EXTERNAL REVIEW OF THE
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS
AT CENTRAL WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY
March 2004
Prepared by
Tom Trulove, Chair, Department of Economics
Eastern Washington University
In preparing this report I studied the “Program Review”, a 2004 self-review by the
Central Washington University Economics Department as well as other documents
provided and collected. I also had the benefit of numerous discussions with the
department co-chairs, faculty, students, Dean of the College of Business and the Provost
and an onsite visit of two evenings and a day an a half. As additional background, my
own department has just completed a major revision of our curriculum and program
which has given me the opportunity to compare the programs of several peer institutions.
My overriding conclusion is that the CWU Economics Department is an exceptional
small department with a very strong and respectable program.
Student Centered
As I began my review of the department’s self-evaluation I was struck by their
early and continued emphasis on teaching, high quality education and student success.
Phrases such as “Teaching is our priority,” “highest emphasis on excellence in teaching,”
“students and faculty work actively together,” “concern for students at the individual
level,” “personalized, innovative instruction,” as well as references to constant
availability for advising and mentoring by faculty raised my level of skepticism. In my
experience most departments make such claims, but few deliver. During the site visit and
by carefully reading student program and course evaluations I set out to verify these
claims. My conclusion is that this department appears to be the exception.
The department has a well thought out advising and mentoring program which is
carried out daily. Faculty members uniformly appear to put extraordinary effort into
teaching strategies and activities. They make use of innovative methods and take
advantage of the wonderfully outfitted electronic classrooms. When asked to comment
on the strongest element of their department and the one in which they take the most
pride, faculty members and the co-chairs immediately cited the personal attention given
to students. They commented on their universal open door policy and their intention to
differentiate the department by developing a reputation for being more student friendly
and supportive than other departments.
Their approach is working. When I asked students the same question they
similarly identified the open door policy, dedication to students, good advising and close
personal support from faculty as the best aspects of the department. They also liked their
courses very much despite the fact that they were perceived as more difficult than most
others at the university. Moreover, written student evaluations regularly emphasize these
features. In fact, students feel very positive about the department. Comments are rarely
negative. They seem to like their professors and courses, believe they learn more than in
courses in other departments, and find the course expectations rigorous. Consequently,
they especially appreciate the help and support they get from faculty. Remarkably, when
compared with student evaluations I have seen from other departments, almost all
comments are positive and the criticisms offered tend to be suggestions for improving
some minor aspect of the course. Comments also indicate that majors and minors feel
they have a “home” in the economics department, a place they can count on for help and
support beyond the classroom. The department’s career and graduate school counseling
is among the best I have seen. Their advising system is comprehensive and excellent.
The student experience is clearly a good one and is justifiably a source of departmental
pride.
The Faculty
The department has a strong faculty. All seven full-time tenure track members
have Ph.D. degrees in economics. All have impressive records in teaching, scholarship
and service which indicate continuous professional activity and dedication to the
discipline. More than half have won CWU teaching and/or research awards. In addition,
I found the department uncommonly collegial. Members seem to have a high level of
mutual respect and a willingness to work together for the benefit of the department. They
seem to have strongly shared goals. Communication among members is good and they
see themselves as a team rather than as a collection of individuals.
One area in which this collegiality shines is the faculty mentoring program. This
program has senior faculty working with junior faculty to demonstrate the possibility of a
fulfilling career at CWU as well as how to meet the requirements for promotion. This is
particularly important to align the expectations of young faculty fresh from graduate
school with the realities of an undergraduate program at a regional university. The
program seems effective in bringing faculty into the department’s student centered
approach, helping to develop excellence in the classroom, encouraging a productive
research agenda and continuing the department’s commitment to service. It also appears
to tighten collegial bonds within the department and enhance the faculty evaluation
process. Many senior faculty elsewhere would consider this type of mentoring beyond
their job. Those at CWU appear to participate with enthusiasm and pride. Not only does
this help the junior faculty, but also makes the department a more cohesive unit.
The high degree of collegiality also appears to support another department
innovation, the dual chair arrangement. When I first learned of the dual chair
arrangement I had reservations about its viability. In many departments such an
arrangement would simply invite division with faculty lining up behind one chair or the
other to opportunistically press their agendas. There is also the possibility that
communication to and from the administration might be negatively impacted. Just as
individual faculty might choose to work with one chair or the other, so might the
administration. Or, leadership might suffer.
My concerns appear misplaced with respect to the CWU Economics Department.
Their collegiality and open communications as a department allow this arrangement to
work. They take the function of chair seriously and believe that discharging it adequately
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requires so much time and effort as to preclude serious research. By dividing the time
required between two people, both are able to maintain a scholarship agenda while
devoting full attention to chairmanship duties during their quarters of service. Each can
also maintain department expectations with respect to scholarly output and service
thereby serving as role models for other faculty as they lead by example. Faculty
members seem universally supportive of this shared leadership arrangement. In fact,
some feel it will lead to greater continuity as they believe the “stress” of the job
prematurely burns out a single chair leading to more frequent turnover and less
experience in the position. Moreover, all faculty feel included in all departmental matters
due to the open approach of the current chairs. In this small, collegial department which
has frequent informal communication and a spirit of respect and goodwill, this
arrangement appears both to make sense and to be working well. I would not recommend
any change.
The resumes of the seven faculty members document an impressive array of
professional activity in all areas when compared with faculty at many other regional
universities. Departmental expectations are high, especially regarding teaching
effectiveness and scholarship. The department’s criteria for merit and promotion codify
an ambitious set of requirements in the areas of teaching, scholarship and service. If
followed, these expectations easily meet or exceed AACSB accreditation requirements.
Departmental standards for promotion to Associate Professor and Full Professor
equal or exceed those of most economics departments at regional universities.
Commendably, the requirements for promotion to Full Professor equal or exceed those
for advancement to Associate Professor. Weighting of activities follows the department’s
teaching priority (40%) and seems to be equal for scholarship and service (25-35%). I
suspect that this overstates the weighting typically given to service given the strong
culture of scholarship among the faculty, although these faculty show that they are very
good campus and off-campus citizens through an impressive array of service activities.
The service area also incorporates rewards for student advising according to the
department’s strategic plan.
Teaching is closely monitored for all faculty including the usual student
evaluations as well as the less usual requirements of classroom visitation and
documentation of teaching approaches. Faculty are also expected to use their scholarship
in teaching activities. The faculty mentoring process also helps insure that a high level of
success is achieved in this area. Many departments who want teaching to be most
important struggle to find ways to objectively measure teaching effectiveness and
differentiate among faculty members. Often they end up simply requiring faculty to meet
some threshold and then finding all who do to be equally good teachers. This, in turn,
tends to put most of the weight for differentiation on scholarly activities which then
become the only major determinants for promotion and tenure. Faculty soon learn to
give teaching lip service, but to spend their real energy in research and publication. I was
unable to determine if this is the case at CWU. However, the department goes further
than most to collect meaningful information on teaching and appears to work closely
enough with each faculty member so as to be capable of objective ranking. Certainly, the
extent of favorable student comments indicate teaching priority and quality control.
Requirements for scholarship are rigorous and appropriate. They also appear to
set higher expectations for the department when compared with other similar
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departments. Most interestingly, the expectations appear to apply to tenured senior
faculty as well. The department takes seriously the designation “academically qualified,”
one I have not heard used much elsewhere. In many other universities, and I am sure in
many other CWU departments, tenured senior faculty choose not to be professionally
active or to worry much about their teaching, while using their job security to engage in
mostly service, if in anything at all. Surprisingly, the CWU Economics faculty appear
unanimous and enthusiastic in their support for the standards they have adopted.
Consequently, a much higher proportion of the economics faculty are publishing and
deemed to be “academically proficient.” The two returning administrators who are not
yet so classified appear to be on accelerated programs to meet the requirement. Such
universal agreement concerning a potentially onerous requirement, even by senior
faculty, is remarkable.
The economics faculty are obviously valued as resources by other departments
and programs at CWU. This is commonly the case on most campuses with economics
having more interdisciplinary connections than most other departments, except perhaps
mathematics and writing. CWU programs such as SOURCE, the Douglas Honors
College, Asia-Pacific Studies, REM, environmental studies and others depend on
contributions from the Economics Department. Economics courses are required by 17
programs outside the College of Business, 10 within the COB and as elective or
suggested courses in 3 others. This demonstrates the broad interdisciplinary demand for
economics as well as the role played by the department as an ambassador for the COB to
the rest of the campus. These are vital and valuable linkages.
Without careful attention these important connections can be threatened,
especially for an economics department within the COB. Economics departments housed
in liberal arts colleges typically find interdisciplinary work somewhat easier. Those in
business colleges can easily fall victim to the anti-professional program bias of the liberal
arts if they do not, or are unable to, make the effort to be visible outside the COB.
Economists can do many useful things within the COB such as teaching statistics and
finance courses. In times of tight budgets it is tempting not to staff economics
departments adequately for interdisciplinary work and to divert the already strained
resources to internal COB needs. These tendencies need to be resisted at CWU,
especially since the state’s budget woes and the push for accreditation might make such
actions tempting.
Economics Department faculty indicated to me a fear that due to their small size
they might be asked to merge with another department. I think a merger would be risky
and a mistake. Their current collegiality which makes possible things such as shared
leadership and achievement of AACSB accreditation standards might not survive such a
move. Currently the department appears willingly to be one of the most productive, if
not the most productive, department within the COB and CWU, as measured by
publications, numbers of students taught and average class size. There is much pride of
discipline and pride of departmental identity at work here. Unbalancing such a well
running machine might not be such a good idea.
Teaching loads in the department, as in the COB, are 6 five credit courses plus
any individualized instruction. The official CWU teaching load is typically 36 credits per
year. The reduction of one course per year for COB departments is justified to recognize
the importance of scholarship and publication in securing and maintaining AACSB
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accreditation. This is very appropriate for Economics Department faculty given their
high level of scholarly performance as well as their volume of individualized instruction.
Departmental teaching loads seem well justified and appropriate.
The Program
The department offers an undergraduate degree with specializations in either
General Economics or Managerial Economics. The General Economics track is designed
to prepare students for more demanding analytical careers or, when augmented by more
math courses, for graduate programs in economics. The Managerial Economics track is
designed for students interested in more general employment opportunities in the private
or public sectors and those intending to pursue graduate study in some professional
program. Not surprisingly, this option includes about two-thirds of the majors. These
options make sense and are consistent with practices at other regional universities.
In addition, the department has a fairly standard minor program, with the
exception that a somewhat narrow range of upper-division courses are permitted. The
department is also very active in the general education program and in teaching
introductory courses required for preadmission to the COB. Courses meeting the
university’s breadth requirements appear to be a good recruiting tool for the major as well
as tying the department to the rest of the campus by serving a wide body of students.
Recruiting majors and minors is always a challenge for most economics
departments. We all would like to discover how to be more successful. CWU’s
approximately 35 majors and 30 minors are comparable to numbers in other universities
of this size. Although these might be considered modest numbers, it must be
remembered that the department is one of the leading departments on campus when it
comes to total numbers of students taught, largely because of its general education and
service courses. The department appears to put concerted effort into recruiting from the
introductory and general education courses as well as by sending personalized letters to
promising students. COB readmission requirements might discourage a few liberal arts
type students from discovering the field. I, who cannot discover how to be more
successful in this area, have no advice to give.
The department also participates in the COB degree programs offered at SeaTac
and Lynnwood Centers as well as offering an outreach minor there. A much smaller
distance education program is offered in Yakima, Wenatchee and Moses Lake. It is very
difficult for me to see how they can adequately and successfully carry out this mission
with their current number of faculty. Westside enrollments are apparently growing.
Quality control seems to be of major importance to the department. Hiring acceptable
quality adjunct instructors is always a problem, even in the Puget Sound region.
Regularly monitoring them creates an almost impossible scheduling problem for the
chairs. Full class schedules and research expectations on the Ellensburg campus make it
extremely difficult, at best, for regular faculty to teach Westside courses in person.
Teaching entirely by two-way video is hardly satisfactory. The department, thanks to
extraordinary efforts by some of its faculty, has devised what they call a “blended”
approach using a combination of live instruction and two-way video. I question whether
this is adequate or truly sustainable given the current level of staffing.
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The department appears to be struggling with this problem. They indicate that the
off-campus program seems to be their best opportunity for growth. They see it as an
opportunity, but, in my opinion, one for which they have not yet worked out a viable
strategy. This is apparently a major topic of discussion within the department and a high
priority for them to solve. However, I believe for them to be successful in this area they
will need more staffing. That might entail hiring some adjuncts and assigning regular
faculty to monitor them closely, or hiring more regular faculty. I do not see how a
program can be conducted and expanded without adding to an already more than fully
employed staff, especially when that program is beyond commuting distance.
The Curriculum
The department offers a fairly traditional and sound curriculum. Its preadmission
requirements parallel those at other schools or the prerequisites and core requirements
where preadmission course completion is not required. Requiring Intermediate
Microeconomic and Intermediate Macroeconomic theory courses of all majors is sound
standard practice everywhere. The prerequisites for the programs and for each course
seem standard and reasonable. The quantitative requirements of Econometrics and
Economic Research make for a strong General Economics option and are a more rigorous
approach than that taken by many undergraduate programs. These requirements are
exactly where the economics profession is going and are essential if students are to be
competitive with those from other universities and in the job market. The Managerial
track appears to be entirely appropriate to accomplish the goals for it set out by the
department.
Limited staffing levels appear to drive the availability of upper-division
economics courses. Compared with many other schools, the number and proportion of
required economics courses for the General track seem large (7 required and 2 electives).
This produces a very constrained curriculum, although the required courses clearly
contribute to a solid understanding of the discipline and a sound major. While the
Managerial track appears to give students more freedom to choose electives, I suspect
limited staffing means that their electives are mostly the same as the General track’s
requirements. Despite the fairly rigid requirements and limited offerings, these are sound
and defensible majors.
The small faculty size appears to have related effects. Many of the economics
courses listed in the catalog are not taught and have not been for some time. These are
courses such as U.S. Economic History, Labor, Government and Business, European
Economic History, Development of Economic Thought, Agricultural Economics,
Economic Development, Comparative Systems, Energy, Resources and the Environment,
etc. Specialties of some faculty are not likely to be taught. This narrows the breadth of
offerings and eliminates courses that might be of most interest to non-COB minors or
courses most useful in recruiting majors from liberal arts fields. It also tends to be
misleading to students. In addition, most required courses are offered but once a year.
The one complaint I heard most often from students was that this once a year scheduling,
especially with the theory courses, often makes it impossible to finish the major in four
years. In fact, some said they were taking an extra year due to scheduling difficulties.
Almost all students said they would like to see more elective fields offered.
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Course scheduling and frequency problems are certainly no mystery. They are
directly related to staff number limitations. All other measures show a very productive
department. Their courses often fill to classroom capacity. The average class sizes
exceed the COB and the university by substantial and consistent margins. Offering more
fields or required courses with more frequency simply requires more faculty. As
compared with other similar departments this one appears understaffed to me, especially
considering that one member is away on military leave. Even with his return, the
department needs one additional faculty member just to provide an adequately varied
program on the Ellensburg campus.
It is not uncommon for departments to require a core of the theory and
quantitative courses and then allow students to choose the remainder of their economics
courses from upper level electives. It is more unusual, such as at CWU, to require
International, Money and Banking and Public Finance as part of the core. While these
requirements do not weaken the program, they do limit the choice and potential breadth
of the graduates. However, with a small number of majors and without demand from
outside departments, minimum class size requirements do impose limitations.
Nonetheless, when reviewing its curriculum the department might want to consider the
ratio of required to elective courses and its frequency of theory offerings.
A rather unique feature of the CWU curriculum is the department initiative to
internationalize. This appears to mean including international topics throughout the
principles courses, inserting them in many upper level courses and requiring majors to
take International Economics. The faculty seem well trained and quite interested in this
approach. It should be of benefit to CWU graduates as they confront an increasingly
globalized world. This appears to be one way of differentiating CWU students from
those at other universities. Some in the Economics Department voiced concern that
international requirements were being dropped by other COB departments and they
worry that this could negatively impact their initiative. This internationalization seems to
me to be something worth preserving.
Library resources are very important to successful programs, although for the
economics discipline much more of our work, especially data based, relies on the
internet. The department finds library resources at CWU adequate to support an
undergraduate program. Students during my interviews with them voiced no complaints
and similarly found the library adequate. It appears that given the local collection, quick
inter-library loans and resources available over the internet, the necessary library
resources are currently available. However, the department’s library budget allocation
appears to be pretty bare bones. With journal subscription and book costs escalating
dramatically over the past few years, this is an area that deserves careful monitoring.
Most regional university libraries are experiencing budget difficulties. Cost reducing
measures such as electronic journal subscriptions or budget augmentation may need to be
explored in the near future.
The department seems to be aggressively using computer and information
technology in their program. The COB also makes available an information technology
systems specialist to provide support. The classrooms economics faculty teach in are
superbly outfitted to allow use of the internet and the most current electronic techniques.
Making even more use of technology is a major part of the department’s future plans.
This is commendable and sets CWU apart from many regional universities.
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Assessment
Assessment requirements have burgeoned over the past few years. Meeting all
the formal requirements can quickly overburden departmental resources and even detract
from course content. Finding a proper balance is a challenge. Every good teacher
constantly assesses their courses and student achievement while making continuous
adjustments. All indications are that the CWU economics faculty are excellent. This,
and the high degree of student satisfaction with economics courses and professors,
indicates that the best form of assessment is carried our regularly.
The department has thought about the more formal aspects of assessment, and as
with all of us, is trying to get viable systems in place that are effective without
overwhelming individual faculty or department resources. They have initiated a pre and
post testing scheme whereby pre-tests are given in their introductory courses (ECON 201
and 202) and then again as a post-test to those students completing the intermediate
theory courses (ECON 301 and 302). This is designed to measure the growth in
economic literacy of some of their majors, but not all as some transfer from community
colleges and do not take the pre-test. It is a little surprising that they do not administer
the post-test to all introductory students at the end of ECON 201 and 202. However, this
is a common technique used to satisfy the assessment bureaucracy. We also use it in my
department, but I have difficulty understanding how it tells us much of use to guide
course or program improvement. For that we have to rely on the evaluation of student
work by individual professors and focused discussion during faculty meetings. I suspect
that this is the case at CWU as well.
Perhaps because they have such a good rapport with their students, the department
appears to have an unusually extensive ability to do program assessment using student
letters, student e-mails, exit surveys of graduating seniors and alumnae surveys. I am
impressed by the willingness of students to write fairly lengthy letters evaluating the
department and their experiences at CWU. These sources, as well as individual course
evaluations, provide very useful information on which to base assessment and continuous
improvement.
The assessment bureaucracy always seems to think we should do more formal
assessment and rarely recognizes how much meaningful informal assessment occurs in
good classrooms and successful departments. Success is not possible without it and
formalizing requirements often does little more than increase burdens and siphon time
from course content and real assessment. In the formal and bureaucratic sense, the
department’s assessment, like that in every department of which I am aware, is not
particularly strong. However, given the overwhelmingly favorable student reaction to
their courses and program, as well as their success in placing graduates, the traditional
informal assessment program at CWU must be sound and used to make improvements.
Additional assessment techniques are possible, but their cost in terms of time and
program impact must also be evaluated. Some departments require majors to enroll in a
capstone course during their senior year where part of the course content is assessment of
the main program goals. This requires that the goals be clearly stated and the body of
work completed by students since the beginning of the program, as well as their ability to
demonstrate certain skills, be evaluated and rated. Other departments have required each
professor to keep track of assessment activities in each class and then have an assessment
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meeting each year where this information is shared and discussed by all faculty members
with some formal record being kept.
I would not recommend more formal assessment exercises for the CWU
Economics Department. However, if they are required to enhance this function I would
caution them not to fall into the trap of devising assessment exercises that in practice
force faculty to teach a rigid set of concepts in a rigid way. If such standardization is
what we want, why hire expensive professors? Finally, assessment results should never
be used in faculty evaluation, but rather only to guide improvements in course and
program design. Sorry that I do not have the correct attitude to be of more help in this
area.
The Future
Commendably, the department is giving much thought to the future. They
recognize the need for continuous evaluation and improvement. The internationalization
of the economics curriculum, more emphasis on writing and continued integration of
computers and quantitative approaches are mentioned. They are initiating a
comprehensive curriculum review. They are putting in place systems to improve
advising, thinking about how to better provide individual studies and internships and
wrestling with strategies to make distance learning an opportunity for them. The
department appears to have identified the key issues and is proactive in addressing them,
another indication of the department’s strength.
As indicated earlier, I think the department is understaffed and that this problem
will need to be addressed before they can successfully solve the problems of upper level
course offerings and distance education. The department has a very tight schedule
(especially with one member on leave), yet is unable to offer required courses more than
once a year or to offer much variety in upper level courses. They struggle to offer
enough upper division courses to meet the needs of majors. Students indicate they
would like more variety and some worry about delayed graduation. While the current
program is a sound one within the current staffing constraints, I strongly recommend that
a curriculum review be initiated to confront these problems of variety and frequency.
Dealing with these issues is a prerequisite to solving the distance education problem and I
believe both will require staff augmentation.
Conclusion
This is a very good department with a sound program and an outstanding faculty.
It compares favorably with other regional universities and often sets standards of
excellence for the others to try to achieve. The faculty’s relationship with students and
their high degree of collegiality are to be envied. Their record of publication and
requirements for being “academically proficient” make them one of the most
accomplished departments in comparable institutions, and surely the main engine in the
COB drive for accreditation. They have a strong commitment to service and have earned
a high level of respect, both on campus and in the wider community. The department has
made thoughtful choices in order to maintain a professionally respectable program within
some pretty severe staffing constraints. Other than the need for more staff and the few
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minor suggestions made in this report, I can think of nothing about the department
needing change or which triggers criticism. In fact, I would recommend this department
and program to students interested obtaining a superior education and degree.
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