| Week | Day | Topic | Readings | Slides | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Thursday | Why causal analysis? | Why causal analysis? Slides | ||
| 1 | Tuesday | Potential outcomes framework | Ferraro et al., 2018 Skim: Holland, P.W. (1986), “Statistics and Causal Inference.” |
The Challenge of Impact Assessment Slides | |
| Thursday | No Class | No Class | |||
| 2 | Tuesday | Causal Diagrams | Brodie, J.F., et al. (2023), “Landscape-Scale Benefits of Protected Areas for Tropical Biodiversity.” The Effect Book (ch6 & 7) |
DAG Slides | |
| Thursday | Causal Diagrams | The Effect Book (ch6 & 7) | Assignment 1 due Thurs, Oct 10 (includes paper topic) | ||
| 3 | Tuesday | Randomized Control Trials (RCT) and Power Calculations | Impact Evaluation in Practice (ch4,p63-86) | Randomized Control Trials Slides | |
| Thursday | Randomized Control Trials (RCT) and Power Calculations | Impact Evaluation in Practice (ch15,p261-287) | |||
| 4 | Tuesday | Matching and Synthetic Controls | Honey-Rosés, J., et al. (2011) Skim: Rubin, D. B. (1974), “Original Work” |
Matching Estimators Slides | |
| Thursday | Matching and Synthetic Controls | Alberto Abadie, Alexis Diamond & Jens Hainmueller (2012) | Synthetic Controls Slides | ||
| 5 | Tuesday | Differences-in-Differences (DID) and Staggered roll-out | Wauchope HS, Jones JPG, et al. (2022) | Difference-in-Differences Slides | |
| Thursday | Differences-in-Differences and Staggered roll-out | Jonathan Roth, Pedro H.C. Sant’Anna, Alyssa Bilinski, John Poe. (2023) | New DiD Slides | Assignment 2 due Tues, Oct 29 | |
| 6 | Tuesday | Instrumental Variables and Regression Discontinuity Design | Mellon, 2024 | IV Slides | |
| Thursday | Instrumental Variables and Regression Discontinuity Design | Noack, Frederik, Ashley Larsen, Johannes Kamp, and Christian Levers. (2022) | Assignment 3 due Tues, Nov 12th | ||
| 7 | Tuesday | Standard errors and spatial considerations | RDD Slides | ||
| Thursday | |||||
| 8 | Tuesday | Remote Sensing and Machine Learning (ML) in Causal Analysis | Proctor, J., Carleton, T., Sum, S. (2023) Proctor, J., Carleton, T. Slides | Spatial Causal Slides | |
| Thursday | Machine Learning (ML) in Causal Analysis | Baylis, K., T. Heckelei, H. Storm. (2021) Avelino et al 2016 Goldilocks and the Raster Grid | ML in Causal Analysis Part I Slides  |
Assignment 4 due Thurs, Nov 30 | |
| 9 | Tuesday | Machine Learning (ML) in Causal Analysis | ML in Causal Analysis Part II Slides |
||
| Thursday | No Class (Thanksgiving) | Thanksgiving | |||
| 10 | Tuesday | Final Presentations | - | Slides | Final Paper Proposal due Dec 9th |