Ann Velenchik

My work is in the general area of labor markets and household behavior in Africa. I have worked on migration, apprenticeship, the relationship between company size and wages and, most recently, on an interdisciplinary approach to questions of intrahousehold resource allocation. I have worked in Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, and Zimbabwe and also done work on Senegal and Malawi. I spent six years as the Director of Wellesley's Writing Program, and one year directing all of Wellesley's First-Year academic programs.   I believe that I am the only economist among the many members of the Writing Program Administrators organization. I am especially interested in the combination of writing and quantitative reasoning.

My teaching portfolio has included a writing course entitled Wealth and Poverty in America, which looks at the distribution of income in the United States over the past three decades, and economics courses including Principles of Microeconomics, Intermediate Microeconomics, International Trade, and Economic Development.  I am particularly interested in active learning techniques in economics, and in writing in the economics curriculum and have written and published several pieces on the use of the case method in the economics classroom. Most recently, I have participated in the development of a Web resource for teachers of economics as part of an NSF-funded project.  

In the Dean's office my portfolio includes Science and Social Science Departments and matters related to curriculum and instruction.

I am married to an economist and the mom of two great kids. I like theaters, restaurants, and elegant bars, but I spend more of my time at sports fields and school auditoriums watching my children play and perform. I do a little performing myself─you can find some of my work at Wellesley's iTunes U site.