Professor Boyer: Teaching Students to See the World
Professor George Boyer recently published his second book on the history of British welfare policies, a passion of his since his graduate school days in the early 1980s at the University of Wisconsin, but each spring, he turns to a very different obsession.
“I’m a huge baseball fan,” said Boyer, professor of economics, and international and comparative labor, at the ILR School. “This becomes my life outside Cornell when the season starts. My favorite team is the Baltimore Orioles, but I also root for the St. Louis Cardinals. I love to talk baseball.”
Boyer, in his 37th year at Cornell, is a man of many interests. He’s proud of his work on “The Winding Road to the Welfare State: Economic Insecurity and Social Welfare Policy in Britain,” published in December. The product of seven years of planning, research and writing, the book examines how British working-class families managed with living standards and welfare policies from the 1830s to 1950.
More than books and baseball, teaching is Boyer’s great passion. His lectures remind students that history often repeats itself, pointing out that many American social programs and policies have roots in Britain, perhaps centuries ago. Fortunately for students, Boyer often brings a lighter touch to classes by sprinkling lectures on complex topics with baseball trivia, puns and jokes.
“When I was a sophomore at the College of William and Mary, I thought my professors had the most wonderful life,” he said. “I’d see all the books on their shelves and talk to them about history and learn what they were researching, and I was hooked. The only weird thing was, many of my professors smoked, and I thought, ‘I don’t want to smoke,’ but it turns out you don’t have to smoke to be a professor.”
Boyer’s first book, “An Economic History of the English Poor Law: 1750-1850,” published in 1990, examined British welfare policies. Americans can learn a lot from British social and economic history, because Britain was the first nation to industrialize, he said.
“As such, British workers were the first to bear the brunt of the disruption caused by rapid technological change, the process of creative destruction that created new jobs, but at the same time, eliminated many old jobs. Britain, however, was also a leader in social policy.”
Boyer said he tries to convince students that current debates on topics such as poverty and welfare, globalization and international trade, immigration and the proper role of government have been going on for centuries. Studying how these debates evolved in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries can yield insights that are timely today. Boyer hopes his teaching has an impact on the way students view the world.
“My work influences students in their careers because they can apply what they learned in my classes to current issues,” he said. “The fact that the issues keep being the same matters, especially if my former students are working on social policies in any level of government.”
Boyer said he tries to convince students that it is good to be inquisitive and that history is important. “In my new book, I present evidence that both sides in the recent debates on poverty in the United States largely repeated arguments made in Victorian Britain,” he said. “If we want to understand why things are as they are, we can learn a lot from how people in the past tackled issues that still haunt us.”
Boyer takes his teaching seriously, but relishes showing the other side of his personality, too. “I’m a horrible punster and I tell an enormous number of puns in class, and if the students don’t react to them, I sometimes stop and say, ‘I made a pun, you could at least giggle a little or something.’”
“I love puns and word games and telling jokes because it lightens up class. I look at the students, and if I’ve gone over something complicated, and they have these hard looks on their faces trying to figure out what I said, I’ll tell a story or a pun or two so they can breathe and catch up on their notes. I hope my sense of humor also lets them know I am an approachable person.”
Boyer was one of the first faculty members hired by Professor Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Cornell’s Irving M. Ives Professor of Industrial and Labor Relations and Economics. “George is a very prolific economic historian and our undergraduate students benefit from his ability to bring his research into the classroom and make British and American economic history come alive,” Ehrenberg said. “George also understands that the use of humor, and more specifically in his case puns, is a way to keep students focused on what the professor is saying, because they don’t want to miss the next joke.”
For Boyer, being a voracious reader helps him be an effective teacher. “One of the great things about all the reading I do in research is that I get to go in the classroom and explain to the students why I am excited about it,” he said. “I think students like it when they see their professors being enthusiastic, and if there’s one thing I am about the stuff I teach, it’s enthusiastic.”
Noah Fink ’19 is in his second class with Boyer, “Special Topics in 20th Century Economic History,” about economic history between the world wars. His first Boyer class last year, “Development of Economic Thought and Institutions,” inspired Fink to re-examine his future.
“I had a great teacher in high school who helped me develop a love of history, and Professor Boyer has been instrumental in bringing that back,” he said. “Because of his classes, I’ve made a late pivot to graduate programs in history.”
Fink follows the Boyer model, learning from lectures and meeting to talk with him during office hours. “In his lectures, he takes complex policies and theories and makes them easier to understand with great energy and enthusiasm. He is also skilled at engaging with students to make it feel like a discussion in a smaller class.”
In Boyer’s office, bursting with books, side by side with the occasional stuffed wombat – Boyer gets a kick out of wombats – they talk baseball and labor history. Fink said, “I think he loves office hours as much as he loves teaching. I can bring up a topic that I am interested in, and even if it is not necessarily a big interest for him, he jumps right on it and becomes just as invested as I am.”
Helen Donnelly ’16, a Morgan Stanley associate in New York City, took four classes with Boyer, her faculty mentor when she was a Hunter R. Rawlings III Cornell Presidential Research Scholar.
“I am a history nerd, so his lectures were very interesting because he’s very passionate about what he teaches and his enthusiasm shines through in every class,” Donnelly said. “But, my favorite memories of Professor Boyer were the times we talked in his office.”
“We met many times to discuss my research, and he also gave me advice on everything from the best classes to take to the best place to eat in Ithaca – Saigon Kitchen, and, of course, there were many funny stories.”
Boyer said he encourages and welcomes students to meet informally with him. “I love it when students come to my office and I can talk with them and get to know them,” he said. “I think a lot of the younger students, especially, would like their professors to talk with them. It makes class better if you know the professor is not a machine.”
A 2018 recipient of the Stephen H. Weiss Presidential Fellow Award, Boyer also has a busy administrative calendar. He was named ILR’s associate dean for academic affairs in October. “I am going to meetings that clearly are important for the school and people are interested in my input,” he said. “It’s a lot of fun work and I really feel involved in the school.”
ILR’s director of teaching since 2002, Boyer is chair of the school’s Teaching Advisory Committee. During his leadership, the committee has organized teaching discussions, mentoring and teaching evaluation programs, and teaching and advising awards, said Professor Martin Wells.
“Under Boyer’s leadership, the committee has helped change the culture at ILR to one that, from assistant through full professors, values teaching,” said Wells, the Charles A. Alexander Professor of Statistical Sciences. “He does a fantastic job of staying connected to the people who foster and deliver excellent teaching at the ILR School.”
Boyer is also committed to his community. He is a board member with Loaves and Fishes of Tompkins County, which feeds the hungry in Ithaca. “Anyone who wants a hot meal can go there five days a week,” he said. “It’s a great place for food and companionship. I love Ithaca and it’s important for me to give something back.”