Alberta Spreafico is a graduate student in Economics, Politics, and International Institutions at the University of Pavia, Italy. While at Columbia, she researched her dissertation, which explores the possibility of an approach to education based on Amartya Sen’s Capability Approach in comparison to the more commonly used Human Capital based approaches. This research was supported by the European Union. Her previous papers include “Beliefs to die for” (2009); “Female Education and Economic Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa” (2009); and “The Italian Political elections in 2008 and the Italians’ responses” (2008-2009).