Classes

• There is a lecture each week of semester. Barring technical issues (which often occur), screen recordings of all lectures will be made available on Echo. Lecture slides and the data sets used for examples in the lectures will be made available on iLearn. The lectures cover all the material necessary to pass the unit, including some material that is not available in other formats. Consequently, students are expected to attend all lectures and/or study the lectures online closely.
• There is a tutorial class held in each week except Week 1. Students must register in a tutorial class and generally will not be permitted to attend a tutorial class other than the one in which they are registered. Changes to tutorial enrolments may only be made using the online system subject to available capacity. The Unit Convenor cannot make enrolment changes on behalf of students. Changes to tutorial enrolments generally take up to 24 hours to be reflected on iLearn.
• In tutorial classes, students will attempt exercises that count towards their final grade. Except in special circumstances (e.g. technical problems that prevent a particular tutorial class from being run), these exercises may only be attempted by students who physically attend the class in which they are enrolled.
• The timetable for classes can be found on the University website: http://www.timetables.mq.edu.au/
• Students are expected to attend all lectures (live and/or online) and tutorials (live only), read the text, attempt the set exercises, and regularly seek help from their tutor for any problems that, having made a reasonable effort, they have not been able to resolve. Following the last tutorial class each week, marks and solutions for the tutorial exercises will be made available. Students should study the solutions carefully, attempt to resolve any issues they had with the work, and seek help from their tutor with any unresolved issues the following week. In general, it is difficult for staff to provide meaningful help to students who do not do this work each week.
• It is expected that students will spend an average of approximately 10 hours per week working on ECON241 (including class time).

Required and Recommended texts and/or materials

• Wooldridge, J. M., Wadud, M. and Lye, J. (2017) Introductory Econometrics (1st Asia-Pacific ed.) Cengage.

Additional useful textbooks and resources.

• Hill, C. H., Griffiths, W. E. and Lim, G. C. (2018) Principles of Econometrics (5th ed.) Wiley.

• Gujarati, D.N., and Porter, D.C. (2010) Essentials of Econometrics (4th ed.) McGraw-Hill.

• Stock, J.H., and Watson, M.W. (2007) Introduction to Econometrics (2nd ed.) Addition-Wesley

• A list of prescribed reading will be developed on the website as the unit progresses.

• The data sets used in the textbook and in lectures will be provided on the website.

Technology Used and Required

• The main software package used in ECON241 is Gretl (http://gretl.sourceforge.net/). This software is available for use in the 06EaR computer labs and may be freely downloaded for use elsewhere. The Microsoft Windows version is available at http://gretl.sourceforge.net/win32/. A Mac version is available at http://gretl.sourceforge.net/osx.html. Linux users should check their repositories or download the rpm or source from http://gretl.sourceforge.net/.

• The use of a spreadsheet will often be helpful for tasks in this unit. Microsoft Excel will be used during tutorials and is available for students to use off-campus at https://wiki.mq.edu.au/display/microsoftstu/About;jsessionid=E26834FF0E276C3384E93466EE687514. For students who don’t wish to use Microsoft Excel, free alternatives include OpenOffice (http://www.openoffice.org), LIbreOffice (https://www.libreoffice.org/) and Gnumeric (http://www.gnumeric.org/, https://portableapps.com/apps/office/gnumeric_portable).

• Formatting of equations using LaTeX will be required in the assignments. Guidance will be given on iLearn and in lectures.

• Course material is available on the learning management system (iLearn).

• Announcements will be made regularly on iLearn. Students should ensure that these announcements are forwarded to their email account, which they should check regularly. Staff may also occasionally directly email students.

• Students are strongly advised to check the unit web page regularly for new material and announcements.