Rate My Professor Rebecca Thornton

Rebecca Thornton serves as Instructional Professor and Director of the M.A. in Applied Economics Program in the Department of Economics at the University of Houston. She earned her Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Houston in May 2000, M.A. in Economics from the same university in May 1996, B.S. in Economics from Texas A&M University in December 1989, and B.B.A. in Finance from Texas A&M University in August 1989. Her career at the University of Houston began as a Lecturer from May 2000 to August 2002, followed by a Post-Doctoral Fellowship funded by the National Science Foundation from August 2000 to August 2002. She advanced to Clinical Assistant Professor in September 2002, Instructional Associate Professor from September 2016 to August 2025, and Instructional Professor since September 2025. Thornton directed Undergraduate Advising and Affairs from August 2002 to August 2010 and has led the M.A. Applied Economics Program since September 2010, including extension programs at the Kyiv School of Economics in Ukraine from 2011 to 2017.

In her teaching role, Thornton has instructed Macroeconomic Analysis at the master’s level every fall semester since 2010 and Intermediate Macroeconomics every semester since 1998 at the undergraduate level. She has also taught Economic Growth Theory in select semesters such as Fall 2005, Fall 2007, Fall 2009, Spring 2012, and Spring 2013, and Principles of Macroeconomics, including developing and teaching a hybrid online version from Fall 2003 to Spring 2005. Her research includes the publication "Learning from Experience and Learning from Others: An Exploration of Learning and Spillovers in Wartime Shipbuilding" in The American Economic Review, volume 91, issue 5, pages 1350-1368, December 2001. Thornton has been nominated for the University of Houston Provost’s Teaching Excellence Award in 2009, 2016, and 2017. She participated by invitation in the American Economic Association’s Council on Economic Education Undergraduate Director’s breakfast meetings from 2004 to 2010 and served on the advisory board for APLIA, a web-based platform for economics education content, from 2004 to 2006. Through her long-standing contributions in Business & Economics education, particularly in applied economics and macroeconomics, she has significantly influenced student development at the University of Houston.