SURF Mentoring

Potential projects/topics: South Asians have been underrepresented in political office despite being one of the fastest growing populations within the United States. However, many South Asian candidates have emerged in local political races in recent years. In this project we will investigate the rise of South Asian local political candidates. We plan to explore: Who South Asian candidates are; Why they choose to run for office; and What campaign and mobilization strategies they employ. For this project we will conduct a large data collection exercise to create a novel dataset of south asians and other minorities running for local office in the united states (over the last five years) in addition to fielding a large mail-in survey of candidates and citizens. We seek research assistants to help us create this dataset that will involve collecting data from different sources, verifying information, and coding this data for our analysis. Applicants interested in this topic and those who want to learn more about data management, data cleaning and survey design – the first step in the research process – will get hands-on training in doing so. This project is ideal for first year students with a keen interest in asking interesting questions and figuring out how to answer them.

Potential skills gained: Data management, coding, using observational data for research, survey design, literature review

Required qualifications:

• Required skills: This is an entry level task and no prior knowledge of coding or data management is required, although some experience with statistical analysis in R would be a big plus. A keen interest in the topic and/or a desire to learn the nuts and bolts of quantitative social science research is desired.

Direct mentor: Faculty/P.I., Graduate Student