Teaching

Classes

Teaching Philosophy

I co-teach Econ 337, Agricultural Marketing, with Lee Schulz in the spring semesters.  I worked with Lee to evolve the course, as it combined three previous courses that covered applied grain, livestock, and dairy marketing.  As the course is focused on applied marketing, we targeted our teaching in the course to guide the students through the subject of agricultural markets with exercises that allow the students to simulate participation in the markets.  As most of the students in the course come from a farming background, they have some familiarity with some of the terms and parameters in agricultural markets.  However, most of them have not actively participated in those markets.  Since the students are often engaged with their parents in the farming operation, they may be talking with their parents about current market conditions.  To build on these possible discussions, we strive to have class materials, such as homework assignments and test questions, reflect “real world” situations using actual market data.  If we are discussing futures and options, the lecture examples are based on the current futures and options prices in the agricultural markets.  As part of the course, the students participate in a online crop marketing simulation that allows the students to make their marketing decisions under actual current market conditions.  The website allows the students to simulate cash, futures, and options trades.  Thus, they experience real world price volatilities and shifts throughout the course.