Economic Foundations of Education Policy

Catalog description

This course is designed for undergraduate students interested in understanding the economic dimensions of education. Students will be shown how to apply economic models to fundamental questions of education policy. Concepts and principles such as returns to education, education production function, market failure in education, signaling model of education, and externalities of education will be introduced with a specific eye towards the application of those concepts to real world education policy issues. The concepts and methods of analysis addressed in this class would enable you to assess the validity of the arguments put forth by economists and education policy makers in various situations and hopefully make you a more discerning consumer of news and education policy topics. The main goals of the course are to (1) introduce students to the theoretical frameworks and empirical methods used by economists to understand and analyze core questions and problems in education; and (2) To teach students how to apply economic concepts, modes of analysis, and methods to analyze real-world education policy issues affecting the United States.