ECON 3375
Economic Growth and Development · 1 instructor on record · 4 sections
Boston College's ratings are bunched at the top — the median instructor averages about 88 out of 100 on the raw scale, and 44% of them clear 90 — so a raw score cannot separate anybody. Every figure here is ranked against BC classes and that rank is re-expressed out of 100, which is what turns a raw 88 — the middle of the university — into a figure that says where somebody actually stands. On this scale 77 is the median, 84 the top quarter and 91 the top tenth. Workload is then an adjustment on top of that, worth nothing at all for an ordinary one. Lighter work than 75% of BC classes.
The class itself, averaged across everyone who taught it — who taught it is the board below.
How is this worked out?
That is what a student picking a section is actually choosing between: the board carries each instructor's own score for this class, and the score above is the class averaged across all of them.
Boston College's own “intellectually challenging” question. It is not a measure of difficulty, grading or workload.
How is this worked out?
Boston College's own “intellectually challenging” question for this class only — students answer it positively about courses that stretched them, so it measures intellectual challenge and NOT grading, workload or quality. Almost every BC class scores high on it, which is why it is shown as a rank rather than a score.
One of Boston College's five workload bands, not a number of hours. Higher means more work, not worse.
How is this worked out?
Boston College reports workload for this class only as one of five bands, not as a number of hours, and it does not publish what the bands mean — so this site will not translate it into hours. Higher means more work, which is not the same as worse.
This class explores economic growth over the past millennia. For most of its history, humanity did not experience the type and quality of life, as we know it today (e.g., electricity, running water, medicine, telecommunications, and transport). It is only during the second half of the 18thcentury when Europe (and later U.S.) started to see economic growth. This growth started with the Industrial Revolution. In the first part of the course, we will study models that explain why economic growth is such a recent phenomenon. We will rely on models such as those proposed by Malthus to understand why the world did not grow at all for most of 5 millennia. We will also explore models that help us to understand the explosive economic growth experienced by the U.S. in the 19thand 20thcenturies (and other countries more recently). As a by-product, there will be some discussion on the recent slowdown affecting most Western economies (the so-called Secular Stagnation). Importantly, we will talk about the increasingly reliance on automation for production in the so-called 4thIndustrial Revolution. That is, the impact automation may have on employment, welfare, and society. For example, we will explore how automation is contributing to inequality.A crucial part of the course is to understand how research and development (R&D) and innovation contribute to growth. Therefore, the second part of the course will be devoted to study R&D at the aggregate (macro) level but also at the industry level. We will use case studies in, for example, the pharmaceutical sector to study why R&D is such a crucial factor for growth but also difficult to implement and predict its impact on firms and ultimately on the economy. We will study the current development of vaccines and treatments for Covid-19. In addition, we also analyze the role of automation and big data (data mining, and machine learning) in R&D.As will become clear, programming is a vital skill in the 4thIndustrial Revolution. To prepare students for this shifting labor landscape,students will learn Python to manipulate data and solve models. An example of this is to compute productivity using data from national accounts for different countries.
| Instructor | Curve | Easiness | Challenge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pablo GuerronProfessor · Economics | 7180 raw · 4 records | 84+2 to the score | 31st |
There is no ranking to read here: Pablo Guerron is the only instructor with evaluation records for ECON 3375, so the number is a record, not a position.
Also taught by Pablo Guerron
4 other classesOther ECON classes
All of themThe line
All 13 items · means across 4 recordsBars are ranks, not raw scores. Nothing here is graded good or bad.
What each item asks
- Explains Clearly
- The instructor was effective at creating an understanding of difficult subject matter.
- Available
- The instructor was available for help outside of class.
- Motivating
- The instructor motivated me to do my best work.
- Sparks Interest
- The course stimulated my interest in the subject matter.
- Organized
- The course was well organized.
- Clear Goals
- The learning objectives for the course were clear.
- Useful Later
- What I learned is applicable beyond this course.
- Assignments
- Assignments and exams contributed to my learning.
- Fast Feedback
- I received feedback on my work in a timely manner.
- Useful Feedback
- The feedback I received on my work was meaningful.
- Workload
- How much work the course took outside class, on Boston College's five-band scale — the band boundaries are not published, so this is not a number of hours.
- Challenge
- The course was intellectually challenging.
- Attendance
- Attending class was necessary to do well in this course.
Why these numbers are curved
Both the number and the bar are the rank against every comparable record we hold, printed back out of 100. BC's questions all have a median around 4.5, so on the raw scale every cell here would read in the high eighties and every bar would be nearly full — thirteen numbers that tell you nothing. Each cell prints its raw BC figure and its percentile underneath, so nothing is hidden by the transform. Every bar is one ink colour — nothing here is graded green or red. The hatched bars are not ratings at all: a higher number on either describes a different course, not a better one.
Game log
4 sections · newest first| Instructor | Term | Sec | Instr | Course | Work |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pablo Guerron | Fall 2025 | 01 | 75 | 71 | 40 |
| Pablo Guerron | Spring 2023 | 01 | 78 | 73 | 40 |
| Pablo Guerron | Spring 2022 | 01 | 93 | 83 | 40 |
| Pablo Guerron | Spring 2022 | 02 | 75 | 70 | 40 |
How to read this board
Instructors are ranked on their record in this class only, never on their average across everything they teach. Scores are out of 100 — Boston College's 1–5 agreement scale, ×20, the way these numbers were printed for years. Workload is BC's own five-band figure, not a number of hours, and is shown as a rank. A dash means the question was not reported, and is never a zero.