ECON 3523. 2023 Assignment 3. Empirical study design (5 points) Consider our course, ECON 3523, Advanced Economic Analysis III. Now the faculty wants to understand how effective the course is in improving students' econometric modelling skills. Last year, the faculty administrative team took a look at the students' overall outcomes of the course, which were pretty good. They concluded that the course was effective in students' econometric modelling skill improvement. 1. Identify at least three issues associated with the above study design.

To improve the above study design, the administrative team ran a separate test in this regard among all third year economics students, and compared the outcomes between those who selected the course and those who did not. 2. What issue is potentially addressed in this case , and what issues remain there?

To further improve the above study design, the administrative team changed the course to be an open selective among all economics students, and ran the test and compared the outcomes. 3. What issue is potentially addressed in this case , and what issues remain there?

To further improve the above study design, they decided to randomly assign students into the treatment group (attendants) and control group (non-attendants) of the course. 4. What issues are there?

Following the most updated procedure above, of course, as it turned out to be, many students hesitated to take an additional test just for course effectiveness study, and refrained from the course as it has 'two exams'. Even though the test for this study won't count, sitting in an exam is an unpleasant experience anyway. Daniel, a student from the course (because I checked and there's no one called this name), suggested he could encourage his friends to enrol in this course, which would be easy, which could then facilitate the study. 5. What are the issues? Specifically, which issue has never disappeared throughout the above updates of the study design?