Site of the week: www.tcd.ie/Economics

Economics is sometimes referred to as the dismal science, but its profile has been raised here in the last few years and making money is now considered sexy. The first chair of political economy at Trinity College was established in 1832, so the study of economics has a long history there. This website continues the good work.

The "What is economics?" section is split into two areas: economic issues/methods and microeconomics/ macroeconomics.

The first explains why economics is important to all of our lives and why it is a social science. "Economists aim to develop theories of human behaviour and test them against the facts" is a good explanation of what an economist does. The second section gives very good, easy to understand, definitions of what micro and macro economics are.

Once that has whetted your appetite for the subject, the course outlines section contains links to all the economics undergraduate courses taught in TCD, arranged by year. For each course there is a brief description, outline, recommended texts and assessment requirements.

The "What's new?" section is good for keeping up to speed economics books, talks, conferences and graduate reunions. The annual report of the department of economics is available here as a download.

The staff section is excellent. For most academic area, interests, qualifications and what they have published are listed. There is also a direct office phone line and email address given for most. This is something that is easy to compile, yet so few colleges bother to do so.

Another area where a lot of college websites fall down is the publication of research papers and lectures. With lack of space and prohibitive printing costs not an issue on the Internet, universities should take advantage and use it give a flavour of their courses. Abstracts of lectures such as "The position of the developing countries in the WTO negotiations on agricultural trade liberalisation" are here with the full text available in PDF format. Lectures from the Dublin economic workshop are put up as soon as they have been delivered.

A well-presented and up-to-date site and a must-see for anyone remotely interested in studying economics at college. Not so dismal a science after all.