Larry Summers, the former president of Harvard and all-round economic guru, has suggested that undergraduate education needs radically reformed to reflect changes in society. Click here to read the things he wants to see change and why. His recommendations centre on what students learn as well as how they learn. Notably, he highlights three thing that we encourage at Queen's University Management School - collaboration in the classroom, active learning, and an ability to handle big data.
My colleague and former PhD student Gareth Campbell has created a website about the British Railway Mania - click here . This episode has been described by the Economist as probably the greatest bubble in human history. Gareth's website provides background on the Mania and posits some explanations for the 'bubble'. In his explanation of why the bubble happened, Gareth places a lot of emphasis on investor myopia regarding future dividends and uncalled capital. His study of investors during the episode does not support the view that this episode was fuelled by naive and irrational investors.
