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Fall 2024 Workshops

Thank you for your interest in the workshops offered by the Social Sciences Quantitative Laboratory! This page lists all workshops planned for Fall 2024. Information about the times and registration for each workshop will be added throughout the semester. You can fill out the following form to be notified as we update information about the workshops being offered at http://tinyurl.com/ssql-interest.

Stata Workshop Series
  • Stata is a statistical analysis software widely adopted by economists for empirical analysis. This workshop series is mainly designed for students enrolled in Econ 31, Introduction to Econometrics. The workshops align closely with the timing of the lectures, and will complement in-class illustration through real-time structured hands-on experience of using STATA to complete basic tasks required at various stages of the course. Students who are not enrolled in Econ 31, but have some understanding of statistics and are interested in learning to use Stata, are welcome to attend.
    • Week 2 (Sep 9, 10)           Intro to Stata and Descriptive Statistics
      Week 4 (Sep 23, 24)        Data Acquisition and Manipulation
      Week 7 (Oct 21, 22)         Confidence Intervals and Hypothesis Testing
      Week 10 (Nov 11, 12)         Regression
      Week 13 (Dec 2,3)            Empirical Project
  • Time and location: M 1-2.30pm Singer 346; M 7.30-9pm Singer 222; T 7.30-9pm Singer 346 (Singer 033 on Oct. 22).
Introduction to R

The Social Sciences Quantitative Laboratory is running a workshop to introduce you to R. This will be hands on, practical experience: each participant will be using the program in real time. We will cover:

  • basics of opening files
  • manipulating variables
  • creating histograms, scatterplots, and regression lines
  • how to deal with errors (inevitable, but manageable), in any statistical package
  • working the R Markdown documents

Details:

Visualizing Regressions Surfaces in R

Regressions are a fundamental tool for analyzing data. Most of the time, we see examples of regressions in 2 dimensions. Seeing examples in 3 dimensions meaningfully adds to our ability to understand regression output. This workshop will demonstrate a new software package in R (regress3d) that allows you to visualize your regressions, and the data used to create your regressions, in 3 dimensions. 

How to Read a Quantitative Paper

Published papers and books that rely on data generally follow a well established pattern. This workshop will help you learn how to both read these publications more efficiently and more effectively. That is, it will save you time and help you understand the material better.

We cover

  • how to read regression tables and graphs efficiently,
  • why you should skim through papers before reading them in full, and
  • common ways regressions are misused.

Two identical sections are offered:

  • Section 1: Tuesday, September 24th 12:45-2:15pm
  • Section 2: Wednesday, September 25th 12:30-2pm
  • Register at bit.ly/read_quant_f24.
Computer Skills to Save You Time
  • Knowing your keyboard and computer's file structure better saves a lot of time, possibly as much as 64 hours per year. Come to this workshop and you can spend that time (one and a half work weeks!) sleeping, hanging out with friends, or studying.
  • For Beginners: Thursday, September 12th 5:45-7pm
  • For Intermediate Users: Monday, September 16th 5:45-7pm
  • Register at bit.ly/computer_skills_f24.
Stata Primer for Intermediate Users
  • This workshop is designed as a refresher for those who have learned Stata before and need a quick review of the basics. It is particularly helpful for those who have taken Econ 31 and are now taking a more advanced level course or seminar that will require Stata use.
  • Time and location: Wednesday Sep. 11, 7.30- 9 pm, Singer 222.