Essentials of Teaching Economics Certificate
The Essentials of Teaching Economics Certificate provides Economics PhD graduate students the opportunity to develop their teaching skills in an economics-specific context. Run jointly by the department and the Poorvu Center for teaching and learning, the certificate goals include:
- Articulate learning goals for students, the nature of learning, and effective teaching strategies that can support specific learning goals and the learning needs of a diverse student body.
- Design processes and strategies to assess what students have learned.
- Implement effective classroom instructional techniques through a short teaching demonstration.
- Develop materials and expertise that can help on the academic job market.
- Use relevant educational literature, including research about high-impact teaching.
Those students who wish to continue on to earn the full Certificate of College Teaching Preparation (CCTP) can double-count the components of the Essentials of Teaching Economics Certificate, as indicated below and should register for CCTP on the GSAS Certificate Program Declaration Request (note that you don’t have to submit a statement of interest on the form).
Certificate Components
To earn the Essentials of Teaching Economics Certificate, you must complete the following three components before you graduate:
- Fundamentals of Teaching Economics (fulfills the Fundamentals requirement of the CCCTP), which is offered each fall and has three sessions:
- Session I: Designing for Student Learning (Backward design, Blooms Taxonomy, Universal Design for Learning (UDL), how to structure a class (opening, main content, and conclusion), effective use of the blackboard, slide preparation, and identifying key points to emphasize presentation)- 1.5 hours
- Session II: Running an Effective and Engaging Class (Explanation techniques, checking for understanding and addressing student questions while keeping the class focused, transitioning smoothly between topics and activities, equitable teaching, and active learning) - 1.5 hours
- Session III: 2 part session- 3 hours:
- Faculty Panel- Course Assessments (assessments, grading, and feedback to students)
- Microteaching- each students will present for 5 mins and feedback will be provided by the group on their teaching choices (students who wish to attend the departmental workshops at 2:30pm will be accommodated)
For the Fall 2026, the sessions will run Sept 15 (Session I; 1-2:30pm), Sept. 22 (Session II; 1-2:30pm), and Sept. 29 (Session III; 1-4pm). Please register here.
- Attend two ITW or ATW (Intermediate or Advanced Teaching Workshops) Poorvu Center events (most sessions 1.5 hours; count toward the CCTP workshops), which you can find on the Poorvu Center’s Yale Connect event page or in our weekly newsletter (which you can sign up for on the Yale Email Subscriptions page by searching for “CTL Graduate and Postdoctoral Teaching” and hitting “Subscribe”).
- Teaching Statement submission with feedback from Econ dept (part of the final portfolio for the CCTP). Please email Eva Chalioti (evangelia.chalioti@yale.edu) when you are ready to submit your statement and set up a meeting.
If you have any questions about the Essentials of Teaching Economics Certificate, please email Eva Chalioti (evangelia.chalioti@yale.edu) and Julie McGurk (julie.mcgurk@yale.edu).