# Midterm Report

This course has **no exams**. In place of a midterm exam, the entire class will collaboratively produce a single, nicely formatted **Midterm Report**—one shared document that analyzes something interesting about the current economy and financial markets. Each student contributes one figure and one short write-up, and we assemble these into one polished, publication-style report for the whole class.

This is also a practical exercise in the social-coding workflow we cover in class: claiming work through an issue tracker, contributing through pull requests, and adhering to a shared style guide so that many people's contributions fit together into one coherent document.

## What You Contribute

Each student must contribute, individually:

- **One figure** that says something interesting about the current economy or financial markets, generated reproducibly from real data (following the reproducible-analytical-pipeline principles from this course).
- **One paragraph** that explains the figure—what the data shows, why it matters, and what the reader should take away.

Your contribution must follow the report's shared **style guide** (formatting, figure style, citation/source conventions) so that it integrates cleanly with everyone else's.

## Workflow

1. I will create a **GitHub repository** containing a skeleton of the report and a set of **issues** in the issue tracker, each describing a possible topic.
2. **Claim a topic** by assigning one of the open issues to yourself. Each topic can only be claimed by one student, so claim early. (You may propose your own topic—coordinate with me through an issue.)
3. Build your figure and write your paragraph in a branch, following the skeleton and style guide.
4. Open a **pull request** with your contribution. Address any review comments and get it merged.

## Grading — 10% of the course grade

Your Midterm Report contribution is graded individually on:

- the quality and correctness of your analysis and figure,
- the clarity and insight of your written paragraph, and
- whether your contribution follows the shared style guide and integrates cleanly (a clean, reviewable pull request).

Exact deadlines and the repository link will be announced on Canvas and on the class GitHub page.