Professors Present Paper to Fellow Economics Educators
Published 02.18.2008
Two faculty members at Pennsylvania College of Technology presented a paper at the Teaching Economics: Instruction and Classroom-Based Research conference held Feb. 14-16 at Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh.
Gerald D. "Chip" Baumgardner, associate professor of business administration, and Abdul B. Pathan, professor of economics, presented a paper titled "Industry Structure: Teaching Via Cooperative Learning in an Online Environment" that also will be published in the conference proceedings.
In cooperative learning, which has been used for the past two semesters in a number of economics courses at Penn College, small groups work together to accomplish shared goals by using a variety of learning activities to improve their understanding of material where each individual is partially responsible for the learning of the team.
"Research shows that cooperative learning can be very helpful in motivating students to learn actively. It also helps students to improve grades and retention of knowledge, and to develop positive self-esteem and interpersonal and communication skills," Pathan said. "Student satisfaction was enhanced as shown in their comments. That's why we have been using cooperative learning methods in our economics courses at Penn College."
Baumgardner holds a doctoral degree from George Mason University, master's degrees from the Pennsylvania State University and Shippensburg University, and a bachelor's from Penn State. Pathan earned a doctorate from the University of Houston and master's degrees from Williams College in Massachusetts and Dhaka University in Bangladesh.
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