Faculty achievement

Economics Faculty Recognized for Excellence in Teaching

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The Provost’s office at the University of Connecticut regularly recognizes faculty members with excellent teaching evaluations commending them as achieving “excellence in teaching”.

A number of faculty members in the economics department have received this recognition in the past year:  Professors Talia Bar, Ken Couch, Delia Furtado, Paul Hallwood, Olivier Morand, Susan Randolph, Kathy Segerson, Mikhael Shor, Owen Svalestad, and Jackie Zhao.

Congratulations to these economics faculty for their important contributions to the educational mission of UConn!

Professor Ahking Publishes in the Journal of Economic and Social Measurement

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JEMProf. Ahking’s paper “Measuring U.S. business cycles: A comparison of two methods and two indicators of economic activities” has been published by the Journal of Economic and Social Measurement, vol. 39, no. 4, pp. 199-216, 2015.

The paper compares the performance of two economic time series in capturing the U.S. business cycle turning points using two statistical methods.

Professor Hallwood Wins Outstanding Researcher Award

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hallwoodProfessor Paul Hallwood last week was awarded the Outstanding Researcher award by the Avery Point Director, Professor Marty Wood.  The prize is awarded annually to faculty including the science departments.

The citations mentioned that Professor Hallwood is the author of 10 books and about 70 papers in refereed journals, and that he is active in applied work – notably in redesigning a tax system for the Scottish government and earlier as an economic advisor to the Government of Saudi Arabia.

Prof. Naknoi has paper accepted by JME

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JMEProf. Naknoi and co-author YiLi Chien (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis) have their paper “The Risk Premium and Long-Run Global Imbalances” accepted for publication in the Journal of Monetary Economics. The paper examines the sustainability of U.S. trade deficits, given the assumption that U.S. investors take on more aggregate risk than foreign investors. It predicts that half of US trade deficits is sustainable. A copy of the working paper is available for download from RePEc.

 

Prof. Kathleen Segerson Honored by UConn Alumni Association

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segersonKathleen Segerson, Philip E. Austin Professor of Economics, has been awarded the 2013 University of Connecticut Distinguished Professor Award. 

The UConn Alumni Association established the Distinguished Professor award in 1976 for “an excellent teacher as well as an individual of international reputation whose scholarship reflects substantial credit to the University of Connecticut – a renaissance person.” 

Kathleen Segerson, an environmental economist, earned her bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Dartmouth and her doctorate in agricultural and resource economics from Cornell. She studies the incentive effects of alternative environmental policy instruments, including applications in groundwater contamination, hazardous waste management, land use regulation, and climate change. She’s also taken part in projects related to ecosystem services and to marine species protection.

Fellowships include the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, of which she has served as president and vice president, and the American Agricultural Economics Association. Kathleen is a member of the Board on Agriculture and Natural Resources of the National Academy of Sciences and a handling editor for the journal Conservation Biology.

She was co-editor and associate editor of the American Journal of Agricultural Economics and an associate editor of the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management. Past service also includes the Chartered Board of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Science Advisory Board and several advisory committees for the National Research Council and the National Science Foundation.

Dr. Segerson will be honored at the Alumni Association Awards Celebration on Friday, October 11, 2013 at the UConn Storrs Campus, and the following day at the UConn Homecoming Game at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Connecticut.

Professor Prakash in the Media

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The London School of Economics has cited Professor Prakash’s paper on education and incentives in Bihar in their blog. The paper, titled “Education Policies and Practices: What Have We Learnt and the Road Ahead for Bihar,” has also been covered by Ideas for India, which Professor Prakash was invited to join earlier this year.

Professor Prakash has also published a non-technical summary of his paper “The Redistributive Effects of Political Reservation for Minorities: Evidence from India” in VOX. VOX is a policy portal that aims to promote research-based policy analysis and commentary by leading scholars.

Professor Nishith Prakash has been invited to Growth Week 2012, a three day conference held by the International Growth Centre at the London School of Economics. Professor Prakash spent time at the IGC this summer as an academic visitor. The conference will be held from September 24-26.

Professor Prakash invited to join new India Policy Portal

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International Growth Centre
Professor Nishith Prakash was recently invited to join a newly formed online economics and policy portal for India, funded by the International Growth Centre (IGC). The portal will potentially become the go-to source for ideas and evidence on policy issues in India.  The portal’s goal is to be an ideologically neutral portal for researchers to discuss policies and ideas with a wide audience, and to encourage debate and analysis based on rigorous evidence.

Professor Prakash’s expertise and research in the Indian economy made him a sought after addition to the group. His “Cycling to School” project, which focuses on school attendance in rural India, is also funded by the IGC.

Professor Randolph on SERF index committee

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Professor Susan Randolph and a small group of scholars worked together to create a new SERF index to measure human rights, which has recently generated media coverage. For more information, please see: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Making-a-difference/Change-Agent/2011/0606/A-new-way-to-measure-human-rights-may-revolutionize-global-advocacy . The new index is expected to be used internationally as a barometer for measuring social and economic rights within a country.

Prof. Carstensen named Educator of the Year

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On Thursday, April 28, the Undergraduate Academic Affairs committee of the UConn Undergraduate Student Government hosted its annual banquet to recognize Professional Excellence in Education among staff, advisers, and faculty at the University. The Committee received 26 nominations for the three categories of awards; based on these nominations, the Committee selected Professor of Economics Fred Carsensen as the Academic Educator of the Year. The student nomination cited his innovative and
challenging class on Contemporary Economic Issues: Globalization, and in particular his use of a “real time” textbook, the Financial Times. Students appreciate his discusion of current events, peppering in anecdotes and personal advice along the way. He also offers his students a rare level of academic freedom. This style encourages creativity and imagination, and his
students are always grateful, even if at first intimidated as they are whet they describe as “the audience to an improv
performance.”