Current Group Members
Faculty
Dr. Li Feng
Postdoctoral Scholar
Dr. Jieon (Jin) Shim
Jieon Shim is a Postdoctoral Scholar in the Department of Finance and Economics at Texas State University. She holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Florida, an M.A. in Economics from Yonsei University, and a B.A. in Economics and International Relations from the College of William and Mary. Her research interests include applied microeconomics, the economics of education, public economics, and labor economics. She has worked as a graduate instructor at the University of Florida and in several positions utilizing her skills in econometric modeling and data analysis. Jieon is working on the NSF Collaborative Noyce project led by Dr. Li Feng (PI) and the NSF STEM Communities Project led by Dr. Heather Galloway (PI) and Drs. Eleanor Close, Li Feng, Cynthia Luxford, and Alice Olmstead (co-PIs).
Conference presentations
Graduate Research Assistants
Xiu (Sue) Wu
Xiu Wu is a third-year Ph.D. student of Geographical Information Science at the Department of Geography and works as a graduate research assistant at the Department of Economics and Finance at McCoy College of Business, Texas State University (TSU). She has been a teaching assistant at the department of geography for two years, holds double Master of Science degrees in Sustainability Studies at the Department of Sociology of TSU and Land Resource Management at the School of Environmental Science & Engineering of Wuhan University in China. Xiu has various skills on spatial-temporal data analysis and Geo-Mapping. Research Interests: Panel Data Analysis, Data Mining, Spatial Data Modeling, Health Geography. Xiu is working on the NSF Collaborative Noyce project led by Dr. Li Feng(PI).
Mariella Van Der Sluijs
Mariella van der Sluijs is a Master of Science student in Data Analytics and Information Systems at the McCoy College of Business at Texas State University. She works as a graduate research assistant in the Department of Economics and Finance at the McCoy College of Business at Texas State University. She graduated summa cum laude in 2019 from John Carroll University with triple majors in Data Science, Political Science, and Communication. After graduating, she worked as a Data Analyst for venture development firm in Cleveland, OH where she focused on the economic development of Northern Ohio, before moving to Austin, TX to work as a Data Engineer for a consulting firm where she worked on-site at Google focusing on internationalization of their search engine. Her research interests include economic development and U.S. politics. Her personal interests include long distance running and weightlifting.
Kenneth Skidmore
Kenneth S. Skidmore is a data analyst at the Legislative Budget Board. He is a second-year, M.S. Quantitative Finance and Economics student at Texas State University and is working on a masters thesis on financial literacy. He holds a BBA in Economics, having earned Summa Cum Laude distinction with a 4.00 GPA upon the completion of his degree in May of 2021. His research interests include humanitarian logistics and relief systems, economics of higher education and spatial econometrics. Kenneth was recently selected to present his research at the Economic Scholars Program organized by the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank for work titled, “Modern-Day Social Stratification? Exploratory Analysis of Socioeconomic Status and Stagnant College Degree Completion Rates.” During his time in his undergraduate studies, he worked as a Research Assistant for Dr. Francis Méndez Mediavilla and Dr. Eduardo Pérez at the Integrated Modeling and Optimization of Service Systems Research Lab at Texas State’s Ingram School of Engineering. Kenneth has served as a Graduate Research Assistant for Dr. Li Feng while he pursues to earn his master’s degree. Kenneth is working on the NSF CAREER project led by Dr. Shetay Ashford-Hanserd (PI) and Dr. Li Feng (Senior Personnel).
** LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kennethskidmore
Undergraduate Research Assistants
Richard Vega
Richard Vega is a first-generation student born to parents that made a life in the United States after fleeing civil wars in their respective countries of El Salvador and Guatemala. After serving 4 years in the Army and representing over 45,000 students of Austin Community College as Student Body President, he was picked by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute to intern for Congressman Jesús “Chuy” García. Additionally, he worked on Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar’s presidential campaign in Iowa, where he had the opportunity to learn about and meet thousands of people from different walks of life. Originally an engineering major, the combination of personal and professional experiences has influenced his decision to pursue economics to develop policy to improve the lives of people.
Richard currently serves as an Economics Undergraduate Instructional Assistant for Dr. Feng in the Finance and Economics Department at the McCoy College of Business at Texas State University. He will serve as a member of the Student Foundation, an Ambassador for the McCoy College of Business, and the Chief Financial Officer for the Hispanic Business Student Association for the 2021 to 2022 academic year. On his free time, he likes to try cooking recipes from different parts of the world with an affinity for spicy dishes.
** LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/richardvega01
** Email: rav97@txstate.edu
Philip Ervin
Philip Ervin is currently an undergraduate research assistant with the Education Policy Lab. He is in his senior year with a double major in Economics and Computer Science. He has presented research projects at the Dallas Federal Reserve Banks’ Economic Scholars Program for Undergraduate Research and the Texas State University Honors College Undergraduate Research Conference. Philip has worked for Dr. Zhai on a research project to measure the effects of COVID-19 prevalence in health and behavioral economics. Philip has conducted empirical analysis to support the NSF Noyce research project and our Learning Loss Recovery project with the Community Health and Economic Resilience Research at the Translational Health Research Center. Philip has presented two posters at the Association for Education Finance Conference in 2023 and the Noyce Summit in 2022. Philip and his team also won 1st Place in USAA Datathon for Data Visualization.
** LinkedIn Profile
** Email: pse17@txstate.edu
Daniel Payan
** LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/daniel-payan
** Email: d_p327@txstate.edu
Former Group Members
Graduate Research Assistants
Babitha Govindaiah
Consultant -Data and Analytics @ Ernst and Young