This paper examines the impact of increasing teacher salaries on student outcomes by exploiting variation from the “50K The First Day” campaign that established a $50K salary floor for new teachers across New Jersey school districts. Using school-level data from 2003 to 2019, we employ a staggered difference-in-differences (DiD) approach and first show that the campaign raised salaries for all teachers in New Jersey by approximately $1.5K. Our results indicate that districts implementing the salary increase experienced improvements in 4th grade and high school Math and English Language Arts (ELA) proficiency scores. We also observe modest gains in graduation rate and college enrollment. Analyzing the mechanisms through which these positive effects could have been observed, we rule out teacher migration as a key driver suggesting that the observed improvements are more likely due to changes in teacher motivation and the quality of new teachers entering the profession. Lifting teacher salaries for all teachers—regardless of their performance level—seems to be improving student outcomes in New Jersey.

U.S. colleges have an inequity problem and even when minority students do attend college, African Americans and Hispanic/Latino students have been found to be two of the most under-performing groups. In that regard, several colleges have adopted several strategies to first increase the diversity of the students in their college and second to ensure these students end up successfully graduating from college. This paper, which forms the first part of my second dissertation chapter, looks at one such program carried out by the Access Center at Colorado State University (CSU) called the Bridge Scholars Program - a program designed to assist students, especially those from first-generation and limited income households, in making a successful transition to college by offering an eight-week summer program the summer before they start their first year. Using a fuzzy regression discontinuity (FRDD) approach under a local randomization assumption, we find positive effects of the program on college retention and first-year GPA.

Building upon existing literatures that have shown that COVID had severe negative impacts on high-school outcomes, we can expect COVID to have had some negative repercussions on college outcomes for affected high-school students. This paper answers this question by analyzing whether studying under remote settings in high school had any impacts on college outcomes. Using a standard Differences-in-Differences (DiD) model under a continuous (non-binary) treatment setting, preliminary analysis show no consistent differences in the impact of studying online during high school on college outcomes as measured through college GPA and major choices. Given the results from our study, we argue that more research is needed to analyze how remote learning in high schools affects an individuals’ college outcomes and while conducting such research, future researchers should also take considerable time thinking about the mechanism through which different learning models could induce differing impacts.(Draft available upon request)

This paper initially started out during my second year of undergraduate when I was taking econometrics and got me interested in time-series analysis. Working on this paper made me 1) think deeply about the many limitations of the study , 2) reflect on the gaps in my knowledge (and thus graduate school!), and 3) finally understand what it actually means when we say "correlation does not imply causation". My research in graduate school has drifted away from this topic but I remain interested in this area. I recognize and regularly follow the many papers economist have published on foreign investment through channels of remittances and as of now, I do not think I have much to contribute to push the needle in this area. Working on this paper also made me realize how to think of non-significant results and whether those results are actually showing negligible effects. It also gave me the very first glimpses into how paper submissions work which for me, as an undergraduate, was interesting to navigate.
Shakya, Prasiddha, and George P. Gonpu. "Impact of remittances on economic growth in Nepal." Nepal Public Policy Review (2021): 31-47.

This is an example of a project I was part of for my work at IRISS where we use social network analysis (SNA) to figure out how connections amongst farmers explain their working pattern. The project was funded by the Environmental Defense Fund. A lot of the social network stuff did not end up in this report but I really enjoy working on these type of analysis and hope to incorporate network analysis in my future works. I have had no formal training on SNA's but I think I have picked up a lot of cool things working on different SNA projects at IRISS. I remain interested to see how, and if, SNA's will gain traction in economics research. Link to EDF report.

Iowa's farmlands, celebrated for their remarkable agricultural productivity, are facing pressing environmental challenges, including soil erosion, waterway nitrogen pollution, and vulnerability to extreme weather events. These issues imperil the state's agricultural sector's long-term sustainability and economic stability. Despite substantial investments from governmental and non-governmental entities to encourage conservation practice use, adoption rates remain persistently low. In this report, we use quantitative, qualitative, and social network analysis on a sample of 38 farmers to understand how social networks shape their adoption of conservation practices. We analyze data through a systems framework and compare counties with high- and low-adoption of conservation practices to assess influences from the individual farmer level to the broader societal context. We conclude with a discussion of strategic implications to promote conservation adoption.

Ellis, Elizabeth, Parker Arnold, Prasiddha Shakya, Juliet Lee, Emilia Ravetta, Ted Toombs, Anne Mook, and Jeni Cross. "Agricultural conservation networks in Iowa." Colorado State University. Libraries.

This was a project I did as part of CSU Extension. It is an input-output model using data from IMPLAN that looks at the economic impact of the Ute Theatre. The model was developed from scratch and I also administered a survey from start to finish to understand the socio-cultural importance of this historical venue to people of Rifle. In designing the survey flyer and in-person questionnaires, I finally made use of the many hours of my time I spent in high school learning how to use Photoshop. Ex-post, I was humbled to find many free websites online could have probably designed the flyers better. Report Media Coverage