How can a Private Economics Tutor Help You?
Teaching in Economics has changed substantially over the last 30 years with a greater focus on mathematical derivations and modeling and less on qualitative theoretical explanations.
This is not to say that the theoretical and contextual underpinnings of economics are ignored in the lecture hall, it is just that students are expected to read much of the background context to the main models that they are taught by themselves. In our experience, this is where a private economics tutor can be a value-added proposition.
Economics isn’t just about maths and modelling, but being able to interpret real-world events and their impacts. We should be guided by the the framework that the models lay out but be aware of their short-comings. This is where we feel that traditional economics courses are failing their students. They teach them the maths, but forget to teach them how to apply it in a qualitative context.
Another problem the new approach to economics tuition, confirmed by some of our own top economics tutors, is that students tend not to have the mathematical background that is desirable to really obtain value from a focus on maths and modelling by economics lecturers.
Also, the approach that universities are taking is possibly more demanding of the student and likely explains why students are increasingly seeking external economics tuition, especially in from top economics tutors in London, where the constituent colleges of the University of London (LSE, Birkbeck, UCL, Queen Mary) are national leaders in economics.
Economics is also a very fluid subject and this lends itself to a more qualitative approach to economics tuition. Consider the following:
During the financial crisis, many students did not even consider the possibility of ‘printing money’, or quantitative easing if you prefer, to help solve the crisis. They just assumed that this was not possible as such an approach had been totally discredited by their lecturers.
In fact, it was quantitative easing that should take the credit for ensuring that the crisis did not become a full blown economic meltdown. We can hear the scramble to rewrite or rather, re-represent economic thought as the crisis had undermined, to some extent, the basis of monetary policy…
Economics teaching will of course adapt to the new mantra that monetary policy actions should be related to whether economic growth is above and below trend. Part of this rethinking includes a new presentation of the Philips Curve first proposed by the economics professor, A.W. Philips in 1958. However, the present economic environment presents a real challenge for the established schools of thought that have been perpetuated by university economics teachers. Interest rates have remained at historically lows for over 6-7 years but inflation is nowhere to be seen. This was not how it was meant to be! Similarly, interest rates as being exogenously determined nowadays, quite unlike the models that we all learnt at university.
The Profs Tuition is based in London. We are the UK’s leading provider of private higher education and offers expert tutors in a range of subjects at affordable prices.
Learn more at www.theprofs.co.uk
