Program Overview

Certificate in Quantitative Political Science Methods

The Certificate in Quantitative Political Science Methods is a program designed to lead to an understanding of how social scientists pose research questions, design tests of hypotheses, and analyze quantifiable information. These are valuable skills for the workforce and graduate school, as well as for all informed citizens. A basic understanding of how social science research is conducted can help citizens evaluate the information they read about in the newspaper or hear about on television.

Requirements

This program is open to all interested parties. We expect to appeal in particular to students pursuing the major or minor in Political Science.

• To participate in the program, students should contact the Political Science faculty advisor.
• Political Science courses that count toward the certificate may also be applied to Political Science major and minor requirements.
• To complete the program, a student must satisfactorily complete five 3-credit courses, according to the following guidelines:
  • Students must satisfactorily complete Introduction to Political Science Methods (01:790:300)
  • Students must satisfactorily complete either Data Science for Political Science (01:790:391) or Survey Research (01:790:307). Students that take both may count one toward the remaining three courses in the certificate.

Course Options

Students must satisfactorily complete any three of the following list. Courses can be in one discipline or any combination of disciplines. The course list will be updated on an ongoing basis to reflect changing course offerings. In some occasions, you may be able to get approval for a course not on the list pending a review of the course content.

Political Science

• 01:790:481, 01:790:482, 01:790:488 Internship (with approved statistical or quantitative focus, taken as a junior or senior)
• With permission from the instructor, the undergraduate office and the graduate office, students may take the following graduate courses at the 600 level:
  • 16:790:670 Multivariate Techniques
  • 16:790:671 Survey Research Methods
  • 16:790:673 Game Theory for Political Science
  • 16:790:676 Maximum Likelihood Estimation
  • 16:790:677 Experimental Methods
  • 16:790:678 Advanced Topics in Multivariate Statistics: Measurement

Computer Science

• 01:198:101 Data Structures
• 01:198:142 Data 101
• 01:198:210 Data Management for Data Science
• 01:198:295 Data Management and Wrangling with R
• 01:198:439 Introduction to Data Science

Economics

• 01:220:322 Econometrics (must complete prerequisites: 01:220:102 C or higher. 01:220:103 C or higher, 01:640:135 (or equivalent) C or higher, 01:960:211 or 285 or equivalent, C or higher)
• 01:220:401 Advanced Cross-Sectional and Panel Econometrics (must complete 01:220:320, 01:220:321, 01:220:322, Calculus II)
• 01:220:481 Economics of Uncertainty (must complete Prerequisites: 01:220:320; 01:960:211 or 285; 01:640:136 or 152, all with grades of C or better)
• 01:220:482 Game Theory and Economics (must complete Prerequisites: 01:220:320; 01:960:211 or 285; 01:640:136 or 152, all with grades of C or better.)
• 01:220:420 Computational Methods for Research in Economics (must complete Prerequisites: 01:220:320, 01:220:321, 01:220:322, 01:640:136 or 01:640:152)
• 01:220:421 Economic Forecasting and Big Data (must complete Prerequisites: 01:220:320, 01:220:321, and 01:220:322)

Math

• 01:640:104 Introduction to Probability (must complete Prerequisite: 01:640:026 or 01:640:027 or placement.)
• 01:640:339 Mathematical Models in the Social Sciences (must complete Prerequisites: 01:640:250 and either 01:640:477, 01: 198:206, or 01:960:381)

Psychology

• 01:830:200 Quantitative Methods in Psychology
• 01:830:323 Research Methods in Social Psychology (must complete Prerequisites: 01:830:200, 321)

School of Communication and Information

• 04:189:220 Data in Context
• 04:547:321 Information Visualization

Sociology

• 01:920:312 Introduction to Statistics in Sociology
• 01:920:360 Computational Social Science

Statistics

• Any 3-credit course in the Statistics Department. Recommendations include
  • 01:960:211 Statistics I
  • 01:960:285 Introductory Statistics for Business
  • 01:960:221 Statistical Inference for Data Science
  • 01:960:212 Statistics II
  • 01:960:384 Intermediate Statistical Analysis

• Political Science courses may be applied to Political Science major requirements under R7 electives.
• Only ONE of these introductory courses (Quantitative methods in Psychology, Introduction to Statistics in Sociology, Data in Context, Statistics I, and Introductory Statistics for Business) may be counted for the certificate.