Purdue Agricultural Economics Honors Program
Eligibility
Undergraduate students with outstanding academic performance (GPA: 3.0) will be invited to join the departmental honors program.
Required Courses
AGEC 375 ( 1 credit) / The Process of Economic Research
(Co-requisites: MA 224 and STAT )
AGEC 499 (5 credits) / Honors Thesis
Honors Thesis
Honors students complete a thesis under the supervision of a faculty mentor. The thesis must be submitted to the honors program coordinator a month prior to graduation, and subsequently be presented to the department.
Honors Program Coordinator
Dr. Todd Kuethe, tkuethe@purdue.edu, 765-494-4251
Former Honors Students
| Student | Honors thesis title | Advisor | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kyla Wolfe | The Opportunities and Challenges in Providing Accessible and Quality Child Care in Rural Indiana | Dr. Michael Wilcox | 2025 |
| Clara Shoopman | Embeddedness and Profitability: The Case of Small Businesses in the US Midwest | Dr. Maria Marshall | 2025 |
| Grant Allyn | Corn and Soybean Marketing Strategy Evaluation for Southwest Indiana Farms | Dr. Jim Mintert | 2024 |
| Austin Wright | Highway Diesel Fuel (HDF) Price: Affecting the Local Elevator Basis Bid | Dr. Mindy Mallory | 2024 |
| Chenyu Pan and Yingzhi Wang | The impact of the Sino-US trade war on international soybean trade | Dr. Michael Delgado | 2024 |
| Anqi Cui | Evaluation of the Kenya Fertilizer Subsidy Program: Identification of the Top Demographic Characteristics Associated with the Subsidized Fertilizer Received by Households and Estimation of Crowding Out | Dr. Jacob Ricker-Gilbert | 2024 |
| Sydney Wheeler | Who are the primary shoppers? An investigation of US households | Dr. Brenna Ellison | 2024 |
| Gabi Paxson | How does motivation impact feed purchases for show livestock participants | Dr. Scott Downey | 2024 |
| Noah Berning | Autonomy and Automation in Agriculture: A Market Outlook | Dr. Scott Downey | 2024 |
| Jemima Baributsa | What factors influence the willingness to pay and consumption frequency of different meats for Chinese consumers? | Dr. Holly Wang | 2023 |
| Cai Chen | Forecasting county-level corn and soybean yield in the Midwest using a multivariate regression model | Dr. Mindy Mallory | 2023 |
| Ethan Buck ('24), Morgan Hinz ('24), Yuxi “Jimmy” Jiang ('23) and Xiuyun “Lisa” Wen ('23) | The Accuracy of USDA’s Retail Food Price Forecast | Dr. Todd Kuethe | 2023 |
| Grace Bolten | Food Insecurity in Indiana | Dr. Joseph Balagtas | 2023 |
| Lorenzo Alegria | Aflatoxin MRL impacts on global reaction to trade shock | Dr. Jacob Ricker-Gilbert | 2023 |
| Josh Bailey | Sources of Value for Agriculture from Space Exploration Technology Development | Dr. Kajal Gulati | 2023 |
| Kendra Personett | The COVID-19 Pandemic and Grocery Shopping Behavior: Who are the hybrid shoppers? | Dr. Brenna Ellison | 2023 |
| MacKinley Cooksey | The Use of Adjustment Strategies in BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) Owned Small Businesses | Dr. Maria Marshall | 2023 |
| Jingjing Tao | Quantifying “local food” online and social media in the United States for 2018–2021 | Dr. Nicole Olynk Widmar | 2022 |
| Owen Coon | Evaluating Expected Values of Breeding Strategies With and Without Bull Breeding Soundness Exams in Beef Cattle Herds | Dr. Nicole Olynk Widmar | 2022 |
| Claire Baney | Assessing Local Food Access: A Starter Kit for Communities | Dr. Michael Wilcox | 2022 |
| Jaden Retter | Technical Trading Systems in U.S. Commodity Futures Markets | Dr. Mindy Mallory | 2022 |
| Jiahui Huang | Research on the Impacts of Banning Plastic Straws in Catering Industry on Chinese Consumers’ Environmental Attitudes | Dr. Jayson Lusk | 2022 |
| Nick Bowser | Attitudes Towards Healthy Eating Across Demographics | Dr. Bhagyashree Katare | 2021 |
| Dane Erickson | The Effect of Chronic Wasting Disease on Resident Deer Hunting Permit Demand in Wisconsin | Dr. Carson Reeling | 2021 |
| Douglas Abney | Web Scraping for Agricultural Related Jobs on Indeed.com An Analysis of the Agricultural Industry’s Job Market | Dr. Todd Kuethe | 2021 |
| Mason Gordon | Indiana’s Stellar Communities Designation: An Evaluation of a State Economic Development Program | Dr. Michael Wilcox and Dr. Larry Deboer | 2020 |
| Katriel Marks | Analyzing Non-Legal Barriers to Women’s Land Ownership | Dr. Rhonda Phillips | 2020 |
| Josephine Cameron | Farm policy and foreign food aid: educating students and stakeholders on the Food for Progress program | Dr. Roman Keeney | 2020 |
| Hillary Vrba | The impact of stress on small business success after Hurricane Katrina | Dr. Maria Marshall | 2020 |
| Andrew Ahlersmeyer | Examining the economic viability of corn after corn cropping systems in the United States corn belt | Dr. Tim Baker and Dr. Bruce Erickson | 2020 |
| Jiyong Kwon | The effect of Chinese consumer characteristics on the dining out behavior | Dr. Holly Wang | 2020 |
| Jongho Bae | Impact of the tariff between the U.S. and China on Soybean Prices and the U.S. Soybean Farmers | Dr. Otto Doering | 2019 |
| Hao Tian | An Empirical Study on Rebound Effect of Hybrid Vehicle | Dr. Michael Delgado | 2018 |
| Shunpeng Wu | Influence of import and export prices on grain market during bubble and non-bubble periods | Dr. Michael Gunderson | 2018 |
| Lifeng Ren | Immigrant Farm and Agricultural Entrepreneurship | Dr. Bhagyashree Katare | 2018 |
| Kezhou Miao | Soft-Drink Consumption Trend in America, could the declining soft-drink consumption in America be applied to all population universally? Especially to children and adolescents | Dr. James Binkley | 2017 |
| Grant Gardner | Predicting Generational Belonging on Farms | Dr. Scott Downey | 2017 |
| Wesley Davis | Further Insights from the Purdue University 2015 Performance Management in Agribusiness Survey | Dr. Michael Gunderson | 2017 |
| Kurt Cheng | The Impact of Exchange Rate, Interest Rate, and Output Prices for Intermediate Livestock Farms | Dr. Tim Baker | 2017 |
| Wuzheqian Xiao | What Determines Urban Chinese Consumers' Shopping Outlets For Pork? | Dr. Holly Wang | 2016 |
| Shelby Swain | Farmer Cooperative Locations Related to Incomes in Indiana | Dr. Michael Gunderson | 2016 |
| Thomas Fisher | Civil War and Child Malnutrition in Nepal | Dr. Jerry Shively | 2016 |
| Sarah Correll | College Bound or Bound to Fail? Determinants of Indiana’s High School Graduation and College-Going Rates | Dr. Larry DeBoer | 2016 |
| Katherine Chang | The Power of Asking Questions: Do Belief, Goal and Need- Related Questions Shape People’s Preference towards a Product? | Dr. Scott Downey | 2016 |
| Andrew Johnson | Agricultural credit risk and the macroeconomy: Determinants of Farm Credit Mid-America PD migrations | Dr. Michael Boehlje | 2015 |
| Erin Whittaker | The Fundamental Factors Affecting Corn Price from 1982-2013 | Dr. Corinne Alexander | 2014 |
| Andrew Sokolchik | Cannabis Farming: The Potential of Hemp in Indiana's Agricultural Landscape | Dr. Michael Gunderson | 2014 |
| Anbo Wang | Performance and Risk of Agricultural Assets: A Time-Varying Approach | Dr. Tim Baker | 2013 |
| Celia Qijun Guan | What Causes Teacher Turnover in Indiana | Dr. Larry DeBoer | 2013 |
| Su Hua | To Rent or To Own: The Residential Tenure Choices of Chinese Students in the U.S. | Dr. Brigitte Waldorf | 2012 |
| Laura Bohlander | The Influence and Relationship between Livestock Producers and Salespeople in the Feed and Animal Health Industry | Dr. Alan Gray | 2012 |
| Amy Winter | Living and Saving Green: An Economics Assessment of Purdue's Food Waste Handling System | Dr. John Lee | 2012 |
| Jamie Steiner | Helping or Hindering Education through School Consolidation: School Building Effects on District Costs and Student Achievement | Dr. Larry DeBoer | 2011 |
| Renee Foltz | The Methodology of Small Business Demise Information Recovery | Dr. Maria Marshall | 2011 |
| Bailey Perry | An Analysis of the Potential for Producer Profitability Given Changing Consumer Preferences for Pasture Dairying | Dr. Nicole Olynk Widmar | 2011 |
| Carissa McCay | Effect of Cooperatives Working Together: Herd Retirements on the U.S. Dairy Herd Size | Dr. Joseph Balagtas | 2011 |
| Jing Hao | Buyers' Cartels: An Empirical Study of Prevalence and Economic Characteristics | Dr. John Connor | 2011 |
| Katharine Bartlett | Effects of Cattle Density on FMD Spread | Dr. Frank Dooley | 2010 |
| Sam Clark | Transitioning to Organic Farming in Indiana | Dr. Corinne Alexander | 2010 |
| Ryan Crane | Management Strategies and Philosophies of Successful Farm Businesses | Dr. Craig Dobbins | 2009 |
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