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Making Economics Personal in a Large-Class Setting

When the department needed someone to teach large lectures in economics, Lori Leachman helped find a way to communicate the material effectively to students

The number of Duke students enrolled in introductory economic courses has grown rapidly in recent years.

Lori Leachman, associate professor of the practice in economics, logs that development in the assets column - not because the world needs more economists, but because the people who live in the world need to understand basic economic principles.

"My gosh, look at our government right now," Leachman said. "One could only hope that they had at least a basic introduction to economics at some point. And one can only expect that that was not the case in many instances."

Leachman, this year's Howard D. Johnson Distinguished Teacher award winner, is doing her part to equip the upcoming generation with the wherewithal to function in the real world.

 

"Everybody, I believe, should have at a minimum an introductory course in economics to prepare them to read a paper and vote," she said.

A tough teacher of a tough subject, Leachman is not one to suffer fools gladly. She's been known to sit silently in class until someone volunteers a comment or question that's intellectually interesting. On one occasion, she walked out of a class that was "dead in the water," she said.

"Learning is not a passive activity," she said. "A student does not sit back and soak up what I'm willing to hand out. That's not the way I teach."

Leachman's teaching statement lays out that she will come to class "prepared and loaded with enthusiasm," and expects no less from the class. In her 23 years as an educator, students whom she has taught at public universities in North and South Carolina and Arizona have not always lived up to her expectations. Duke students delight her with their ability to rise to the occasion.

"Duke students are great," she said. "They benchmark against each other, and you can use that in your classroom dynamic, in how you grade, in how you push them. As a teacher, it means you can always cover more rather than less, because you know they'll get there."

In the 1990s, when careers in finance and entrepreneurial ventures beckoned enticingly, students planning a career in business or finance flooded the economics department because Duke has no undergraduate business school. So many professors were teaching introductory courses that no one was left to teach the upper-level electives.

Frustration grew as seniors, needing one more course to graduate, were wait-listed for upper-level classes. With leadership from director of undergraduate studies Tom Nechyba, the department instituted a large lecture format for principles courses to free up teachers for upper-level electives. Leachman, the department's associate director of undergraduate studies, is one of the teachers for the new principles courses.

Compressing more material into the core courses and lecturing on a stage in a large room pushed Leachman to change the way she presented material. She worked with an economist to create a Web site with a computer graphics program that walks students through complex economic theories and applications as many times as they need to review. She helped launch a new unit, EcoTeach, to more effectively advise and mentor students, train teaching assistants and assure standard quality throughout the degree.

Admittedly, covering more material in a large, impersonal setting is "not necessarily a desirous thing from a student perspective," Leachman said, but uncorking the bottleneck in upper-level classes has been "a huge improvement for us."

Leachman's career in academics came about by applying that same pragmatism to her life. The Savannah, Ga., native, whose father's work as a professional football coach took the family to various places across the United States and Canada, had her sights set on a position in California when she questioned her motives for taking the job. Her adviser at the University of South Carolina, where she got her undergraduate and master's degrees in economics, urged her to teach for one year.

"I did it, and I liked it," she said. So she stayed at South Carolina until she earned her doctorate.

Over the years, family has always been a priority.

"My work has facilitated my life; it's definitely not my life," she said. "For a long time, I was a single parent. There aren't many jobs that you can have a career - not just a job - and be the kind of parent you want to be. Academics is one of them."

Now married to Duke Provost Peter Lange, with one son in sixth grade, the other a senior in high school and two stepchildren in college and graduate school, she said her ambition in the next few years is personal: "to do a decent job in what I'm doing and put my extra energy into my family." Next year she will become economics' director of undergraduate studies.

If Leachman ever gets to the point where she can have a second career, it will be in art. She paints and does collages, and has a piece that was exhibited in this year's Durham Arts Guild Emerging Artists show. But economics will always be part of her life.

"I teach one of the coolest, most dynamic subjects out there," she said. "It's relevant to every single person. And I have to say thank you to the Duke undergraduates. They've made me a much better teacher."

Written by Nancy Oates

 

Teaching Awards

The David and Janet Vaughn Brooks Award Amin Vahdat, computer science The Robert B. Cox Award Laurie Shannon, English The Richard K. Lublin Award Naomi Quinn, cultural anthropology The Dean's Award for Excellence in Teaching (Graduate School) James Thrall, religion