I am so excited to be joining the economics department at
@UofGlasgow
this Fall. Really looking forward to joining this fantastic group!
To the young girl fascinated by economics in high school, following Adam Smith's footsteps from
@BalliolOxford
to
@UofGlasgow
feels surreal 💫
Teachers are a powerful influence on student learning.
What happens when teachers stop believing that their effort matters for student learning?
In my JMP, I document the wide prevalence of such beliefs and investigate their role in shaping teacher effort + student learning 🧵
Interested in research on economics of education?
Come work with me on a research project in rural Punjab.
Graduates based in Punjab, any discipline, with a drive to learn and passionate about making a difference, please apply!
Thrilled to present my JMP on teacher self-beliefs and implications for student learning at the Harvard Kennedy School. Thank you
@aikhwaja
for a great conference!
#NEUDC2023
#NEUDC2023
session Early Childhood Education examined design and behavioral responses by schools, interventions for teacher effort, and promoting parent-child reading as methods to improve outcomes, chaired by
@michelacarlana
.
🖇️Read the papers:
Interested in research on economics of education?
Come work with me on a research project in rural Punjab.
Graduates in any field (based in Punjab) with a drive to learn, passionate about making a difference through field research, please apply!
Farewell
@JPAL_SA
. Had a terrific year full of power-packed learning under
@Prof_Karthik_M
and
@singhabhi
Meanwhile, here is a colleague's impression of my life at work, aptly summarised.
Picture credits: Rashmi Menon
Today's cool young researcher
#EconTwitter
is
@kaurjalnidh
- incoming AP at University of Edinburgh (congrats!) who works on topics related to education + behavioral economics
Not easy to be a twin mom and doctoral student at the same time, but
@jasleen17_kaur
is nailing it all. Inspiring to be in the company of such resilient friends. Thanks
#2023APPAM
for a great conference!
Second recruitment drive:
Interested in research on economics of education? Hiring surveyors for data collection in rural Punjab, India.
Graduates based in Punjab, any discipline, with a drive to learn and passionate about education, please apply!
DM for details
Thank you TCHousing
@TeachersCollege
for the surprise this morning. These name plates are lovely! Excited to begin the spring semester on a flowery note.
Many congratulations to Dr
@andydebarros
- a dear friend, mentor and an inspiration. Thrilled to witness the terrific defense with illuminating insights from
@karthik_econ
and
@felbarrera
. Wish you all the best for future work and the exciting journey ahead! 👏✨
Thrilled this morning! Nobel for economists doing "noble" and path-breaking work on eradication of global poverty.
Congratulations and thank you for being torchbearers and mentors for many young researchers. Incredibly proud to be part of the
@JPAL
family.
BREAKING NEWS:
The 2019 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel has been awarded to Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty.”
#NobelPrize
A fantastic opportunity to learn and grow while having a lot of fun! Join us on this exciting education study in Tamil Nadu/Pondicherry. Please spread the word!
@econ_ra
#Tamil
#EconTwitter
📢📢Hiring RAs!
Come work with
@kaurjalnidh
and me on an exciting education project in TN/Pondicherry(!) with
@JPAL_SA
Its a short term position and will involve field work across a couple of districts. Can promise learning, fun, and some Pondi beaches :)
2 years of RA experience with
@JPAL_SA
provided me an excellent exposure to research process - from front-end of data collection to back-end of data analysis. Most importantly, you get to shadow top researchers in the field and discover your interests.
Nice resource from
@JPAL_Global
on how to land that coveted RA job:
TL;DR version:
1) take math, stats, and econ courses
2) do a great job on your thesis
3) get experience programming in stata/r/python
4) find someone who can write you a strong letter
1/Many
Dear PhD students and advisors: with input from
@jscottclayton
@peterbergman_
@amrasabicPHD
and our students, I put together a collection of advice and best practices for thriving in a PhD, with a focus on econ and related fields.
This thread is the tl;dr version
Feeding crowds in protests and pandemics.
Heartwarming to see NYT coverage of langar serving humanity.
Langar is the practice of preparing and serving a free meal to promote the Sikh tenet of seva (selfless service)
I build on solid descriptive work by
@shwetlena
and others at
@WBG_Education
Alarmingly high shares of teachers self-report that their effort has a limited influence in the absence of other inputs. Especially, in settings where most kids come from disadvantaged backgrounds
@salonigupta435
is a wonderful human and a thoughtful researcher. Have witnessed her project from start to end and its incredibly amazing to see her journey and see this work coming together ❤️
This 🧵is about developing human capital for innovation in schools, which is also my job market paper
📄 Please see the full paper here:
Thank you,
@jenniferdoleac
, for finding me and sharing it. It encouraged me to write this thread.
This work has been a labor of love 🩷
Originated as a raw insight during my time as a teacher in rural India and started off as a sentence in my SOP for grad school application 📝
This has never happened in life before. Never knew it could.
Scored 106/100 in the midterm exam on one of my statistics classes. Thanks to the extra credit questions!
@AditiBhowmick18
I got 11 out of 11 rejections when I applied for PhD right after MPhil at Oxford. Things worked out really well after that. The additional years of field experience fuel my research interests now and are the main reason I enjoy my PhD day in and day out!
Extremely privileged to be part of this vibrant creative space encouraging development and refinement of research ideas. Our bi-weekly sessions provide a sounding board for fresh ideas in a candid informal setting.
Here is a picture of my PhD students and me in our biweekly research in progress meeting
#Welooklikeeconomists
Are you an aspiring PhD student interested in economics and education? Development too? Apply to join us, deadline December 15!
I am profoundly grateful to my advisors:
@alexeble
, Cristian Pop-Eleches,
@supKaur
,
@peterbergman_
who saw promise in my ideas early on, helped me nurture them every step along the way, and were the best "referees" for my work
Lots of big-picture takeaways and specific insights on a range of themes. Great to connect with outstanding scholars working at the frontiers of economics of education research in India. Thanks
@Hyderabadi_chai
,
@ambudon
,
@IIMA_Economics
for hosting the conference.
@JPAL
Five years ago, I emailed Abhijit Banerjee expressing interest in his work. His Poor Economics had been a guiding light during my undergrad years - showed me how incredibly meaningful and impactful economics tools could be. (2/n)
"Find your voice and know that your voice and views will grow and evolve over time. Draw strength from your struggle. There is deep truth and knowledge within you."
Profound advice and words of wisdom from
@aadukia
New research by
@kaurjalnidh
shows how a teacher's belief in their own efforts in class can positively impact test scores. Big implications for ed policy intervention, as we find new ways to improve the quality of teaching. Thanks Jalnidh for speaking with me about your work!
Thrilled to join and present at Field Days. Great conversations, intensive engagement and feedback + a spectacular hike to Pulpit Rock with breathtaking views! Thank you
@SimoneHaeckl
for organizing, and helping me connect with an amazing group of researchers in Europe.
When you are a PhD student and your ever-supportive and encouraging better half gives you the most thoughtful birthday surprise!
Thank you
@DivjotSingh89
for fuelling dreams and making every moment of the journey memorable. ❤️❤️
Also, sharing and brainstorming ideas in a low-stakes setting promotes creativity while making the entire process less stressful and more enjoyable. I will tweet about the long-term gains in a few years!
I return with lots of new ideas, reflections, and broadened horizons.
Also, personal accomplishment - second conference with a toddler. Grateful to my life partner
@DivjotSingh89
for being my rock.
@JPAL
I was thrilled by his response - he referred me to helpful resources. Joining JPAL was the best career decision at that juncture. Exposed me to grassroot-level economics and helped me find my calling! (3/n)
It was rejuvenating to reunite with colleagues and friends from
@JPAL_SA
Big thanks to
@karthik_econ
@singhabhi
@marome1
for investing in current and former RAs and building this intellectually vibrant community
Have a problem? Talk to someone. Talking is therapeutic. (Karoge gall Milega hall - popular Punjabi adage).
Dad's op-ed
#2
today - exhorts people to talk it out and ventilate. Promoting mental health well-being among farmers to end depression and suicides.
Also relevant for policy, especially professional development programs, which mostly focus on skill deficits.
My results suggest that using targeted psychological content may provide a promising option to influence teacher productivity
@shwetlena
@WBG_Education
Together with
@World_BeingOrg
, I design an intervention that uses insights from positive psychology to target beliefs about perceived control in everyday life, using contextualized narratives.
@JHB_econ
Hugged my 3yo tight as I dropped her off at school this morning. Cool to know another mommy in the same boat presenting in the same session! First SOLE as well, would love to meet and chat!
Thats why I maintain a gratitude journal documenting positive milestones. It has served me well in downhill times, flipping the pages back makes me feel more content about my progress and gets me out of the trap of recall bias. Highly recommend!
If you are in
#gradschool
listen up: do NOT discount your accomplishments, even the little ones like "experiment worked" or "read 5 papers". I promise you this is a recipe for disillusionment and unhappiness. The many tiny steps are real progress.
@AcademicChatter
#phdlife
Having said that, newer models of schooling will appear where parents pay for good teachers and curriculum - not buildings and buses. The market hopefully will evolve more choices.
An IIT coaching institute's full page advert in today's HT.
Took me a while to spot the faces overshadowed by ranks.
True picture of an obsessed society.
#reducedtoranks
#JEEAdvanced
Importantly, the intervention did not have any references to classroom skills or pedagogy, yet had these behavioral effects.
This suggests that teachers had content + pedagogical knowledge but were not putting it into use due to binding self-beliefs!
SO COOL to see work of
@kaurjalnidh
, with whom I overlapped at both Oxford and St. Stephen's, covered in
@TheKenWeb
newsletter by
@OBanerji
. Corporate-wallahs will get to read cutting-edge econ research on how teacher self-belief affects learning outcomes.
A key takeaway is that self-beliefs about perceived control can be a powerful lever for effort decisions and outcomes in education, with applications in settings outside education.
RA candidates interested in education policy, apply for this.
@Prof_Karthik_M
and I are looking for team mates on an exciting set of education reforms in India. Lots of hard rewarding work, great peers at
@JPAL_SA
, great field exposure. Multiple positions.
Thanks to a dream team of advisors
@alexeble
,
@peterbergman_
, Kiki Pop-Eleches, and
@supKaur
who encouraged me to pursue the questions I was passionate about, asked tough questions, and gave insightful feedback early on
An interesting case for using 'reasoned intuition' - a convex combination of evidence and intuition when it comes to interpreting external validity of RCTs and designing policies.
@shwetlena
@WBG_Education
@World_BeingOrg
I find that the intervention leads teachers to
(1) update their beliefs about the effort-learning mapping, based on a revealed preference measure,
(2) exert more effort both inside and outside classroom
Thank you for the shoutout
@maibennett
! So awesome to reconnect with you. Thanks
#SREE2023
for creating an intellectually stimulating space, bringing together folks across disciplinary boundaries. Discovered others doing causal work in ed psych + teacher ed on similar topics!
Great time at
#SREE2023
these past few days. A lot of working on the side, but always awesome to see new work and reconnect with great people. In particular, very impressed by
@kaurjalnidh
’s work (she’s on the market, so give her a follow!)
@singhabhi
1) Bike along the Hudson (enjoy spectacular views of river and skyline), 2) Walk the Brooklyn Bridge at sunrise, 3) If the weather isn't great, explore art/history at MoMA/Met. Not to miss - Levain cookies!
@airindiain
, I am booked on flight AI105 from DEL to EWR on Mar 18, along with my husband and daughter. Today we got an email out of the blue about a change in itinerary that moves my date to Mar 24, my husband and daughter's travel date to Mar 22 without our permission.
No reason was noted. This disrupts our work, family and travel plans drastically. The hotline assistant was grossly inconsiderate and talked like a robot. I am outraged, this is unbecoming and unprofessional.
Regulators please intervene.
@AAI_Official
@DelhiAirport
@JM_Scindia
Personally, this was my first in-person conference after becoming a mom. The logistics were complicated, but the most supportive
@DivjotSingh89
and family made it possible❤️
@anustup_nayak
Wondering if parental preference for peer quality would still remain and how would it interact with teacher choice, in light of today's AER
@shwetlena
For sure, thank you
@shwetlana
, this means a lot. I'm so grateful for your phenomenal work that has given me excellent shoulders to stand on.
Happy to share that my paper with
@AidanCoville
, "How Do Policymakers Update Their Beliefs?", is accepted at the JDE!
We leverage World Bank and IDB workshops to examine how policymakers, practitioners and researchers respond to
#evidence
.
Here is what we find: 🧵