2009 Undergraduate Opportunities in the Social Sciences

ICPSR Undergraduate Research Paper Competition

ICPSR sponsors two undergraduate research paper competitions. The first competition, sponsored by the general archive at ICPSR, requires a research paper supported by quantitative analysis of any dataset(s) held within the ICPSR archive or any of its special topic archives. The second competition is sponsored by the Minority Data Resource Center (MDRC). The paper must address issues relevant to underrepresented minorities in the United States including immigrants, and data must be drawn from the MDRC. A separate committee will be formed to judge this competition. The purpose of these competitions is to highlight the best undergraduate student research papers using quantitative data. The objective is to encourage undergraduates to explore the social sciences by means of critical analysis of a topic supported by quantitative analysis of a dataset(s) held within the ICPSR archive and presented in written form.Up to three cash prizes will be awarded for each competition, and the deadline for submission is May 31, 2009.

ICPSR Undergraduate Internship

The ICPSR Internship is a 10-week program designed to familiarize students with social science research, data preparation, and analysis. Interns work in the UNIX and Windows environments and gain experience using statistical programs such as SAS, SPSS, and Stata to check data. Data processing skills will be applied to prepare social science data for permanent archiving and distribution for secondary analysis; preserving respondent anonymity; and composing descriptions of data collections. These positions are supervised by an experienced Research Associate.

Interns attend courses in the ICPSR Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research. Interns will be required to attend a weekly Lunch and Lecture series that will expose them to various aspects and departments of ICPSR and Institute for Social Research (ISR). There may be additional social and work-related functions involving other ICPSR staff and interns from other ISR units and summer programs.

This is a paid internship and the application deadline is February 2, 2009.