  (In other words, take notes.)  This will be a readying activity for you to meet with your team members and discuss the paper.

4.  There is some online presentation/lecture material on our next topic.  It will be available on Monday.  I expect it to take you under an hour to review.  Some of it is on content in Econ 202.  Some of it is on risk preference, which you may have not seen before.  Please do go through it in advance of the Excel homework due a week from Wednesday.

Reminders

1.  In Moodle - Experiment with Quiz Function.  This closes tomorrow before class.  It will take you all of one minute to do and will give you 10 points of course credit (the same as an Excel homework).   The purpose is so you are familiar with this functionality before doing the real quiz.  In particular, you should be able to see how you did, once the quiz closes.

2.  The Excel homework on Coordination, which had been due last Wednesday is now due this Wednesday.  Please get it done.   It has important stuff in it.  Use cell references for computing formulas.  That will save you a lot of trouble.  

3.  The actual quiz will be made available in Moodle immediately after class on Thursday and run through 6 PM on Friday.  I estimate it will take you about 20 minutes.  You might want to set aside more time than that so you don't feel rushed doing it.  It is worth 50 points.