The Beginner’s Econometrics Workbook

Author

Colleen O’Briant

Published

May 4, 2023

Introduction

Welcome! This workbook is designed for undergraduates taking their first Econometrics course. In this course, you will:

  • Develop your understanding of probability and statistics,
  • Learn how to create elegant solutions to complicated problems having to do with data analytics using R, and
  • Explore the versatility of linear models and the method of least-squares.

By mastering these skills, you will gain a deeper understanding of the kinds of applied research typically conducted by Economists. Moreover, I’m hoping that this class will spark your interest and motivate you to start your own research projects!

The rest of this page summarizes the course policies for my Fall 2023 EC320 class.

Flipping the Class

This class will follow a flipped model. First, you’ll familiarize yourself with new concepts through readings and homework. During class, rather than lecturing, I will allocate the entire time for you to work in small groups, diving deeper into the topics with classwork problems. You will submit the week’s classwork by 5pm on Fridays. Over the weekend, you have two responsibilities:

  1. Peer review your classmates’ classwork. This process should prompt you to closely examine answer keys and better prepare for exams.
  2. Take a brief online multiple-choice practice exam to further reinforce your understanding and get you ready for the exams.

Groups

This is how the groups will be assigned:

  • Group set 1 for Classworks 1-5: Initial random groups
  • Group set 2 for Classworks 6-10: We’ll shuffle the groups randomly once more for a fresh perspective
  • Group set 3 for Classworks 11-17: You’ll have the opportunity to request your group-mates

Note that you’ll be randomized into groups and you’ll keep those groups for a couple of weeks at a time, so you’ll want to prioritize keeping the group atmosphere respectful and harmonious. Disagreements are bound to happen, but it’s never a good idea to put someone down or be dismissive just because you don’t see eye-to-eye. Stay patient, positive, and open-minded and you may even find that you enjoy this style of learning!

Attendance and Participation

Attendance is crucial in a flipped class like this, so while I understand that life happens, please note that absences will impact your grade. If you anticipate needing to be absent for a significant portion of this course, this class will definitely not be a good fit for you. Exceptions of course include absences because of religious observances.

This is the way that absences impact your grade: at the end of each group phase, you’ll rate your groupmates’ participation. For each groupmate, you will answer these three questions:

Question 1) How often did your groupmate attend classes since you’ve been grouped together?

  1. They attended all classes.

  2. They missed one or two classes but informed us and compensated for their absences by either contributing remotely or taking on extra responsibility later.

  3. They missed one or two classes and did not adequately compensate for those absences.

  4. They missed three or more classes.

Question 2) How often was your groupmate prepared for class?

  1. Always: They consistently demonstrated that they had thoroughly and thoughtfully completed the homework and were ready to contribute meaningfully.

  2. Often: They seemed ready about 75% of the time.

  3. Sometimes: They appeared ready roughly 50% of the time.

  4. Rarely or never: They mostly seemed unprepared to make any meaningful contributions, or they missed a significant number of classes.

Question 3) What was your experience like working with your groupmate?

  1. Always pleasant: My groupmate was always engaged, open-minded, cooperative, and receptive to different points of view.

  2. Usually pleasant: My groupmate had a few lapses in engagement or cooperation, but overall it was a positive working experience.

  3. Sometimes pleasant: We had occasional challenges and it was a neutral overall experience.

  4. Difficult to work with: Frequent absences or multiple instances of dismissive, condescending, or disrespectful behavior. (If you witness such behavior, please inform me immediately!)

Each a) you receive counts as 3 points, each b) is 2 points, each c) is 1 point, and each d) is 0 points. I’ll take the median of your score from all your groupmates and that will determine your participation grade, which counts for 10% of your final grade. I will only post participation scores after week 6 (after shuffling groups into the final group set), and then also after week 10 (at the end of the course).

Note: if you are frequently absent, not only will you be making life difficult for your groupmates, but you should also expect to score low on all these questions, which will have the effect of lowering your final grade by up to one letter grade.

Lab

We technically schedule an online lab every Wednesday at 4pm. However, due to our class’s flipped format, I’ve found it more beneficial to use this time as an additional Zoom office hour. Rest assured, the regular class sessions provide ample active learning opportunities that effectively replace what a traditional lab would offer.

Office Hours

The way I like to do office hours is this: as I’m getting up, I make my coffee and open up Zoom to chat. I find that 9am is usually early enough so that people don’t have a lot of conflicts. But I don’t love waiting around just to see if anyone will drop in. So I’ll be available Mondays through Fridays at 9am for Zoom office hours (along with Wednesdays at 4pm), but if nobody drops in in the first few minutes, I will leave. I’ll stay as long as it takes to get everyone’s questions answered, but this is not a study hall: you should always come with specific questions prepared.

E-mail

Whenever it’s possible, please bring your questions to my office hours instead of reaching out via e-mail. I find that face-to-face communication fosters a more efficient, effective, and engaging dialogue. When we talk face-to-face, we can more readily clarify points of confusion and delve deeper into the subject matter. These opportunities for personal interaction can sometimes be lost in electronic communication, leading to a more detached, impersonal academic experience for both me and you. So if you e-mail, this is why you’ll usually get a “Can we talk about this in office hours?” response from me. Exceptions include emergencies or sending me notifications (when no response from me is required).

Errors in Course Materials

This Fall will be the first time I’ve taught this class, so unfortunately that means there will likely be quite a few errors in my course materials. If you come across something you think might be an error, this is an instance where email is appropriate: as soon as possible, please shoot me an email pointing me toward it (cobriant@uoregon.edu).

Textbook

For this course, you’ll need the textbook “Introduction to Econometrics” by Christopher Dougherty, fifth edition (ISBN: 9780199676828). We will study the first half of the book in this course, while the second half will be covered in EC421. Though I won’t assign problems directly from the book or test on content unless it’s been explicitly taught in the materials I create, I recommend this textbook. It’s well-written and serves as an excellent reference if you need clarity on any Econometrics topic we discuss.

Assignments

I find that active learning is really crucial in a class like this, so there will be kind of a nutty amount of assignments. Every week will work the same, so hopefully you’ll catch on to the pattern pretty quickly.

Note that deadline flexibility isn’t easy for me to give because your group is depending on you to come to class prepared each day. So instead of flexibility with deadlines, your grade is spread evenly between lots of small assignments so that missing one will usually have a negligible effect on your final grade.

Grade breakdown

Here’s the grade breakdown for reference:

  • Homework from the workbook: 10%
  • Classwork: 15%
  • Completing peer grading: 10%
  • Practice Exams: 10%
  • Midterm Exam: 20%
  • Final Exam (cumulative): 25%
  • Participation: 10%

Exams

The midterm and final exams will be in-person and closed-note. I’ll give you a formulas sheet (see the last chapter of this workbook for the list of formulas). On both of these exams, there will be a multiple-choice section and a short-answer section. You can prepare for the multiple-choice section by reviewing the practice exams. You can prepare for the short-answer section by reviewing the classwork problems.

Grading Scale

At the end of the quarter, I’ll take your final grade, round to the nearest integer, then apply this:

  • A+: 98 or above
  • A: 93-97
  • A-: 90-92
  • B+: 88-89
  • B: 83-87
  • B-: 80-82
  • C+: 78-79
  • C: 73-77
  • C-: 70-72
  • D+: 68-69
  • D: 60-67