Economic Statistics

I had a positive experience overall in this course. Professor Gong is great and makes himself very easy to reach out to. The course itself can be difficult at times but just requires a little more practice. STATA is hard at first but also just requires a little extra time to understand enough for the exams.

Honestly this class probably wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t as poorly taught. Professor Gong is obviously excited about the material, but over-explains things to the point that he is almost impossible to follow sometimes. The tests are not overly difficult, but it can be hard to tell if the homework will take 1 or 4 hours.

In the beginning of the course I really hated the class, but reflecting back to last semester when I took it. It was super helpful! I am now in regression and I think Professor Gong did an incredible job of preparing us for Regression- from Stata to the actual concepts. I cannot imagine taking Regression without the preparation from Gong's class. However, the learning curve for Econ Stats is extremely steep in the beginning but towards the end you will get a hang of the class. The only thing that I did not like in the class was how high the threshold for an A was which was 95%, so if you messed up badly in anything- you would blow you chances of an A.

In the beginning of the course I really hated the class, but reflecting back to last semester when I took it. It was super helpful! I am now in regression and I think Professor Gong did an incredible job of preparing us for Regression- from Stata to the actual concepts. I cannot imagine taking Regression without the preparation from …Read more

Professor Gong is the perfect professor for econ stats. I took an incredible amount of transferrable value from every class and I actually use what I learned in this class for research in other classes, after just one semester. Professor Gong was very clear and the work was manageable, though overwhelming at times. Though the class was very hard, it was incredibly rewarding. The course concluded with a research project that involved a paper and analysis using Stata. I loved practically applying what I learned in the course and Professor Gong was very available to support students. He uses Slack instead of email to communicate and responds very readily to help students with homework and projects.

Professor Gong is the perfect professor for econ stats. I took an incredible amount of transferrable value from every class and I actually use what I learned in this class for research in other classes, after just one semester. Professor Gong was very clear and the work was manageable, though overwhelming at times. Though the class w …Read more

Professor Gregg is amazing!! She is super enthusiastic about the material and tries her best to keep students engaged by using funny and interesting examples. There are weekly problem sets that don't take very long and are similar to the example problems done in class. Professor Gregg is super helpful and willing to answer questions during office hours. The exams are very similar to the problem sets and are not super challenging. I definitely recommend taking this class!

Professor Gregg is amazing!! She is super enthusiastic about the material and tries her best to keep students engaged by using funny and interesting examples. There are weekly problem sets that don't take very long and are similar to the example problems done in class. Professor Gregg is super helpful and willing to answer questions …Read more

Professor Gregg is so silly and enthusiastic! She explains formulas clearly so you will rarely be confused. She is also very helpful during office hours. I honestly have nothing negative to say about this class! Highly recommend taking this class with Professor Gregg.

Gregg is a great prof and is really passionate about teaching. I would definitely recommend. If you pay attention in class and take notes you should have no trouble succeeding in this class. Tests are fair, just make sure to go over problem sets to get comfortable with the question format.

Prof Amanda is absolutely my favourite prof this semester. She is extremely passionate about what she is doing. Her office hours are a good place to ask everything I'm curious about Econ and college life. However, this course is truly hard. PSets were really difficult and often took me half day to complete.

Professor Sommers is a character of a different era, and he is still an effective professor. He likes to talk about baseball and some other inane topics from time to time, but he is an engaging lecturer and I feel I learned a great deal about statistics from him.

While a lot of the concepts in this class appeared simple, it could take some time to wrap your head around them. The material is a little more abstract than other econ classes I've taken, but reasonable if you go through the problem sets. The tests are fine as long as you review the homeworks.

Professor Gong is a good teacher for econ stats. He explains the material in a concise and easy to understand manner and will further explain things if anyone doesn't understand. He provides plenty of examples in class for each concept through in-class worksheets and real-world examples. The major assignments you need to worry about are the problem sets, tests, weekly quizzes and the final project.

Professor Gong is a good teacher for econ stats. He explains the material in a concise and easy to understand manner and will further explain things if anyone doesn't understand. He provides plenty of examples in class for each concept through in-class worksheets and real-world examples. The major assignments you need to worry about …Read more

This was a pretty good class with Erick gong. He simply cannot explain questions for the life of him though. It's truly unfortunate. However, he is enthusiastic and provides as many resources as he can to make sure that everyone takes away as much as possible.

If you're interested in learning about research this class is for you. The two problem sets a week were time consuming but helped teach the material very well. It was tough at times but very valuable. Professor Gong definitely knows what he's doing and is great at explaining the content as clearly as possible.

Gong was extremely knowledge and made the lectures very interesting. We covered a good amount of material so the class was very face-paced. There were 2 midterm exams a ten page research paper and final exam which were all difficult, but if you pay attention in class and study a decent amount you’re good

Gregg undoubtably has passion for the material she teaches and generally teaches it in a digestible manner. Unfortunately she has a massively skewed perspective about what her class is. She is not at all forgiving for outside of class accommodations and consistently demonstrates the belief that her class is the be all and end all of her students life.

This class has a TON of work each week. There is a problem set due nearly every class and they are not quick, however, I found that this style does make you actually learn the material. Tests are take home but very time consuming. Classes are lectures that you can find yourself zoning out of until he cold calls on you. I actually enjoyed the class but I did have to earn a good grade, as it will not be handed to you. Class also features a Stata lab every week and a research paper that was fun to do.

This class has a TON of work each week. There is a problem set due nearly every class and they are not quick, however, I found that this style does make you actually learn the material. Tests are take home but very time consuming. Classes are lectures that you can find yourself zoning out of until he cold calls on you. I actually enj …Read more

This course required a decent amount of work and you were forced to learn the material. Problem sets are due at the beginning of every class, including one Stata lab per week. Sommers is very passionate about Statistics and will say at least one or two funny things per class, good guy overall.

Erick Gong is probably the best professor to teach this class. Although it's a very difficult class, he has a lot of enthusiasm and will put time aside to make sure each student individually understands the material being covered. He teaches using stata, which is basically coding. I had a lot of difficulty with this, especially as there are two problem sets a week about it.

A problem set due for each class was a lot at times and grading could be inconsistent but was overall fair. The prof doesn't do the grading, graders do which meant that some people got different grades for the same work. Exams were take-home and open note which made them pretty easy. Overall a pretty easy A/A- with a decent bit of HW.

This course is a lot of work, and you need to put in a lot of effort learning STATA at the start, but it does get easier as it goes, and the math is not that difficult. The professor knows his stuff and teaches well, so you learn a lot. However, the grading system is quite tough, with weekly quizzes that are quite hard.

The class has a lot of homework, but it's pretty easy but just time consuming. Exams are take home which was nice. Professor Sommers is a great person, good professor, but does assign a lot of work. But we are encouraged to work with other people in the class

I really enjoyed the class and got to learn so much. The professor is definitely one of the most wholesome people I have ever met. I got inspired a lot in his experience and expertise in the field. The class materials were really helpful and so were the professor's teaching. The workload was inevitably huge but minor stress in terms of grades as it was meant for you to explore and challenge your knowledge gained from class. I like the exam policy as it was super flexible and it for sure demonstrates your performance precisely.

I really enjoyed the class and got to learn so much. The professor is definitely one of the most wholesome people I have ever met. I got inspired a lot in his experience and expertise in the field. The class materials were really helpful and so were the professor's teaching. The workload was inevitably huge but minor stress in terms …Read more

Taking this course with Professor Rao is definitely tough. He grades with a points system so you know exactly where you stand throughout the year, but the issue is that there is an endless amount of homework that lasts all semester long and the exams are also super tough

I would like to preface this description by saying that I received an A in the class, but cannot recall a single aspect of it. I truly could not stand this guy, the way he treated the course, and his students. We all know we don't hold PhDs in Economics, why does he act as if we are idiots because we don't? He lacks social skills, empathy, and a willingness to actually teach.

Prof. Gregg is incredible, and her office hours are extremely helpful. The class has a perfect pace, and the weekly problem sets are very good for checking where you understood and where not. The tests are fair too.

Perhaps the best Professor to be teaching Economic Statistics. Yes, this course is difficult and you need to constantly be studying, but it is very achievable - use your resources. Prof. Gong's structure of the course is very conducive to learning a lot.

Amanda Gregg is great. A lot of people seem to be complaining abt her, but she is fair, offers good help outside class, breaks down all content so that is is very manageable. Highly recommend taking this class

You can tell that she enjoys teaching this class and goes at a very reasonable pace. The way she explains the topics is very clear and thoughtful. This class has a decent amount of work, but it is very manageable.

Gong’s lectures were quite enjoyable, he did a good job being engaging and explaining concepts. His grading was unnecessarily tough, you needed a 95 for the class to get an A, I had a 94 and worked hard and wasn’t rewarded.

Professor Gregg is very passionate about teaching this course and delivers the information effectively. There are weekly problem sets, 2 mid-term exams, 2 lab papers, and a final project. It is not an easy course but enjoyable.

Professor Gong is a great professor. The course moves pretty fast but he explains concepts very well and he gives review packets before exams that are really clear. If you spend time reviewing all the materials, the exams shouldn't be too difficult

Erick is a really solid professor and the class is about as engaging as it can be for econ stats. Homework is ok, but takes a while and the tests are fair. I think the average score was a B+. I would take again.

exams are really difficult and I did not understand how to study properly for the exams. The homework load is fine and the classes are decent but its just very difficult to do the tests. Stata labs are super tough as well

Professor Gong is very passionate about research and using data, however, his teaching style does confuse most of the students in my class. Hard exams (two midterms, a final, a research paper) and problem sets are hard to keep up with.

The other reviews pretty much make this clear, but Rao is 100% THE professor to take for stats. He teaches with a kind-of-flipped classroom style (recorded videos lecture, then in-person lectures that go deeper and clarify concepts). Also, he is very available for questions in office hours and on Slack. His grading policy made this class much lower stress than it could have been: all assignments could only increase our grade, not detract from it, and most were graded just for effort/completion. There were a lot of assignments, as expected, but I think this was the best stats experience that I could have had. His millennial references and personal anecdotes made this class fun too. Overall, the content was manageable and Rao was very accommodating and passionate about the material. (Lastly, pro tip: go to class! He gives out a lot of extra credit points just for showing up)

The other reviews pretty much make this clear, but Rao is 100% THE professor to take for stats. He teaches with a kind-of-flipped classroom style (recorded videos lecture, then in-person lectures that go deeper and clarify concepts). Also, he is very available for questions in office hours and on Slack. His grading policy made this …Read more

Sommers really old and really single. His inner loneliness protrudes through the way he teaches the course given that he can be mean and rude to students he does not like. There are constant (3) problems sets due per week along with an additional Lab assignment. Then he gives out extra credit HW but unless you get a 100% on it, the HW will not help your grade. If your an athlete (although debatable) or know sommers' favorite students then he will treat you well. If not, then good luck. ECON stats is incredibly boring and barely even touches economics. Take this class as a last resort

Sommers really old and really single. His inner loneliness protrudes through the way he teaches the course given that he can be mean and rude to students he does not like. There are constant (3) problems sets due per week along with an additional Lab assignment. Then he gives out extra credit HW but unless you get a 100% on it, the H …Read more

Amanda Gregg was very effective in her teaching of the class material and very fair when it came to her midterm exams. If you redid the problem sets, and understood the material, there was no reason you couldn't do very well on the exam. Would recommend.

Gregg is awesome. She knows the material well and is very passionate about the subject. Her in-class examples are funny and down-to-earth, which really helps students to understand the concepts. It prepares you really well if you intend to take Regression afterwards. She also hands out very clear instructions of her expectations or how to study for her class. She also cares about each student.

Gregg is awesome. She knows the material well and is very passionate about the subject. Her in-class examples are funny and down-to-earth, which really helps students to understand the concepts. It prepares you really well if you intend to take Regression afterwards. She also hands out very clear instructions of her expectations or h …Read more

Rao is a great guy and is really enthusiastic about what he's teaching. There are a lot of assignments each week that can add up if you get behind, but the grading is really easy and he's super accommodating for late days and you can really turn things in whenever. Getting an A is a lot of work but not very difficult. I'd definitely recommend Rao! He's a chiller for sure.

For a required class this was very enjoyable and Sommers is an awesome prof. Some may say he is a slow teacher but I believe it was more of a chill and relaxed setting. He was very accommodating, allowing us to come to the other section of lecture or lab when we miss and letting us turn in assignments late. I find the examples he uses to be very helpful in understanding the material and interesting and able to connect them to my life. We also had take home exams that were beneficial for testing our knowledge. I feel prepared for regression and believe he did a better job with out sections than the other prof Gregg.

For a required class this was very enjoyable and Sommers is an awesome prof. Some may say he is a slow teacher but I believe it was more of a chill and relaxed setting. He was very accommodating, allowing us to come to the other section of lecture or lab when we miss and letting us turn in assignments late. I find the examples he us …Read more

Do not take sommers! He is a nice guy, but he assigns way too much homework. On top of that, his STATA lab assignments are super long and don't have much real-world application. Stats is important to a bunch of different majors, but take this with a different prof if possible!

Great class. Although this class is theory-based, it is not text-book-heavy. Prof. Sommers used various interesting examples in real life(NFL game, Olympics game, GDP, credit card, etc) to make the content really intriguing. Really enjoy having his class and listening to some of his stories sometimes. There is homework after each class, but the amount is definitely acceptable and doable unless you study less than one hour per day. Lab is useful, should take this before R. Exam is ok- fair grading with bonus.

Great class. Although this class is theory-based, it is not text-book-heavy. Prof. Sommers used various interesting examples in real life(NFL game, Olympics game, GDP, credit card, etc) to make the content really intriguing. Really enjoy having his class and listening to some of his stories sometimes. There is homework after each cla …Read more

Professor Gregg is my favorite professor I've had at Middlebury. She is incredibly upbeat and excited to teach the material and to help her students understand it. The homeworks asked questions that are directly covered in class, so as long as you attend class, there should be no reason this class gets to be overwhelming.

Gregg is one of the best Professors I've had at Midd. She is very passionate about the course material and she makes the lectures engaging. There's a pset every week and a lab assignment as well. Exams are very similar to the material you see in class. The class is super organized and easy to follow.

Sommers is a well-organized teachers. His lectures have not differed from his start date back in 1983. Every class you'll receive a problem set that takes on average an hour to do. Each week also comes with a Stata Lab but he gives the majority of the answers during the lab session. He teaches the material well and will prepare you for regression. (Expect corny jokes with him)

I love Sommers! He is quite old so makes A LOT of dad jokes but he makes the material fun and it's really not a difficult course. There are three problem sets per week and a lab assignment which can be a lot but you're allowed to work on them in groups so I have found that helpful (TA hours help a ton too). Tests are light work and open note so as long as you pay attention and use your resources they're totally fine. Great class, great prof, and fun for a major requirement.

I love Sommers! He is quite old so makes A LOT of dad jokes but he makes the material fun and it's really not a difficult course. There are three problem sets per week and a lab assignment which can be a lot but you're allowed to work on them in groups so I have found that helpful (TA hours help a ton too). Tests are light work and o …Read more

Gregg is one of the best Professors I've had at Midd. She is very passionate about the course material and she makes the lectures engaging. There's a pset every week and a lab assignment as well, two papers and two midterms. Exams are very similar to the material you see in class. The class is super organized and easy to follow.

Prof. Sommer's lectures are decently entertaining, and although his handwriting is not great, he does explain things decently well. Important to note that his office hours are plentiful and VERY helpful; he for all intents and purposes gives you the answers on homework as he walks you through it. Also: I never spent the $350 on the textbook and I was fine lol

Professor Gregg is very enthusiastic about this class and she explains concepts very well. The problem sets are also great practice and sufficiently challenging, but not too difficult. Her exams are also sufficiently challenging but only cover what was discussed, no surprises. I definitely recommend taking her for statistics.

This class is horrible. There's so much homework and all of it is graded, and Sommers does not teach very clearly so it's difficult to do well on the homework without extensive help from the TA. Sommers also seems to not want his class to succeed – today he realized that everyone got a certain question on the homework wrong, so instead of going over it again, he just told us it would be on the final exam. This course is very frustrating and although the material is probably useful, you won't understand it unless you take it with another professor.

This class is horrible. There's so much homework and all of it is graded, and Sommers does not teach very clearly so it's difficult to do well on the homework without extensive help from the TA. Sommers also seems to not want his class to succeed – today he realized that everyone got a certain question on the homework wrong, so inste …Read more

Sommers is a great guy but cannot effectively teach econ stats. He assigns homework every single class, so you are always playing catch-up, and he makes the take-at-home tests extremely difficult - 10% of the class failed. I would try to take this course with a different professor if possible.

For anyone wanting to take Econ stats in the future… do not take with Sommers! He is planning on making exams (which were take home this semester) in person next semester. There are also 4 homework’s per week which graded closely for accuracy. The amount of homework and the way it’s graded does nothing to help you learn the content but instead just incentivizes getting answers from other sources in order to keep a decent grade in the class.

For anyone wanting to take Econ stats in the future… do not take with Sommers! He is planning on making exams (which were take home this semester) in person next semester. There are also 4 homework’s per week which graded closely for accuracy. The amount of homework and the way it’s graded does nothing to help you learn the content b …Read more

I think this is a good course to take if you are unfamiliar with statistics. The contents will give you a good understanding of what you will likely need for future courses in the economics department. The work load is not too bad, and as long as you follow along in class and take good notes you should be fine.

Paul Sommers is a cool guy, and I am able to follow along on his lectures fairly well, but he assigns way too much homework. The STATA labs are even worse as they take so long to do. Midway through the semester, Sommers cranked up the difficulty on the homework and the second midterm since people were doing too well. I would highly recommend taking this class with a different professor.

Paul Sommers is a cool guy, and I am able to follow along on his lectures fairly well, but he assigns way too much homework. The STATA labs are even worse as they take so long to do. Midway through the semester, Sommers cranked up the difficulty on the homework and the second midterm since people were doing too well. I would highly r …Read more

Professor Summers makes use of Stata, which is a frustrating software and less useful than knowing R. He also is unable to post assignments online, requiring students to write down the assignment that he writes on the board each class. There are four homework assignments a week, and although they are generally easy, doing them all is very time consuming.

I'm actually study with professor Amanda Gregg, but for some reason I can't choose her as the professor for this semester. She's absolutely passion and provide lots of good lectures. I love the way she teaches and the homework is really similar to the exam.

Professor Gregg is the absolute best. Her exams and problems sets are very fair and based off of the material she covers in class. She is so enthusiastic and funny, and makes every effort to be available for questions. I would take every class she teaches.

Professor Gregg is very smart and asks very smart questions. Both her labs and lectures were amazing - I actually still remember how to use STATA even a year after I took the class. I would love to have her again.

Sommers lectures were pretty boring despite his attempts to make jokes the whole time. The class also has constant problem sets every week that are tedious but kinda necessary to turn in. You also have to submit them in class which forces you to go.

Everything is graded on whether or not you turned it in, but has a large workload and the lectures are boring. Don't really get taught how to code you essentially just watch. Feel like I could have done just as well without showing up to any classes

Prof Rao is a great teacher. I enjoyed his statistics class and he made me fall in love with statistics. I think it is fair to say he is fair in his evaluations and you just need to work for the grades you want.

I thought that the class was fairly easy. Professor Gregg posts her notes online and as long as you do the homework and look at her notes, the exams are fairly easy. Out of my econ classes, this class was the most enjoyable.

Akhil Rao is a very sweet man who really cares about what he's teaching, as well as how it is received by students. While I greatly enjoyed the lectures and labs, this class represented the largest workload I have ever had at Middlebury.

Sommers is a great guy but a not-so-great professor. The constant homework assignments made it difficult to actually feel like I was applying what we were learning in class to the homework assignments. Tests were open-note, but instead of reviewing questions the entire class got wrong, he would say that these questions would be on the final exam.

This course was interesting but required a lot of time to complete the lab assignments given every week and problem sets assigned each day. The exams were take-home exams but were challenging and required at least 5 hours. The professor sends out lecture notes before class so it is easy to follow along.