Putting the Invisible Hand to Work

Service learning is an experiential learning pedagogy that enables students to integrate their study of economics in the classroom with service activities in their communities. It can enhance both economic literacy and the quality of our communities by helping to make economics more accessible to an increasingly diverse student body, increasing citizenship skills, and improving the relationship between colleges and universities and their communities. Putting the Invisible Hand to Work offers an overview of the theoretical and practical aspects of service learning in economics so that economics instructors may begin to design service-learning programs for their own classrooms.

KimMarie McGoldrick is Associate Professor of Economics at the E. Claiborne Robins School of Business at the University of Richmond.

Andrea L. Ziegert is Associate Professor of Economics at Denison University.

Praise / Awards

• "For many, the recipe for making an economist has become a bit stale: too much talk, too much chalk, and not enough stirring. This book offers some new recipes with some spice and lots of stirring. It is a required read for economists who take their teaching seriously, especially those who are having a difficult time facing yet another class presenting yet another curve."
  --David Colander, Professor, Middlebury College
  
• "Putting the Invisible Hand to Work represents a very timely contribution to the growing literature on discipline-based service-learning. Covering both theoretical and course-specific topics, it provides a basic guide to faculty in economics who have begun to discover the power of community-related work. It also serves as a welcome complement to and extension of the American Association for Higher Education's 19-volume series on service-learning in the academic disciplines."
  --Edward Zlotkowski, General Editor, AAHE's Series on Service-Learning in the Academic Disciplines, and Senior Faculty Fellow, Campus Compact
  
• "This book makes a persuasive case that service learning can enhance student understanding and more. Through studies and examples the authors show how projects that bring together students, communities, and economics have the potential to transform all of these for the better."
  --Julie A. Nelson, Global Development and Environment Institute, Tufts University