Geography Curricular Inventory Project

Geography 350: Urban & Regional Economic Analysis
Günter Krumme

(http://faculty.washington.edu/krumme/courses/geog350lo.html)

Supporting & Related Pages:

• Geography 350 Syllabus
• What's Needed to Do Well..."
• Bloom's Taxonomy
• General Class Objectives
• Learning Objectives and Outcomes for Geography 207 (Economic Geography)
• Learning Objectives and Outcomes for Geography 450 (Location Theories)
• Krumme's Learning Matrix

Learning Objectives with Examples of Expected Learning Outcomes

At the end of this class (and hopefully for some time thereafter), students completing this class with a 2.0 or better are expected to be able to:

• Convey the conceptual meaning of approximately 120 terms (half of them overlapping with Geog.207), identify, explain their conceptual uses and significances in the context of class content and suggest specific applications of the concepts in the context of class topics or a student's individual area of interests.
  • Differentiate among conceptual uses of the term "structure" in Economic Geography and then explain the difference between "compositional" and "interdependence" structures of regional economies.
  • Differentiate between a "nodal" and a "homogeneous" region and demonstrate this understanding by applying these concepts to analytical, planning, policy or marketing issues (or tasks) in students' particular area of interests.
  • Explain the statistical/analytical meaning and use of "probability", "coefficient" and "quotient".
  • Explain and exemplify the analytical use of the concept of "indirectness" in the context of (marketing, material procurement or information-) environments of economic activities in regions.
  • Apply a concept or analytical tool covered in class or by the text in a particular context to a different, but sufficiently related context.

• Identify and assess some of the pertinent structures and inner-workings of the economies of relatively small regions (such as urban areas) and their varying dependence on outside economic environments, forces and developments.
  • Demonstrate through class discussions, examinations, exercises or a project an understanding of local economies in general and of specific local economic sectors or other sub-economies (such as local labor or housing markets or "urban services"), including, if appropriate, their significance for the student's future in this or other communities.

• Identify and assess the strength and limitations of different analytical tools and their assumptions; more specifically, explain the analytical significance of the difference between linear and non-linear functions in a variety of production, consumption and spatial contexts
  • Evaluate the significance (purpose, downsides etc.) of the "assumptions" made when using "location quotients" to derive regional exports.
  • Assess the impact of the Engel's Law or the law of diminishing returns on findings resulting from the use of (linear) input-out functions for forecasting purposes.

• Match specific research questions with types of "simple" numerical analysis (location quotient, coefficients of specialization or localization, shift and share, economic base analysis, others) and perform simple numerical tasks associated with such analyses
  • Formulate a manageable research question (hypothesis), identify an appropriate analytical method, identify information needs, find appropriate data, execute the needed calculations and interpret the findings in view of the research question(s) and the strength and limitations of the analytical tool and the selected data.
  • Trace transport and other interdependence links via simple graph- or input-output-analytical (matrix-algebraic) procedures (as evidenced in class, examinations and home-exercises).

• Understand the "gist", i.e. conceptual context, information needs, assumptions made, and interpret the nature and general usefulness of findings of more complex types of analysis (example: cohort analysis, input-output analysis, linear programming, and others, based on the premise that the hands-on use of facilitating software and expansive data sets and executions of more sophisticated calculations are covered by 400-level classes such as Geog. 440, 445 and 471 or requires further training and experience).
  • Compare the use of input-output-derived multipliers for impact analysis with that for forecasting the performance of the local economy over the next five years.

• Understand and derive insights from local economic reports, impact analyses and media accounts of local economic developments and the operations of major local corporations such as Microsoft, Boeing, Nordstrom, Costco, Weyerhaeuser etc.
  • Interpret to third parties (a future employer?) the frequent, usually poorly explained references to the "multiplier" (typically using different names) in local papers and suggest which multiplier (from among different versions of multipliers) might actually be underlying the newspaper account.
  • Summarize, identify key findings, suggest implications (other than those already provided) and critique one of Richard Conway's (or an alternative) report / impact analyses of a local economic sector, activity or corporation.

• Appreciate the need for and gain access to sources of information other than those associated with class meetings and textbook; evaluate the quality and reliability of such information.
  • Access, evaluate, extract and utilize information from a variety of sources available on campus, in the community or electronically for preparing and executing rudimentary forms of regional/local economic analyses.
  • Understand the differences between "numbers", "data" and "information" and the significance of these differences for securing appropriate statistics for local & regional analytical ends.
  • Evaluate critically the quality and reliability of information sources in light of the research question(s), the costs and benefits of that information and the information from alternative sources and (last not least) the availability of alternative analytical methods with different information needs.
  • Review and evaluate relevant (online or on-paper) journal articles, books and/or reports and compose brief reports on the content and significance of this literature.

• Practice and improve (widen & deepen) already existing writing, communication, project development, information resource, collaboration and presentation skills and -- selectively -- add to such skills.
  • Present to a group of informed people (such as all members of the class) an area of interest which has been pursued during the quarter by a student and to which specific conceptual insights and analytical tools have been applied. Such a presentation should reflect the student's collaboration with other students in the class and make use of one or a combination of the following presentation tools: (a) a Website; (b) a Poster; (c) a set of handouts together with overheads using Powerpoint or another appropriate software. In addition, all weekly class exercises have to be made available on time on the student's own Website.