To Aplia or not to Aplia: Technology in an intro to economics setting

The literature regarding technology in the classroom is extensive and with conflicting results. In general, college students of the current generation not only are familiar with standard technology (e.g., computers and the Internet) but they also expect this technology to be part of their academic experience. However, the impact of higher technology on student achievement is not clear. For instance simulations in the classroom seem effective, while Power Point is not. A new technological innovation having an increasing presence in economics classroom nationwide is Aplia. Given that this technology is relatively new, the research about its effectiveness is limited. However, although limited, research seems to imply that Aplia has a positive impact on students’ achievement as measured by final grades. This paper offers a new wrinkle regarding Aplia’s effectiveness. We use a Logit model to measure the impact of Aplia on the likelihood that students will pass Intro to Econ courses with a grade of C or better.  However, after imposing relevant controls our results show that Aplia has no impact on the likelihood that a student will pass an Intro to Econ course with a grade of C or better.