We describe Shamir's secret sharing scheme and explain how it can be used for secure and redundant cryptocurrency storage. We include samples of individual and group assignments that can be used in an upper-division cryptology class for students who are familiar with modular arithmetic. It takes about one class to cover Shamir's secret sharing,…

Despite recent clarifications by central banks that it is indeed "commercial banks" that are the main creators of the money supply, money creation processes remain as confusing and opaque as ever to many. This article develops a simplified macro-visual diagram of today's money system based on the increasingly accepted "credit…

The purpose of this article is to provide guidance for instructors who wish to develop a course associated with student participation in the College Fed Challenge (CFC), an academic competition designed to test students' knowledge of current economic events and monetary policy. We eschew a lecture-only methodology and use small-group and…

Blockchain, which is a disruptive technology, affects many technologies, and it will affect many other technologies. Main property of blockchain technologies is assuring trust without central authorization. This is achieved through immutable data and decentralization. Moreover, blockchain is founded on the principles of cryptography, which…

The 3-equation model by Carlin and Soskice (2014) introduces the current consensus in modern monetary macroeconomics to undergraduates through a static framework in which adjustment occurs via the monetary policy rule of an inflation-targeting central bank. In this article, the authors present a dynamic extension of this model and an Excel-based…

This paper provides details on a classroom experiment that focuses on returns to foreign assets given uncertain future exchange rates. Students are assigned the role of foreign analysts and decide how much to invest abroad given their expectations about future exchange rates. The experiment allows students to practice calculating the returns to…

In this article, the authors describe a classroom experiment on exchange rates appropriate for undergraduate courses in macroeconomics, international economics, and money and banking. Student teams compete by managing virtual portfolios of six foreign currencies over a period of several weeks. Trading requires a few minutes in class. Students gain…

From the early 1600s to the late 1700s the monetary system of the 13 colonies was so dysfunctional that basic transactions required cumbersome mathematical calculations, specialized almanacs, and extensive knowledge of foreign coinage weights, measures, and values. Once the Declaration of Independence was signed, one task of the Founding Fathers…

The cryptocurrency Bitcoin has been prominently featured in the news recently. Its ascension in value has been nothing short of extraordinary. This article briefly explains what Bitcoin is and how it works. The more challenging question is what Bitcoin--this cryptographic breakthrough--really is: currency, like the U.S. dollar, an asset, more like…

The manuscript proposes a method based on Blockchain technology, IPFS, and asymmetric key algorithm to authenticate academic degrees and certificates. The proposed method employs decentralization and therefore provides a scalable, secure, transparent, and economical solution than existing methods. In the proposed framework, the degrees and…

The money creation and monetary policy chapters in the leading introductory textbooks commonly present an outdated and misleading approach that is now largely irrelevant. A preferable model would help students understand that money and monetary policy are about bank and household motives, the importance of capital, and the role of credit. An…

The foreign exchange (FX) market is an important chapter in international finance. Understanding the market microstructure is critical for learning the FX market. To assist students better understand the FX market microstructure, an instructor can use an event study with minute-by-minute quote data provided in the Excel assignment, asking students…

In the year that George Ritzer publishes the ninth edition of "The McDonaldization of Society," moving his famous theory firmly "Into the Digital Age," critical educator Petar Jandric and sociologist Sarah Hayes invited George to a dialogue on the digital transformation of McDonaldization and its critical application to Higher…

Early in the semester, during a seemingly benign math lesson over money, one of the students in my second and third grade blended classroom halted the instruction to ask "Wait! Why are there no women on money? Is there any money with women on it?" Never one to miss an opportunity to get my students thinking critically, we took some time…

Over the course of one semester, six empirical assignments that utilize FRED are used to introduce students of money and banking courses to the economic analysis required for the conduct of monetary policy. The first five assignments cover the following topics: inflation, bonds and stocks, monetary aggregates, the Taylor rule, and employment.…