The real-world power of economist Michael Murray’s teaching is on display everywhere his former students go.

Take, for example, Analysis Group in Boston, which has had an active alumni connection since its co-founding by trustee emeritus Bruce Stangle ’70 in 1981.

Jim Hughes, one of Murray’s ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ colleagues, does consulting at Analysis Group. More than once, a former Murray student now working at Analysis has given Hughes “a lecture on the econometric techniques needed for a project that I’m working on. It blows me away.â€�

“Michael just makes econometrics click for them in a way that other people don’t.�

Making things click for generations of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students is why Murray, the Phillips Professor of Economics and a member of the faculty since 1986, has won the 2017 Kroepsch Award for Excellence in Teaching, the college’s top teaching honor carrying a $5,000 prize.

As Hughes’ anecdote indicates, one of Murray’s courses (he’s taught 16 different ones at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½) is econometrics, a notoriously difficult course at any college because it asks students to use math and statistics to grasp the workings of economic systems.

Students don’t just rave about Murray’s ability to communicate econometrics. They say he even makes it fun. “He made complex concepts enjoyable and interesting to learn,� says Sarah Centanni ’17 of Hingham, Mass.

To his students, Michael Murray is “passionate, intelligent, funny, caring, and personable,â€� says a former student. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Murray has written the book on understanding econometrics, literally. His textbook, Econometrics: A Modern Introduction, was published in 2005. “It’s quite different from other textbooks,� he says. “In that sense, I teach the subject in a very different manner.�

It’s a manner that studiously avoids what he calls “black boxes,� which symbolize memorizing. In his book and in his classroom, Murray instead tries to give his students an understanding of econometric theory, rather than simple proficiency in using the various tools of the field, including econometric software.

With that approach, he’s passing on a maxim from his own school days.

An amateur actor who’s been in many ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ theater productions, Murray adopts the character of a beloved high school math teacher who spoke with a nasal twang and would draw out certain words. Time and again, the teacher would tell Murray and his classmates, “Don’t memorize. Understaaaannnd.â€�

And his students do. “Professor Murray lays out the base of the material in class and he pushes you, the student, to find the answers on your own,� says Dan Willsey ’18 of Glastonbury, Conn. “He holds his students to an incredibly high standard.�

“When I did not understand some material during the course, he talked with me for over an hour until I got it,� recalls Shelby Rader ’17 of Duxbury, Mass.

Here are some scenes of Murray in the classroom as he talks about teaching ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students:

In courses like econometrics or statistics, an array of software — STATA, Eviews, R, or SPSS — can crunch right through problems that Murray is trying to get his students to understand.

Leaning on those tools, “it’s easy to decide that you want to get your students to learn the mechanics of an analysis,� says Murray. “I figure our students are bright enough to figure out the mechanics. They’ll benefit most from the stuff they couldn’t learn for themselves. And that’s understanding.�

Hughes, the college’s Sowell Professor of Economics and Murray’s colleague since 1992, says the stakes are high when it comes to teaching topics like econometrics or statistics, which he teaches.

It’s a “dangerous thing,� he says, for teachers to succumb to the “temptation to teach econometrics and stats by saying, ‘Let the computer do it.’ Or just teaching students that ‘when faced with this, do that,’ figuring, ‘Who cares? You’re just going to be a research assistant.’�

Students can get by on that kind of teaching, he says, “but Michael’s talent is to get his students to want to go deeper.�

Understanding doesn’t come cheaply, in terms of Murray’s time investment. Students repeatedly mention long office hours, three-hour study sessions before exams, and the time he drove to ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ from Portland after returning on an evening flight in order to hold a 10:30 p.m. study session.

Students and his colleagues also routinely praise Murray’s enthusiasm in the classroom. Actor that he is, he nevertheless disagrees that he’s playing a part — an econ version of Dead Poets Society — as he enthuses about this or that econometric model in a Pettengill Hall classroom.

Economics professor Michael Murray works with students in his econometrics course on April 3 during the final week of classes. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

Murray recalls teaching at the University of Virginia in the 1970s, where he had two sections of an economics course, each with 600 students. There, “the skills I use in theater are very valuable. I can project my voice. I can project my presence. I can move in ways that will hold people’s attention.� In those settings, “there’s a point at which teaching has become performance,� he says.

At ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, classes are much, much smaller. “I can be myself,â€� he says. For students, Murray being Murray means experiencing someone who’s “passionate, intelligent, funny, caring, and personable,â€� says Cosmin Bardan ’16. That authentic love of his work resonates with his students. Murray’s “pure love of the field,â€� Centanni adds, made her “more invested in my work.â€�

Still, Murray is an entertaining figure in class, which does serve the purpose, he says, of “infusing energy into the room.�

“Economics — love it though I do — is a subject that can easily put people to sleep and make them tune out,â€� Hughes says. “Whether you call it performance or you call it agitation, what Michael does is convey his excitement and his belief in the importance of what he is putting across in a way that makes students sit up and say, ‘I really need to know this.’â€�

“The way Michael’s mind works, he’s thinking, ‘Wow, so you didn’t understand it that way? OK, I just thought of another three ways, and if you still don’t get it, I’ll come up with six more ways to teach it, until I finally see the light bulb come on over your head.�

And the bulb usually blinks bright. “I have never had a professor who cared so much about making sure students understand,� says Alexander Stekler ’17 of Avon, Conn., while Centanni talks about the feeling of “joy and satisfaction when a complex problem finally clicked.� (And yes, we’re still talking about economics.)

In the end, Murray says his classroom style is all about “establishing relationships with the individual students.�

And that, he says, “is what makes it really pleasurable to teach at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½.â€�

James Hughes, Thomas Sowell Professor of Economics at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College, has received the Ruth M. and Robert H. Kroepsch Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Hughes has taught at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ since 1992. He teaches microeconomic theory and economics as it intersects with law, labor, health, the environment and gender. His areas of research include labor, health, and law and economics.

In connection with the award, Hughes gives a talk titled Wait a Minute — YOU Won the Teaching Award? at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 30, at the Edward S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave. Sponsored by the Kroepsch Award Selection Committee, the college division chairs, Information and Library Services, and the dean of the faculty’s office, the event is open to the public at no charge.

“What just keeps me coming back to teaching is how much I learn through it,” Hughes says. “If there’s one big surprise that I’ve had in my career, it’s that, even though I might teach the same course over and over, not a semester goes by when I don’t find myself learning something new, learning how to explain something a little better, understanding what I’m teaching more deeply.”

“That’s what keeps it fresh and keeps it fun.”

Hughes, of Waterville, “is one of the brightest minds here,” says one of his students, senior economics major Daniela Jaeckel of White Plains, N.Y. “It’s not surprising that his classes are always hard to get into.”

“He has been the clearest professor I’ve had at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½,” adds junior Brendan O’Brien of Mont Vernon, N.H. “He creates examples of ideas that students can relate to in order to keep their interest during lectures. And he manages to be incredibly humorous while conveying important points.

“Hughes challenges students to actually understand the material rather than just robotically spit it back.”

“There are a lot of great things about teaching in a small college environment like ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½,” says Hughes. “The best thing, I think, is that you’re teaching students who want to be there, who are highly motivated to learn, who have strong backgrounds in what you’re trying to teach.”

Hughes has conducted research on sex discrimination in labor markets in the U.S. and China. His research into fee-shifting on litigation outcomes culminated in an invitation to contribute an entry on the subject to The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics and the Law.

With his wife, Debra Barbezat, Mitchell Family Professor of Economics at Colby College, Hughes is researching the disappearance of African-American jockeys from thoroughbred racing at the turn of the 20th century.

“These jockeys were the most successful athletes in the most popular sport of the day in the late 19th century,” he says. “By 1905, African-Americans were all but gone from the sport. We want to identify these men, and learn how such a fully integrated sport was so rapidly and thoroughly segregated.”

“Teaching economics anywhere, you have to get across that this matters in people’s lives,” he says. “What I try to do with every concept, no matter how simple or obscure, is to try to make it clear that what we’re talking about comes up in the real world and that it makes a difference.

“It’s possible to use very simple economic tools to learn about very difficult problems, and if my students leave the classroom feeling that they can reflect on what’s going on in the world as an economist, even a little bit, then I think my teaching’s been quite successful.”

Hughes received his doctorate in economics from the University of Michigan in 1987, and his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Boston University. Prior to coming to ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, Hughes was on the faculty at Amherst College and The State University of New York at Albany.

Hughes is a blues fan, and builds guitars as a hobby. “I wish that I played beautifully and made ugly guitars, but it turns out I play poorly and build beautiful guitars,” he says. “So now I spend most of my free time building guitars, and not as much time as I used to playing them.”

Each year ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ students and recent alumni nominate Kroepsch Award recipients on the basis of their outstanding performance as teachers. Each year a committee of previous recipients selects the Kroepsch honoree from the list of nominees.

ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College has named James W. Hughes, a member of the economics faculty since 1992, as the Thomas Sowell Professor of Economics. Hughes presents his inaugural lecture as Sowell Professor at 5:15 p.m. Friday, Oct. 28, in Chase Hall Lounge, 56 Campus Ave.

Titled . . ., Drugs and Rock & Roll: Intellectual Property in the 21st Century, Hughes’ talk is open to the public at no charge. A reception follows.

The endowed Thomas Sowell Professorship in Economics was established in 2002 through a gift from ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College trustee Joseph T. Willett and his wife, Janice, of Ridgewood, N.J. A member of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ class of 1973, Willett is the former chief operating officer of Merrill Lynch for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

The professorship honors Sowell, an economist, author and commentator, and someone whom a Washington Post reviewer called America’s “most valuable public intellectual” for his challenges to orthodox thought across the spectrum of society.

“I’m both happy and humbled that the college chose to appoint me to this prestigious position,” says Hughes. “I’m grateful to Joe and Janice Willett for the generous gift that made this professorship possible, and pleased that they chose to name the professorship for such a prominent and provocative economist as Professor Sowell.”

Hughes’ lecture will examine serious challenges to intellectual property rights faced by two very different industries, pharmaceuticals and the music recording business, and how the public views those challenges.

“Intellectual property rights form the basis of their business” for both sectors, says Hughes. “Yet in public perception and public policy, there seems to be much more sympathy for the recording industry than the pharmaceutical industry. I hope to explore the reasons behind such different public perceptions.”

The talk relates to Hughes’ current research into the social value of pharmaceutical patents and the factors determining the longevity of such patents. He teaches economics across a wide range of applications, including labor, health and law. He has also investigated issues as diverse as gender equity in academic salaries, the effect of tort reform on medical malpractice claims, and Wal-Mart and the labor market.

Hughes’ work on the effects of fee-shifting on litigation outcomes culminated in an invitation to contribute an entry on the subject to The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics and the Law.

He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan in 1987, and his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Boston University. He is married to Debra A. Barbezat, professor of economics at Colby College. They live in Waterville and have a son, who is a junior at Waterville High School .

“The relentless search for the truth and the courage to express it despite its occasional unpopularity distinguishes Thomas Sowell,” Joseph Willett said in 2002, when the was announced. “Sowell’s writing reveals a great and real compassion for people — but one rooted in facts, not merely lofty sentiments.”

The Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow in Public Policy at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Sowell writes on economics, history, social policy, ethnicity and the history of ideas. His recent books include Black Rednecks and White Liberals (Encounter Books, 2005), Affirmative Action Around the World (Yale University Press, 2004), Basic Economics (Basic Books, revised and expanded edition, 2003) and Barbarians Inside the Gates (Hoover Institution Press, 1999).

Sowell’s current research focuses on cultural history in a world perspective. He was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2002 and the Bradley Prize for intellectual achievement in 2003.

Written by economist Howard Bodenhorn of Lafayette College, the 2001 study, Economic Scholarship at Elite Liberal Arts Colleges: Are Other Economists Paying Attention? measured the influence of 439 economists at liberal arts colleges. Bodenhorn concluded, “Although prominent economists at elite research universities produce the most influential scholarship, economists at the nation’s leading liberal arts colleges make significant contributions to the literature.” Ranking the publication record not by the number or books and articles, but by the frequency with which others cite their work, the study seeks to measure the quality and influence of the department’s scholarly output, rather than its quantity.

David A. Aschauer, the Elmer W. Campbell Professor of Economics at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, was the top-ranked full professor among liberal arts colleges. A former Federal Reserve senior economist, Aschauer has taught at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ since 1989. His teaching and research interests center on macroeconomics, financial markets and public finance.

Aschauer’s scholarship represents only a part of his department’s publication record. Michael Murray, the Charles Franklin Phillips Professor of Economics; Margaret Maurer-Fazio, associate professor of economics; and James Hughes, associate professor of economics, all have substantial numbers of citations.

Murray’s work concerns public economics, urban economics, econometrics and urban development. Maurer-Fazio’s research focuses on labor-market issues in China. Hughes specializes in labor economics and health care economics. “We were quite pleased with the results of the study,” said Hughes, who is also the department chair. “People have been working hard to complete and publish their work. It is nice to see that other economists have been paying attention.”

Hughes also noted that the rankings did not include the publications of the department’s newest member, Associate Professor Lynne Lewis, a well-respected and highly productive environmental economist. “If you include Lynne’s work, our ranking would be higher still,” said Hughes.

According to Bodenhorn’s findings, the 10 most productive liberal arts economics departments in the 1990s were Wellesley, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, Wesleyan, Colby, Williams, Bowdoin, Middlebury, Smith, Lafayette and Swarthmore.

Bodenhorn’s study cites 1999 research by James Baughman and Robert Goldman published in Change, a journal of higher education, that shows a high correlation between faculty publication records and college rankings. Prestigious baccalaureate liberal arts colleges have faculty publication records comparable to some research and doctoral granting institutions, Baughman and Goldman concluded.