Online Education is a convenient way to meet continuing education requirements - right from home, and on your own schedule.


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Get Ready for Spring 2010!


Participants receive:

  • Economics curriculum, including background content outlines, classroom activities, and teacher guides
  • Lecture (PowerPoint with audio) and Video demonstration CDs of classroom activities
  • Instruction by nationally-acclaimed mentor teachers and professors
  • Online interaction (asynchronous) with teachers throughout the United States and across the world
  • Graduate credit and "clock hour" confirmation, and graduate credit available. (Optional graduate credit from University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, $50/sem. hr. additional fee)

Sample Online Lesson

The stimulating mix of academic rigor, research based content, application of experiential learning simulations, and emphasis on interactive, asynchronous discourse make the Online offerings among FTE’s most popular courses.

Online Courses

Course Dates Status Graduate Credit Registration Deadline FEE
The Economic Demise of the Soviet Union OnlineJanuary 12 - March 16, 2010Closed2 creditsJanuary 6, 2010$150*
Economics Online for Teachers, Part 1January 26 - March 31, 2010Closed2 creditsJanuary 26, 2010$150*
Economics Online for Teachers, Part 2January 26 - March 31, 2010Closed2 creditsJanuary 26, 2010$150*
Is Capitalism Good for the Poor? OnlineJanuary 12 - April 6, 2010Closed3 creditsJanuary 15, 2010$150*


*This is a NON-REFUNDABLE registration and administration fee.

Online Course Offering Descriptions

Economics Online for Teachers, Parts 1 & 2 (EOFT-1 & EOFT-2)

Based on the 10-topic curriculum of the FTE's flagship Economics for Leaders program, the two Economics Online for Teachers courses are designed to reinforce teachers' understanding of basic concepts and the tools of economics reasoning that form the foundation for a standards-based, semester-long secondary course in economics. A combination of practice problems (with individual feedback from outstanding instructors experienced in both online and classroom teaching), stimulating discussions with teacher participants from all over the U.S. and around the world, and video demonstrations of classroom activities that address a variety of learning styles, EOFT is designed to increase teacher confidence in both the content and pedagogy of dynamic, engaging economic education. (Optional graduate credit available: Part 1 & Part 2, 2 sem. hrs. each)
EOFT-1: no pre-requisite EOFT-2: - no pre-requisite

Is Capitalism Good for the Poor? Online for Teachers (CAPO)

Funded by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation, Is Capitalism Good for the Poor? uses the tools of institutional economics, current data from respected sources including the World Bank and the United Nations, and case studies from such diverse locations as Brazil, Vietnam, China, Argentina, and Kenya to address that timely question. CAPO: successful completion of EOFT 1, 2 or EDSUO
Lesson topics include:

  • What is poverty and who are the poor?
  • An institutional definition of capitalism
  • The institutions of capitalism: property rights, rule of law, markets, and entrepreneurship
  • Using experimental economics and game theory to investigate the effects of capitalism on cooperative behavior in society
  • Why property rights are the ultimate human rights

The Economic Demise of the Soviet Union Online for Teachers (EDSUO)

With generous grants from the Calvin K. Kazanjian Economics Foundation, FTE first created The Economic Demise of the Soviet Union curriculum materials, and then incorporated the 6 lessons in a graduate-level teacher-education course. Both the curriculum materials and the online instruction focus on the fatal flaw of central planning - the innate inability to get the incentives right. Using the world wide web to enhance and supplement the background information provided in the curriculum outlines, EDSUO helps teachers understand -- and explain to their own students -- the weaknesses that undermined the Soviet economy. Video demonstrations of classroom activities simulate common features of Soviet daily life, helping to illustrate the application of economic reasoning to historical inquiry: Why did the economy of the Soviet Union collapse when it did? (Optional: 2 sem. hrs. graduate credit available)
EDSUO: no pre-requisite

The Calvin K. Kazanjian Economics Foundation again supported the creation of an online course for teachers based on the content and pedagogy of the high school curriculum unit and the wealth of supplementary sources available on the Internet. This is an intensive, in-depth examination of how one of the newest tools of economic reasoning - institutional analysis - informs one of the toughest challenges of the modern world. (Optional: 3 sem. hrs. graduate credit available)

The Economics of Disasters (EODO)

This set of lessons looks at a variety of natural disasters – from the Black Death of the Middle Ages to Hurricane Katrina in our too-recent memory, to fears of avian flu pandemics that haunt the future – through the lens of economic analysis.
EODO: successful completion of EOFT1, 2 or EDSUO