Departmental news

We are delighted that a number of final year undergraduate University of Warwick Economics students were accepted to present the results of their dissertation research at the 2021 British Conference for Undergraduate Research.

This year's conference was hosted online by the University of Leeds, taking place over two days; 12-13 April 2021. Since it was founded in 2010, the BCUR offers a fantastic opportunity for undergraduate students to present their research in friendly environment and experience the atmosphere of a research conference. The annual conference is held annually at different UK universities and is open to a range of disciplines.

At this year's online conference, there was around 250 presentations by students at 70 higher education institutions presenting on a broad range of subjects, a selection of 100 flash talks, Q&A session with PhD Postgraduate students and a virtual conference social.

The Warwick Economics students who presented at the 2021 conference were:

• Gin Fah Chong (BSc Economics)
• Wing Chow (PPE)
• Larina Corniciuc (Modern Languages and Economics)
• Kai Foerster (MSc Economics)
• Patricio Hernandez Senosiain (BSc Economics
• Salman Mallick (BSc Economics)

Student BCUR Presentations

Iarina Corniciuc's presentation titled 'Does boardroom diversity affect a firms financial performance' highlighted that the ethical argument for increasing diversity is irrefutable. Through her research Iarina provided an economic case for diversity to further strengthen the argument. The presentation is available to view here:

Kai Forester asked the question 'Does staying home slow down COVID-19 transmission?'. Kai's research attempts to uncover the casual relationship between people's mobility patterns and COVID-19 cases using latest econometric techniques. The presentation is available to view here:

We are very pleased to announce that Jenny Guo, a second year undergraduate student (BSc Economics) has been named as a finalist for the First Generation Undergraduate of the Year 2021 Award.

The TARGETjobs Undergraduate of the Year Awards is a competition open to students across the UK where they can win prizes such as placements, internships and trips abroad with internationally recognised organisations. This year there were 9 different awards that cover a range of academic subjects and skillsets with over 5,000 students applying with 200 making it to the second stage of the competition.

To make it to the final of the Undergraduate of the Year Awards students had to first complete an application, including essay style questions and online tests. Once passing that stage students were either invited to a telephone interview or take part in an assessment centre. HSBC, who sponsored the prize, have been extremely impressed with Jenny and she was invited to the grand final which took place on Friday 30 April. Although Jenny didn’t win the prize, we congratulate her on the fantastic achievement of making it to the top 10 in the country for this category.

We asked Jenny to reflect on the competition as well as her time at Warwick and here is what she said:

What made you enter this competition?

As the first person in my family to attend University, I thought this competition would be a great way to gain new opportunities, build my confidence and network. I found out about this competition through an email from TARGETjobs.

What did you have to do as part of the competition?

As part of the competition, I had to complete an online application with three questions specifically set by HSBC. Following that, I had to sit a couple of online tests and participated in a virtual assessment consisting of solving a business problem in a set time.

What was it like to attend the final ceremony which was a virtual event? The virtual ceremony was great - we got a lovely picnic hamper sent to us the day before with lots of treats and had the chance to network with fellow finalists, HSBC staff and Rachel Riley!

What was the top prize in your category?

The prize is a paid summer internship with HSBC, one-to-one mentoring sessions and a breakfast meeting with a senior manager.

What have been the highlights of your degree course at Warwick to date?

The Economics degree is intellectually rewarding, at times challenging, but I enjoy the module flexibility, which has enabled me to pick topics like Development Economics and Applied Economics. Another highlight is the diverse range of people at Warwick and the long-lasting friendships that I have built. I have learnt so much from chatting to fellow peers, be it about seminar problem sets or discussing recent market news.

What is your favourite module?

My favourite module this year has been Macroeconomics (EC201). Despite the virtual environment, our lecturers, Roberto and Federico were very engaging, and I enjoyed learning about the new macro concepts.

What student societies do you engage with and why?

Student societies have been a major part of my University life. One highlight was co-founding Warwick Women in Economics Society last year and I have been on the exec team for EconSoc and Warwick Women’s Careers Society. Last year, I was also a student consultant for Warwick Consulting Society working on a project for a FTSE 100 FMCG company. I try to get involved in many different societies as I think it is a great way to meet new people and gain the practical skills needed for the workforce.

What can you tell us about your role of Co-president of the Warwick Women’s Careers Society?

In a nutshell, my role is to ensure the society functions effectively and help expand WWCS to a greater level in line with our vision: unlocking female employment potential in all sectors. I am very excited to lead the society for the upcoming year and work with other incredible female students!

What are you planning to do after graduation?

I will be doing an investment banking internship this summer and hopefully, I can convert that into a graduate role. I am also exploring MSc/MBA routes following graduation.

What are your longer-term career plans?

I am currently interested in a career in investment banking or consulting, but ultimately, I’ve always wanted to set up my own business one day. I am also very passionate about volunteering, so I hope to also travel in the future to do charity work and give back to local communities across the world.

Related Links:

TargetJobs First Generation Undergraduate of the Year 2021

Warwick Women in Economics Society

Warwick Women's Careers Society

Warwick Economics Society

Warwick Consulting Society

We are delighted to announce that PhD student Karmini Sharma has won the best student paper award at the Australian Gender Economics Workshop 2021 and at the Women in the Economy: 3rd Annual Workshop.

The Australian Gender Economics Workshop is an annual event that has been running for the last four years. The workshop brings together a global community with the shared goal of understanding what drives gender inequality in the Australian society and economy, as well as what can be done to reduce the inequalities that exist. This year’s event was held online and attracted an increased number of international colleagues and a large number of students who presented their papers during the course of the two days.

Karmini also won the best paper award at the Women in the Economy: 3rd Annual Workshop organised by the Initiative for What Works to Advance Women and Girls in the Economy (IWWAGE) based in Delhi and the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI). IWWAGE is an initiative of LEAD, an action-oriented research centre of IFMR Society (a not-for-profit society) and is supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The initiative aims to generate new research evidence to inform and facilitate the agenda of women’s economic empowerment by looking at barriers to women working in India. Currently, the labour force participation is one of the lowest in the world and continuing to fall.

In her paper ‘Tackling Sexual Harassment: Evidence from India', Karmini focuses on whether sexual harassment of women by men can be deterred through awareness training for men. Karmini studied whether the deterrence takes place due to changes in intrinsic attitudes and norms against sexual harassment or due to changes in beliefs about them. Her study found that the extreme forms of sexual harassment can be deterred by these trainings with men and presented evidence supporting a change in men's perception of norms as a mechanism behind it.

Professor James Fenske, who supervised Karmini’s research stated:

"Karmini has been doing excellent work experimentally evaluating interventions aimed at tackling sexual harassment in Delhi colleges. It is great to see her paper recognised."

We are delighted to announce that for the second year Warwick’s Department of Economics has been ranked 25th in the 2021 edition of the QS World University Ranking for Economics and Econometrics, published on 3 March 2021.

We have been placed in the top 5 of the UK based Universities after LSE, Oxford, Cambridge and UCL. The rankings, compiled by global higher education analysts QS (Quacquarelli Symonds) examined over 14,000 individual university programmes, taken by students at 1,452 universities across the world.

Commenting on the news, Professor Jeremy Smith, Head of Department of Economics, said:

“I am very pleased to hear the news which shows that the Department has been consistently achieving high rankings in subject league tables. This is a great achievement for us all as it recognises the hard work, passion and dedication of our staff and students. I would like to thank them all for their contribution to this collective success.

I would also like to add that, despite a very challenging year, we have been able to adapt successfully to a blended approach to teaching and learning. We will be continuing to develop strengths in research and teaching, attracting high calibre students and staff to the Department.”

Useful links:

• QS World University Rankings for Economics and Econometrics, published 2021.
• 2021 QS World University Rankings ranks University of Warwick in world’s top 100 for 16 subjects.
• About the Department of Economics, University of Warwick
  • Find out more about Our Reputation
  • Learn about Our Community Values
  • Study with us
  • Work with us

We caught up with Aneesah Sarwar (BSc Economics, 2019), who currently works as a graduate analyst at Barclays UK. We heard that Aneesah had started, with five other graduates, a new podcast and we wanted to ask her a few questions about this enterprise and about her life and work since graduating.

Can you tell us what you have been up to since graduating from Warwick?

I graduated from Warwick in 2019 with a BSc degree in economics. After completing an internship at Barclays at the end of my second year, I was offered a place on their graduate programme and have been working there ever since graduating. Whilst at Barclays I took part in a social intrapreneurship challenge which was all about being an entrepreneur within a large organisation to tackle a social problem in a way that benefits the consumer, the company and society at large. Through this challenge, I met five other recent graduates that were also passionate about solving the problem identified by The Alison Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship. One in three entrepreneurs in the UK are female, which represents £250 billion of new value that could be added to the UK economy if women started and scaled new businesses at the same rate as men. The review has identified ways of unlocking this untapped talent and the team and I took it upon ourselves to help close this gap and in doing so, the podcast and online community Her Own Boss was born.

How is Her Own Boss helping young professional women?

In order to bridge the early careers confidence gap, Her Own Boss is a podcast and online community designed to help young women find their inner entrepreneur, by exposing them to inspirational role models and providing practical advice for personal and professional development. The episodes explore the stories and experiences of female entrepreneurs from a wide range of industries, covering aspects of entrepreneurship like side hustles, venture capital and start-ups. Listeners can also hear useful tips and tricks in the minisodes where the expert mentors share advice in a bite-sized format. You can listen to the podcast on Anchor, Spotify and Apple Podcasts and all other major podcast platforms. Be sure to subscribe and follow Her Own Boss on Instagram and LinkedIn to hear the latest episodes as soon as they come out.

Explain to us the process of creating and publishing new episodes?

As the team’s Content Lead, I plan the main episodes and minisodes for the podcast. One of my key roles is researching different topics and industries and putting together the plans for each episode to ensure we have a wide variety of content across each season. In order to add value to our audience, it’s important for me to understand listeners’ interests and habits, as well as the early-careers and entrepreneurship space. This helps me identify topics and potential guests that would be perfect for the podcast. Then it’s all about reaching out and inviting people onto the podcast, followed by engaging in content discussions with them. As a team, we then record, edit and distribute the episodes across all our channels for our listeners to enjoy.

What are your favourite episodes?

It’s incredibly hard to choose my favourite episodes because I enjoy every single one. However, one of my favourites is definitely ‘Feminism, fast fashion & sustainable entrepreneurship with Josephine Philips’, which covered the green agenda and environmental sustainability – a topic I’m personally very interested in and passionate about. Having recently graduated university, Josephine has recently launched her green start-up and explained how the fast fashion industry impacts sustainability, feminism and human rights, as well as discussing her own journey to make both her business and personal life more sustainable. I personally love hearing from all the amazing women like Josephine that join the podcast; it leaves me feeling inspired and ready to grasp every opportunity life throws my way. Other episodes have covered entrepreneurship within academia, women in gaming and STEM. These are such interesting industries that I might not otherwise have exposure to, so I find it fascinating to learn more about them by listening to the guests’ experiences and insights.

What have you learnt personally?

I’ve personally found the minisodes so useful for my development. In particular, Vanessa Vallely OBE, founder and CEO of WeAreTheCity, joined us for an episode on how to kickstart your network, which highlighted how to identify who you need to network with, how to approach them and how to keep those relationships thriving. I started using her tips in my professional career and I can see the difference it’s making already! The minisodes have also covered topics like how to overcome imposter syndrome, how to present yourself with confidence, how to create your own career path and much more. Our feedback has shown that our minisodes are not only useful for both students and recent graduates, but also for people wanting to develop in their careers.

How did your experiences at Warwick help you in your career?

Whilst at Warwick I was involved in the Warwick Economics Summit and joined the team in my very first month of starting at Warwick. From starting as a Social Events team member to then leading the Social Events team as a Coordinator in the exec team, I then decided to step it up a notch and take on the role as overall Summit Coordinator. It was a vast amount of responsibility and commitment that challenged me to develop skills such as strategic thinking, communication, time management and leadership, all of which are vital skills in the workplace and beyond. The experience meant that I had both the confidence and ability to seek out and successfully take on additional responsibilities on my graduate programme, which is allowing me to develop further professionally and excel in my career.

What advice would you share with current students and early career professionals?

Focus on yourself and your own goals. You may feel the pressure to conform to what everyone around you is doing but remember that everyone is unique and can create their own path so don’t worry too much about what other people are doing, whether it’s related to studying, societies, socialising or careers. Figure out what works for you and what you want in life and just focus on that.

Her Own Boss - Selection of Episodes and Minisodes

• How to set goals with Niamh Crawford-Walker, 21 December 2020 – Listen now.
• How to succeed in job interviews with Sophie Miller, 14 December 2020 – Listen now.
• How to build your personal brand with Mary Agbesanwa, 30 November 2020 - Listen now.
• Women in gaming: representing the other 50% with Jay & Poornima, 13 November 2020 - Listen now.
• How to overcome imposter syndrome with Sonya Barlow, 9 November 2020 - Listen now.
• How to speak up against micro-aggressions with Hannah Awonuga, 19 October - Listen now.
• How to kickstart your network with Vanessa Vallely OBE, 11 September 2020 - Listen now
• Finding confidence throughout your career with Kate Bache, 3 July 2020 - Listen now.

If you would like to take part in the podcasts, please contact Aneesah via her LinkedIn profile or the Her Own Boss Instagram page.

About Aneesah Sarwar

Aneesah Sarwar is a graduate analyst at Barclays UK. During her time at Warwick, Aneesah volunteered as a WES Summit Coordinator and helped to organise their 18th edition of the Warwick Economics Summit. Aneesah studied BSc Economics between 2016-2019.

A recent report co-authored by Dr Arun Advani, Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics, University of Warwick and Co-chair of the national campaign Discover Economics, has highlighted the need for action to increase levels of diversity of academic economists in the UK, an issue which the Department is committed to addressing.

The report was the outcome of a collaborative project between several organisations: The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), Royal Economic Society (RES), Centre for Competitive Advantage (CAGE) based at Warwick and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC).

It finds that 24 per cent of academic economists conducting research are from BAME backgrounds and this proportion is increasing with time. However, there are large differences in representation across ethnic groups, with Chinese and Indian ethnicity overrepresented and Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Black individuals significantly under-represented.

The report also finds that diversity is uneven across the HE sector, with Black economists 64 per cent less likely to work in Russell Group institutions than White economists. Ethnic minority economists are also less likely to hold senior academic or managerial positions than their white peers.

Will things be better for the next generation? The study reports good representation of BAME students among undergraduate students (37 per cent in 2018) studying economics. The issue of concern that emerges here is that of gender representation: men are much more likely to choose to study economics than women (1 in 29 British men study economics for their degree compared to 1 in 105 for women).

What action can be taken to increase the diversity of the profession? The report highlights the fact that the economics pipeline starts at school and many of the differences between groups derive from the lack of opportunity to study A level economics.

Dr Arun Advani comments, “Our findings show that without improving access to economics in schools, it is hard to make economists more representative of society”.

Dr Stefania Paredes Fuentes, Associate Professor within the Department of Economics, University of Warwick, has recently been appointed as the Royal Society of Economics’ Diversity Champion. In this role, Stefania will help embed diversity more fully into the RES’s decision-making and promote and monitor diversity across all the Society’s activities.

Widening Participation and Outreach

The Department of Economics is also working hard to increase diversity amongst students and staff at Warwick. In addition to embracing the national Discover Economics campaign as reported in October 2019, the Department contributes to the University's initiatives to increase diversity within economics, including:

• Sutton Trust Summer School
• Pathways to Banking
• Warwick Scholars

The Department of Economics believes that access to a world-leading university should be open to people from all backgrounds. With an aim to raise students' aspirations and increase students' awareness of the benefits of Higher Education, the Department runs a number of initiatives, some of which include:

• Running a Discover Economics Virtual Series for Year 9 and 10 students from the local area.
• New webpage to access Economics academic resources for prospective students.
• Providing access to additional academic and pastoral support for eligible students.

Dr Lory Barile, Widening Participation Co-ordinator in the Department of Economics has said:

"Economics has a diversity problem which is largely affected by a misperception about the subject. Because of this, many talented students from diverse groups and backgrounds do not even consider studying economics.

We are working hard on increasing diversity in our Department by contributing to a number of initiatives at University level and organising our own activities at Departmental level to increase ethnic and gender diversity. We are very proud of our recent achievements on attracting students from under-represented groups and backgrounds, though we recognise the need to continue to work on creating a more inclusive and diverse environment within our discipline."

Find out more

Community Values

As another example of its commitment to diversity, the Department of Economics are also delighted to have recently published a set of community values which outlines key principles that in which all staff and students are expected to embrace.

These values aim to create a community where differences in culture are celebrated, difference of opinion is welcomed and respected and where prejudices and socially unacceptable behaviours of any kind are never tolerated.

Find out more

The eighth edition and the first virtual version of Warwick Economics PhD Conference was held on 6-7 November 2020. The event was organised by PhD students with the help of the Marketing & Communications Team and with financial support from the Department.

This year, the annual conference which is organised by PhD students of the Department of Economics, received over 150 applications from graduate students of leading research institutions across the world. A multi-stage selection process, involving a scientific committee consisting of Warwick faculty members and PhD students, helped in the process of whittling down these high-quality applications to seventeen – 10 seminar presentations and 7 poster presentations.

The conference was due to take place earlier in the year but had to be postponed due to the pandemic. As with most events this year, we decided to host the 2020 edition online, aiming to provide an opportunity for young researchers to present and exchange their work and ideas via a digital platform of MS Teams.

Over two days, conference delegates and speakers engaged in intellectually stimulating presentations by students from Paris School of Economics, New York University, University of Amsterdam, Oxford University, University of California Davis, Toulouse School of Economics, Columbia University, Georgetown University, Erasmus School of Economics, KU Leuven, VU Amsterdam, Stanford GSB, and University of Southern California.

The papers presented covered a broad range of topics and fields, and were organised into four main sessions: Public Economics, Macroeconomics, Applied Economics, and Economic Theory. Each 20-minutes presentation was followed by a discussion and comments from students and faculty members in the audience, providing the authors constructive feedback. Another interesting aspect of the conference were poster presentations which were also well received.

Overall, the event was a great success: it provided a platform to graduate students from different institutions to showcase their work and gave a great opportunity to Warwick students to discuss their research and promote the Department’s program to their peers across the globe.

Learn more about who the participants were and their projects.

The Department is pleased to announce that Economics at Warwick has been ranked 4th in the specialist subject table for Economics in the Times and The Sunday Times Good University Guide 2021.

The Good University Guide 2021, published annually by the Times and the Sunday Times at the start of academic year, provides British university rankings based on five categories: teaching quality, student experience, research quality, entry points and graduate prospects. We are particularly pleased to see Economics at Warwick achieving high scores for graduate prospects (95.1%) and a total score of 99.5% placing us 4th behind Oxford, Cambridge and the LSE.

Earlier this year we were also ranked 4th in the Complete University Guide and 6th in the Guardian’s league table. In the QS World University Ranking for Economics and Econometrics we are currently ranked 25th.

Professor Jeremy Smith, Head of Department of Economics, said:

“I am pleased to see the Department consistently achieving high rankings in subject league tables as it recognises the hard work, passion and dedication of our staff and students. I would like to thank them all for their contribution to this collective success.

It is also important for me to stress that we are never complacent and we will continue to develop our strengths in research and teaching, attracting high calibre of students and staff to the Department.”

Find out more:

• The Times and The Sunday Times Good University Guide 2021 (The Times subscription is required to view it).
• The Complete University Guide 2021 ranked Warwick Economics 4th.
• We are currently ranked 25th in the QS World University Rankings for Economics and Econometrics, published in 2020.

We are pleased to report that the Sutton Trust Summer School (STSS) which ran between 27-31 July was a great success. The programme, offered to Year 12 high achieving students from disadvantaged backgrounds, attracted 120 participants from across the UK.

Since 2016, Warwick has been one of 13 partner universities in the Sutton Trust's UK Summer School Programme, organised by the University's Widening Participation and Outreach Team and supported by academic departments, including the Department of Economics. The aim of the programme is to enable the participants to experience what being a student at Warwick is like. They attend taster lectures in a subject of their choice and learn about the UCAS process as well as attend social events.

Virtual delivery

This year, the challenge was to organise and deliver the STSS programme entirely in a virtual environment, via the Sutton Trust Online Platform. As in previous year, we supported the initiative by delivering academic content as part of the Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE) stream, alongside our colleagues from the Department of Philosophy and the Department of Politics and International Studies. As we are all getting used to more digital communications since the beginning of the pandemic, the presenters, facilitators and the participants found it relatively easy to adjust to a virtual delivery of the programme.

Behavioural Economics

The Economics session was delivered by Dr Lory Barile, Associate Professor and the Widening Participation Coordinator in the Department of Economics, who engaged a group of 28 PPE stream participants in playing a simplified version of the public good game with punishments as described in Fehr and Gatcher (2000). The idea was to link the experiment with the concept of altruistic punishment and individuals' behaviour during the pandemic. For the online game, students were put into eight groups of four and in each round they had to make individual decisions which had brought different levels of benefit to them individually and to their group. In break-out rooms, after the game, they had an opportunity to answer some questions and reflect on the nature of the game they played, the strategy they had adopted during the game, the reasons for their contributions to the common project, and the relevance of the game for economists.

Dr Lory Barile said:

"I really enjoy working with the young students to open their eyes to the exciting subject of economics. I think that experiential learning is an excellent way to introduce and discuss complex economic concepts! "

Before starting the game, students were also asked in an online survey, to describe in three words what economics is and what economists do. The results can be seen in the word clouds below.

What is economics?

What do economists do?

The answers to these questions as well as those that guided discussion in the break-out rooms survey were used to conduct some data analysis that was presented in a Q&A session the following day. During this session, the link between the reading material suggested prior to the live session and the experiment was made clear, and with clear reference to the pandemic. The results of the experiment, its relevance for economists and any misconception about what economics is and what economists do were also discussed and the winning group was announced.

During the experiment, Dr Barile was assisted by a group of colleagues from the Department of Economics (Atisha Gosh, Cecilia Lanata-Briones and Bozena Beauclair), one Economics student (Elakiya Ananthakrishnan ) and members of the wider WP and Outreach team, who acted as facilitators in the virtual break-out rooms.

Feedback from the participants

Here is what the participants posted in the anonymous online poll, which shows that they did enjoy the session:

"The experiment in the economics lecture was super accessible whilst opening up some really interesting discussions afterwards."

"The experiment in the economics seminar was very engaging."

"The experiment that had taken place in economics was engaging as we were challenged to think outside the box and come up with what we thought the aim of it was - the conversations that followed were also really engaging."

Further information

For further information about different aspects of this article, please visit:

• our Outreach in Economics page to see how the Department is involved in various outreach initiatives and who to contact;
• Dr Lory Barile's profile and how she describes her research in behavioural economics
• Experimental and Behavioural Economics research group page - to find out more about the Department's research in this area.

We are delighted to announce that two of our postgraduate research students have been recognised in the 2020 Warwick Awards for Teaching Excellence for Postgraduates who Teach (WATE PGR): Cora Neumann (winner) and Riccardo Degasperi (commendee).

Research students can carry out a range of teaching activities including facilitating seminars, lecturing and project supervision, and the WATE PGR programme aims to recognise the best teachers from postgraduate research students at Warwick, nominated by students, fellow postgraduates, and the Department.

Cora Neumann is a PhD candidate in the Department with research interests in economic history, labour economics and gender economics and she teaches first and second year undergraduate modules in economics for business and economics for strategy. Riccardo Degasperi is also a PhD candidate in Economics and his research interests are in applied macroeconomics and time series econometrics. He contributes to teaching on econometrics and advanced econometric theory modules.

Here is what they said about their WATE PGR recognition:

It means so very much! Since I am relatively new to teaching it still takes a lot of work to prepare for good seminars, and it is very gratifying and humbling to be recognised for what I consider an integral part of my PhD. Being recognised through this award is also a motivation to become an ever better teacher and to continuously develop and improve.

Read the full interview with Cora here to find out about how she adapted her teaching during Covid-19 and what she has learnt from the experience.

It is a huge honour. I try my best with my students. Knowing that they appreciate this and that the University acknowledges it is extremely rewarding.

Read the full interview with Riccardo here and find out what he enjoys most about teaching and what his recipe for the perfect inspiring teacher is.

Further information:

• Find out more about the 2020 Warwick Awards for Teaching Excellence for Postgraduate Research Students.