University of California, San Diego Winter Quarter 1997-98
Department of Economics Professor T. Groves


Economics 191A: Senior Essay Seminar, First Quarter



Syllabus and Course Schedule



This course is Part I of the Economics Department's senior essay seminar that is required for all economics and management science majors who wish to graduate with the "highest distinction" honors designation on their diploma. Part II, Economics 191B, will be given in the Spring Quarter of Academic Year 1997-1998. Both quarters must be taken to receive departmental honors. The only requirement of the two course sequence is to complete a 25 - 30 page paper on an economics topic approved by the instructor. However, to satisfactorily complete the first half of the sequence, a first draft of the paper must be turned in by the end of the quarter. Typically the first draft should contain the theoretical analysis of the paper and a preliminary description of the empirical content.

We will meet three times the first, ninth, and tenth weeks (MWF at 10:10) and once a week during the rest of the quarter -- typically on Wednesday at 10:10. These sessions will be devoted to discussing your paper topics, resources, and, at the end of the quarter, to presentations of the first draft of your papers.

The seminar the first quarter will be divided roughly into three parts -- (1) selecting your topic and finding sufficient reference and source material and writing a short description of your topic, including at least three references, (2) formulating an outline, and (3) writing a first draft. At the end of each part you will turn in your work product to date.

To help in suggesting a wide range of possible topics I have assigned the following books for you to read:



To facilitate communication and to help you gain access to many useful resources, you must get a personal computer account from the Academic Computing Center. Rudy Rodriguez in the Undergrad Econ Office can help you do this, if you don't already have an account. In addition to allowing you to communicate with me and others in the course, you will be able to use your account to search the library for material, access the Social Science Database for an enormous amount of data, and access an incredible amount of useful (and not-so-useful) material on the World Wide Web. I have established a course web site that has links to some important sources of information and data as well as information about the course. It can be accessed at URL:

http://weber.ucsd.edu/~tgroves/ec191.html


Office Hours:


My office hours for this course are on Friday from 11:00 a.m. - noon and also by appointment. My office is room 317 of the Economics building. I can also be reached by electronic mail to ask questions, set up an appointment, and the like. E-mail me at my campus e-mail address -- tgroves@ucsd.edu

Schedule Dates