Tawni H. Ferrarini, Ph.D., is the Associate Director of the Hammond Institute for Free Enterprise, the Director of the Economic Education Center, and the Robert W. Plaster Professor of Economic Education at Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Mo.

Dr. Ferrarini is the 2020 recipient of the Patty Elder International Award and was the 2015 president. She was the inaugural recipient of the National Association of Economic Educator’s Abbejean Kehler Technology Award. Other accolades include a 2009 Distinguished Faculty at Northern Michigan University and 2009 Michigan Economic Educator of the Year Award. 

Dr. Ferrarini has written curriculum materials for the Council on Economic Education - USA and Fraser Institute - Canada. She specializes in the effective use of technology in the classroom and the integration of economics across subject areas, especially American history. She was instrumental in helping to formally establish the Council on Economic Education – Japan, and is a consultant for the Korea Development Institute in Seoul.

Professor Ferrarini publishes in economic education, technology, and education journals. She is a co-author of Common Sense Economics (2016), Economic Episodes in American History (2019), and Teachers Can Be Financially Fit (2020). She earned her doctorate in economics in 1995 from Washington University in St. Louis, where she studied economic history under the 1993 Nobel Laureate Douglass C. North.