 |
Department News
Charlie Holt is first Wilson Scholar
Thanks to a generous gift from Jackson L. Wilson, Jr., an Economics alum and a founding partner of Accenture, the Department has launched a new program that will bring prominent professors at other universities to the UA as Wilson Scholars, to interact with students and faculty. Our first Wilson Scholar, Charlie Holt of the University of Virginia, visited for a few days in February. Charlie presented a research paper, met with faculty and doctoral students to discuss research ideas, and had some great interaction with some of our undergraduate students.
Inaugural Ed Zajac Prize
This spring the Department will award the first Ed Zajac Prize for the Best Doctoral Student Paper produced in the Department's annual competition. Ed taught a core doctoral course for years and was loved by his students. He was also the longest-serving chairman of the modern-day UA Economics Department. The Zajac Prize was recently endowed by the generosity of three dear friends and former colleagues of Ed's, Bruce Greenwald and Ken and Jennifer Kroner.
Matt Stone named a Marshall Scholar
Economics major Matthew Stone has been selected as a Marshall Scholar. In honor of George Marshall and the Marshall Plan that rebuilt Europe after World War II, the United Kingdom awards about 40 Marshall Scholarships each year to American students for study in the U.K. Matt will spend a year at the University of Dundee, in Scotland, and a year at King's College London studying the economics of energy markets and their relation to international security and terrorism. During his undergraduate studies Matt spent a year in the Russian cities of Irkutsk and Vladivostok, doing research on Russian oil relations with East Asia. Matt says he has "developed a passion for energy markets and their geopolitical ramifications."
Ryan Johnson named a Fulbright Scholar and Outstanding Honors Graduate
Economics and International Studies double major Ryan Johnson has been selected by the UA Honors College as its Outstanding Graduating Senior. Ryan was recently named a Fulbright Scholar, and he was also one of the UA's three finalists this year for a Truman Scholarship. Ryan will spend his Fulbright year in Brazil, doing research on Rio de Janeiro's public transportation system. Ryan first became interested in the economics of public transportation systems during a United Nations internship in Chile, where he studied the effects of using per-passenger incentives to pay bus drivers in Santiago. His Santiago study helped him win a place on USA Today's All-USA Academic Team.
Daniel Tuttle Awarded Prestigious Truman Scholarship
Economics and International Studies double major Daniel Tuttle has been awarded the prestigious Truman Scholarship. Truman Scholars are selected on the basis of leadership potential, intellectual ability, and commitment to public service. Nationwide only 75 Truman Scholarships were awarded this year. The scholarship provides $30,000 for graduate study. Daniel plans to do graduate study in development economics and to eventually help channel China's increasing economic power into socially responsible investment in developing countries, especially in Africa. Daniel is a Flinn Scholar and an honors student, and he has spent nearly two years studying abroad.
Jianjun Wu Joins the Faculty
Assistant Professor Jianjun Wu has joined the Arizona Economics faculty this fall. Jianjun received his PhD in August from Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Managment. Jianjun's research concerns strategic interactions in markets, focusing especially on dealing with uncertainty. Jianjun is teaching our undergradate course in business strategy.
Sam Allen wins the John Heinz Award
Sam Allen, one of our recent doctoral students, has been named this year's
recipient of the John Heinz Dissertation Award for his doctoral dissertation, "The Economics and Politics of Workers' Compensation, 1930-2000." The award, named for the late Senator John Heinz, is given each year by the National Academy of Social Insurance for the best American dissertation on social insurance. Sam is currently in the second year of a post-doctoral fellowship at UC Davis.
Gary Libecap named Wesson Fellow
Professor Gary Libecap has been named the 2005 Robert Wesson Fellow in Scientific Philosophy and Public Policy at Stanford's Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace. While at Hoover Gary will conduct research on transaction costs and institutional change in western water law and institutions.
Gerry Swanson awarded Thomas R. Brown Chair
Professor Gerald Swanson has been appointed to the Thomas R. Brown Chair in Economic Education. The new endowed chair honors the late Tom Brown, co-founder of the Burr-Brown Corporation, the famous Tucson-based microelectronics firm. The Thomas R. Brown Family Foundation created the Brown Chair in recognition of Tom Brown's belief in the importance of economic literacy. Tom believed that everyone should have a sound education in the principles of economics, and Gerry Swanson has probably done more to implement that vision than anyone else in the world. Congratulations Gerry! And our thanks to the Brown Family Foundation!
Martin Dufwenberg receives Royal Economic Society Prize
The 2004 Royal Economic Society Prize has been awarded to Geir Asheim and Martin Dufwenberg for their article "Deductive Reasoning in Extensive Games," which appeared in the April 2003 issue of the Economic Journal. Their paper introduces a new concept for analyzing strategic behavior and demonstrates how it can be applied.
Gary Libecap Heads Three Societies
Gary Libecap, already 2004-2005 president of the International Society for New Institutional Economics, has been elected president of both the Economic History Association and the Western Economic Association as well. Congratulations Gary!
Kurt Schnier Receives Award for Best Dissertation
At its annual meeting in August the American Agricultural Economics Association named Kurt Schnier's Ph.D. dissertation, "Economic Analysis of Spatially Heterogeneous Resources: the Case of the Fishery," the Outstanding Dissertation of 2003. One of our recent doctoral students, Kurt is now a member of the faculty at the University of Rhode Island's Department of Environmental and Natural Resource Economics, one of the nation's leading environmental and resource economics departments.
Rebecca Holmes Receives Nevins Prize
Another of our recent doctoral students, Rebecca Holmes, has been awarded the 2004 Nevins Prize for the year's best Ph.D. dissertation in American Economic History, "The Impact of State Labor Regulations on Manufacturing Input Demand During the Progressive Era." The prize, given annually by the Economic History Association in honor of the great historian Allan Nevins, was announced at the association's annual meeting in September. Becky is now an economist at The Salt River Project in Phoenix.
Rachel Wellhausen is Honors College's Outstanding Senior
2004 Economics graduate Rachel Wellhausen has been selected by the UA Honors College as its Outstanding Senior of 2004. Rachel is a Flinn Scholar, a National Merit Scholar, and a Presidential Scholar; in each of her first two years at the U of A she was named the university's Outstanding Woman of the Year. Rachel has just completed degrees in Economics, in English, and an interdisciplinary degree in Russian and Slavic Studies, German Studies, and Political Science. (Did she ever sleep?) She spent a year studying in Irkutsk, Siberia, and now she's headed for a masters degree at the London School of Economics. Congratulations Rachel!! (More details can be found at http://www.honors.arizona.edu/images/May04.pdf)
Todd Neumann receives Best Instructor award
Third-year doctoral student Todd Neumann has been named the 2004 recipient of the Summer Excellence in Teaching award for graduate student instructors at the U of A. Todd received the honor, which includes a $500 cash award, for his ECON 330 course on Macroeconomic Institutions and Policy. He was nominated independently by many of his students. Another of our doctoral students, Jaret Treber, was one of the other four finalists for the award. There were nearly 400 graduate student instructors at the UA last summer, so we're extremely proud of Todd and Jaret, who exemplify the great teaching we aspire to in the Economics Department.
Crystal Millican receives Fulbright Award
Crystal Millican, the December 2003 recipient of the Outstanding Graduating Senior in Economics award, has recently been selected as one of the eight recipients nationwide of a Fulbright Binational Business Grant to study and work in Mexico. Crystal will be based in Mexico City where she will take courses in economics and business and will intern with an international company. Congratulations Crystal!
|
|
