Return to Table of ContentsApril 1998
Professor Oversees Pilot Curriculum
for Boston Public SchoolsFive years ago, Professor Lal Chugh, chair of the accounting and finance department, joined the Financial Executives Institute (FEI), a national professional organization of 14,000 business executives with an active Boston-area chapter. He now serves as director of academic relations for the Boston FEI, whose membership he describes as a "who's who of the local financial world."
Chugh is working with financial officers and representatives of local colleges and universities on an important project -- the development of an economics curriculum for grades 4, 8, and 10, presently being piloted in six Boston Public Schools.
The pilot program has been developed in response to new economics curriculum requirements mandated by the State Board of Education. Students will be tested in economics on examinations to be given for the first time this year to all Massachusetts students at these grade levels.
The FEI has contributed $45,000 to the curriculum development, which is being prepared by Boston University. Co-sponsor of the project is the Boston Plan for Excellence in Public Schools. The schools involved include Boston Latin and Charlestown High Schools, the McCormack Middle School, and the Farragut Elementary School. Two more schools are expected to participate.
"We're training two teachers in each of the schools in a standard concept of economics with a historical context," says Chugh."The curriculum is general enough to allow the teachers to incorporate their own ideas and examples, and be creative in the classroom," he adds. An independent educator will conduct assessment of the pilot program. If successful, the program will train more teachers and bring the curricula to more school districts.