UChicago Data and Policy Summer Scholar Program: Conversation with Alumni

Welcome everyone welcome to the University of Chicago data and policy summer scholar program webinar today is a very special webinar as we are joined by the DPSS Alumni, who are here to answer your questions and talk about their experience with this four week summer program and give some real insights into how this program can be beneficial to you so thank you all for joining us.

Throughout this presentation, you have the option to type in a question either for myself or for the alumni so please. Feel free to use that chat box feature at anytime throughout the presentation.

To give you a bit of an agenda or a road man. We will first began with a bit of an overview about the program because I know some of you, joining us today may not be familiar fully yet, with the structure of this program so I'll talk about that and then we'll open up to questions with the alumni in the bulk of our time today will be those a questions.

And as I am so excited to dive into this conversation. Today I failed to introduce myself so for those of you who may not be familiar. Yet my name is Andy Ingram Ackles. My pronouns are Xi'an, her and is my pleasure to serve as the program manager for this DPS as program.

So let's begin with a bit of a program overview. An worlds to start other than the University level and the University of Chicago is unique and a lot of ways, but I think one of the key factors that distinguishes the University is what we call the Uchicago Way. You Chicago way means students and faculty here at U Chicago really challenge the status quo. They are keen to.

Making change and not living with? What is currently going on. They want to bring ideas perspectives different tools and training to make an impact in a way that will better their communities. Whether that is at a city level. A state level or an international global level and so that's what really makes the uchicago a distinctive place by bringing in all these different diverse ideas opinions and trainings to really equip our students to make the change that they want to see in the world.

And this program is unique and it's sitting in the place of the University. Ann the 1st way that really comes about is in its academics. This program is quite rigorous in its academic training. An I'll have our alumni elaborate that on that shortly but to give you a sense of what the academic structure of this program is you were taking 3 primary courses. The first course is a quantitative analysis and public policy. This is Compara Bulto, a statistics or econometrics type corpse.

Then second you're taking introduction to programming and R so you're going to learn how to use the program software of our.

And then Lastly there is a writing and policy course, which helps you being able to communicate. These quantitative and coding skills in a way. That'll be really effective and persuasive to the decision makers or policymakers in your group and you'll spend most of your days and most of your time in this four week program in these courses, particularly the quantitative analysis in the R programming course. This is really what the University of Chicago and the hair school public policy deems as.

National for affective policy making and policy making really based on data and evidence so these courses are designed to equip you with that very tangible toolkit to be affective in the world of policy.

But another key component to this program is the faculty LED Capstone Research Project, which is one of the favourites of the students and this program or this section of the program is in the 4th week of the program will you will primarily working on a research project in a group about 10 or so students with one of the faculty member.

The topics of the project change each year, but on the screen. You perspective students can see some of the example topics that we've had in the past, one of which is conflict in a Sergeant Learning and that is with Austin right? Who is the faculty director and assistant professor here at Uchicago Harris and he has access to data.

Really quite vast beyond what you and I could access on our own such as declassified data from the Central Intelligence Agency and so students in his capstone project have access to that data to able to clean it. Analyze it and put it into a policy memo and making a recommendation on how to move forward in policy on that topic.

But this program is more than just academics. There are some other elements that I think are worth mentioning and one of those components is the career exploration peace and some of this is actually changed from last year. So our alumni can speak a bit to what their experience was noting some changes for the 2020 program. But some of these different elements is our policy and action series where we have practitioners in the field weather at a consulting firm or in the local government here in Chicago.

To academic researchers or think tank reach researchers to come. Talk to us and tell us about their path and Paula see how they use quantitative and coding skills in their day-to-day job and also work shopping with you on how you can follow a similar path or make your own path in this area. We're also going to have some workshops with our career coach is making sure you feel equipped with your resume and interviewing skills. There's going to be networking with the U Chicago community both current students.

Alumni another community partners and will have a graduate admissions panels if you're interested in a graduate program, particularly in the field of policy or data science at the University that can be really good chance to learn more about our graduate programs.

And those are the four components of the career exploration piece of this summer program.

But another key component is the student life component, but cohort life experience. You're spending 4 weeks in the city of Chicago for most students. It's their first time in the city of Chicago. Some of them. It's their first time in the US and so it's a really fun way as a group to go ahead and explore the city and see all the different options that you have both on the weekends and in the evenings and we really as a program really tried to help facilitate that fun.

Student life components and one of the ways we do that is helping students be arranged into a cohort groups. These are groups of students about 10 to 15 students per group and within that group. You go out and explore the city. You can take pictures and send it to the program for all of us to see sometimes you'll have lunches together, either range by the program or amongst yourselves. You can determine where you'd like to be.

And we help facilitate different activities throughout the city. I imagine at least 1 of our alumni may mention a bullhorn.

Boat ride I don't word I was trying to say there but a boat ride on Lake MI as a way to celebrate the end of the program and so there are a couple different elements of the student life experience. But I'm going to end that component so I can let our alumni speak more for further on that.

So to summarize the program this program is primarily an academic program focused on quantitative analysis in R programming with ways in which you can apply those skills in a capstone research project and learning? How to write and present that information in the policy memo. There's opportunities for career exploration through engaging with practitioners. An preparing your own professional skills. All while having this fund student life cohort experience.

And in today we won't be talking about the application process or admissions process. But if you do have questions on those topics. Please feel free to send me an email after the presentation today and I'd be happy to chat further with you through email, or one on one Phone call to go through that process a little further.

Without further ado, let's turn it over now to engage with the alumni who are here with us today.

And so to begin I'm going to have our alumni introduced themselves. In doing so, they will provide their name. The Year in which they completed the DPSS program. Their academic background like their University and or majors and what they're doing now? What is their current program or wool?

So, which alumni would like to go 1st.

Hi welcome, everybody, I'm happy to join you my name is heavier coat and I'm from Mexico City, Mexico and I was part of DPS as during the summer of 2019.

I'm currently a full time student at the time I'm involved in a double major program in Economics and political science. An I just finished an internship and I'm looking to become a research assistant.

Hi I'm Kevin I just graduated from Williams College. I did the DPSS program last summer on my study history with a particular focus on intellectual history and now I work as a research analyst an adventure cap.

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Regional think we're having some audio trouble trouble hearing you.

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Rachel minutes see if there's a way in which you can maybe in the call and then rejoin us and hopefully that will enable a smoother connection as I would hate to have our portable connection. So if you want to go ahead and disconnect and reconnect and then we can have you re introduce yourself? When you re join the conversation?

While Rachel's doing that I wanted to see if we had any other alumni on the call who want to introduce themselves.

I think that might be, it at the moment I know I'm really was going to join us. And so is robbing but they may be a little delayed so while Rachel is reconnecting. We're going to go ahead and move on to the next question that we have which is why did you choose this program? Why did you choose. You Chicago's DPS and as you were thinking about your different summer options. Why did you choose this program over other options such as internships?

Or maybe other academic programs. Javier do you want to start by telling us why you chose DPSS?

Yes, I I Fortunately found the DPSS program. Uh was while I was looking for uh. I don't know a next step of my academic life.

I chose it over the internships and perhaps taking classes during the summer because I realize what the value of this program could be in terms of the intensity and the skills learned.

I then we

yeah, make was a big part of it and I truly enjoyed it but also it gave me certain coding skills or made me think about my future green part for Graduate School. I think that kind of exposure and engagement with a huge cloud community is just beyond any other option for the summer.

Great thank you have your Kevin you wanna tell us why you chose this program.

Yeah, and there's a series of reasons, but mainly the timing was really, really flexibel appreciated that it was really intense portion so I still had time before and after to do other things.

And I also really wanted to build those.

Data analysis and econometrics skills that you spoke about before and yeah, and I also really wanted to explore Chicago. I'm it's really great and.

Unique place to be as a young person.

Thank you. Kevin I see Rachel you re connected on the call you and try again and see if you can introduce yourself and see if the audio is working better now.

Rachel I'm sorry we don't hear anything coming from your end so maybe we can keep trying and I know Maria's trying to get connected but having some trouble so again. We're going to continue moving on with our next question. But when you're able to reconnect we will try again.

Well, but Rachel you there?

Not yet OK well then.

We will now go into our next question, which is to talk a little bit more about the academics for those of you if you can elaborate on did you have a quantitative background coming in? Are you familiar with this brand new for you? Was there a big learning curve. How intense was it and what was the biggest takeaway from the academics. Kevin we want to start with you.

Yeah, totally I'm so I had taken you know a couple introductory concourses and one like really basic statistics purse. So I really didn't have a level of quantitative rigor that I wanted to graduate college, which I did this December.

Oh, you know the web program set up is it's not really that you catch up. But like you kind of like build the foundation really quickly and.

You You You're given the opportunity to scale up to the level that you want so for the art course. You know there. It was three 4 hours a day. But on Top of that, if you wanted to go. The extra mile instructor. Dan Dan snow was always really amenable to helping you out, the listening to you to giving you extra work to giving you a trapper 20s and I think it's really important to take advantage of that she want to and also you know professor way in Austin was really.

I'm really helpful and kind of elucidating kind of really complex additional and econometrics. Concepts and showing how they matter and helping us read through papers and kind of see different aspects of this that you know.

I kinda missed in my college experience that I think a lot of students do because you can only focus on so much so. I think that this course really getting a strong academic foundation. That's also really practical outside that.

Thank you. Harvey are you wanna tell us about your experience with academics of this program.

Sure, uhm well, I had some background and just distichs from the course. But I have to say it was definitely different from how I have learned during my classes. Yes, the I think the focus is very practical and very.

Um.

Very focused on how to translate this valuable conclusions and papers into real life situations. I also felt very close that I was able to reach out to a professor or even during class just keep asking questions as everyone is very curious about about the topics for me. The coding part was more difficult and I had to put some extra time to it.

But I guess everyone comes from a different background and everyone supports one another.

Also, you can reach out to the TA sessions or your instructors. I think it's very, very, very open to having you asking questions.

Yes, that's a good .2 things to take away here on the academics is one perspective students. You do not need a background in this field to be successful in this program. The alumni it. They have very diverse exposure to things like statistics and economics. We don't require any of that in the application process. So this program is really meant to be with anyone with any type of background. It's a really good foundational accelerated way to gain those quantitative skills.

And yes, we offer graduate teaching assistants there there every week night to be a support. If you want. Additional conversation about how to understand the concepts extra training whether to make sure you feel confident or as Kevin was saying. If you want that stretch project if you want to go and little bit further with the coding. Those graduate teaching assistants are going to be there to help you really master the material.

As he Maria you may have been able to reconnect to our conversation re are you able to hear us and join.

Not yet OK well, we'll keep working on that, but now we're going to take a step back from the academics and move into that student life that student cohort experience alumni? Can you tell us maybe one of the key highlights if it was an event or a day that really stood out to you as well as what did a typical day look like.

Javier you wanna begin.

Sure, I mean, uh for me a typical day would look like perhaps uhm starting off with some exercise. Then I would you know just walk out of the door and grab something for breakfast on the way?

And then I would just come to the Harris building and start meeting all of these people and good friends that I made to read this for weeks.

Uh of course, we spend most of the academics inside the classroom.

But I guess we also had some time to you know talk to our classmates into the professors and we had this thing that's the lunch and learns.

Which we have during our lunch breaks of course, but they were a good time to think an uhm listen to people that were doing. We doing research on how certain policy things could be translated into real life situations and then. After that, I would usually stay for 80 a session whether I wanted to.

You know just go over the coding again or perhaps if I had certain I don't know could be our city about the quantitative analysis Class I would stay for an hour or as long as I wanted because the TAS were always available to us and then perhaps I would go to have dinner with my classmates an that would be it a great day.

Thank you.

Kevin you want tell us about your typical day.

Yeah, so you know, I think you know hobby kind of.

No, the the key parts of of anyone stayed in this program. But you know you kind of wake up. You do your own morning routine of mine is never the same and then you know you're in class for 6 Seven hours a day.

And then after that, you know, I always tried to go to that. EA sessions or 2. You know there are 2 hours afterwards and to the reviewing concepts. I'm getting help with coding. Even just talking to the TAS about things you know, kind of like PA office hours. It's a really useful time and these are like PhD students really knowledgeable people that can tell you a lot about their experience and you know they got the point where they know so much really in their heads so that was great.

And then after that, I try and go for a run by the Lake and that's kind of where I had my happiest memories over the summer weather. It was you know just grabbing pizza and then eating his friends by the Lake. Some friends from my cohort, particularly and and yeah.

I'm sorry, but yeah, you know, those cohort experience and doing things together really sticks. You know for example, me and hobby. We met up in.

In Mexico City, a couple weeks ago. You know, even though we did this program over the summer and only hung out of it.

Yes, Javier sent me the picture of the 2 of you reconnecting and I think that as the program manager. It's just such a joy to see you know this these 2 of you in different students. They come from all the world. They spend a very short period of time together here, but are able to reconnect or stay connected months later. I also serve as a role with our graduate students here at Uchicago Harris, an one of the things that I continuously to hear from them as well.

Is about?

That you're your own networking as a cohort as students that each of you in this in the classroom are really valuable to stay connected with because not only do you have that innate friendship? But as you go on into different graduate programs or different jobs in different careers. They are still able to leverage one another down the road for making that social impact that you're looking for so I'm really glad to hear that you've been able to stay connected even months after the program.

And Kevin you had mentioned you know work going along Lake MI. We here at the University or a 10 minute walk from Lake MI, which is just huge and beautiful were there any other activities that you did with in the city of Chicago that you really enjoyed or would recommend to our perspective, students, joining us today, that they should do while there in Chicago.

Yeah, I mean, there's a bunch really you know, kind of depends on what you want to do you can get baseball tickets to a White Sox game? Which is really close by for you know $10 you can get it. Amazing museums of all kinds. Even within the Uchicago campus is just beautiful architecture and art everywhere. You know there's the.

Chicago zoom invite but then there's also like the campus itself, it's just amazing.

And I think it, it, it's worthwhile just to.

To really kind of like making effort and go around.

And and yeah, you know, I kind of tried to stay closer to the campus. Even though downtown has a lot to do and you know the River cruise that we did was amazing candy.

And and yeah, so, so I think that there's something for everyone and it's.

About how much fun exploring what you're comfortable with even you know when.

Camping 1 short weekend for one night down by the Indians dunes, which is a 25 minute.

Hum kinda like train tram right away.

Thank you. Kevin Harvey or do you have anything else to add about new your favorite memory within the city of Chicago?

Yeah, I mean, you could truly go out and explore, especially during the weekends. It's always a good idea to gather around some friends and go out and see what the city has to offer. I particularly enjoyed riding the bike along Lake MI and visiting the museums, but you know during the week. I would do same scabbing and see around campus, with your student ID you could access a lot of the facilities.

And you could you know just go and explore and see what's going on. Um it's really pleasant to be the usual campus, but also around the area. There is a very local I don't know community.

Pretty pretty cool around it.

Oh yeah, so many are restaurants within a quick walking distance and you know the city is Chicago has a number of different museums and one of them is just a few minutes of a walk from our campus an with your uchicago ID you get in for free so there's certainly an endless amount of things to do within the city. But as our alumni are saying no due diligence of your time spend time on campus focus on your academics and your time together, but you know when you feel confident and ready, please go ahead and explore the city.

That's really glad to hear.

So now let's let's move away from the program. It's now been about over 6 months since you have left Chicago Mama. If you want to tell us a little bit more about what you're doing now and how did this summer program impact that and you know what is your next step after the next 6 months? What are some of your long term goals?

Sure, um so you know after this program. I could I finish kind of my academic research. An I started to take more quantitative classes kind of to help set me up for my job. I'm really interested at the intersection public policy in Tech.

And I'm really hoping to kind of dive into.

This world world now there's a couple of fellowships and waiting to hear back from and I think this program kind of helped give me kind of again. The quantitative rigor and foundations necessary to be more competitive applicant and to kind of like start building a bit of a portfolio that you kind of need to be.

In this space for me, you know it's packed and hopefully public policy. Later on, but yeah, you know it. Was it wasn't that I intentionally avoided it my first you know 3, 1/2 years of college. It's just that it never was my priority and then I kind of realized that I needed it to accomplish the terrible's that I wanted. I'm kind of you know open a different opportunities. But in any space now that involves research and Analytics. During the need to know certain things with this program gives you.

Thank you. Harvey are you want us a little bit more about your doing now. You had mentioned that you're looking for maybe some research opportunities can you tell us more about that?

Sure, Uhm I guess big take away from their DPS as program was that I discovered that allowed the discussions in a lot of the.

Things that I wanted that I have heard about policy. Uh needed to be addressed in an evidence based way, and I agree with. Kevin you have to like you're interested in this area. You might have to start building your skills about this research an?

How are you? How to translate strong analytical tools into strong and valuable information to policymakers?

Uhm I had you know, we addressed some of my courses in order to take more of these.

The six classes an I also have learned that the coding part. I really, really enjoy. It's something that I really profited from during my internship because I was able to.

How many played in?

Dumb clean and sort of being able to manage the data to reach out to strong conclusions.

I yes and I'm also looking to become a research assistant because I'm truly, truly interested on what the academia? What this statistical tools, I can be translated to.

Perhaps into policy.

Please.

And perspective students, please continue to use that chat box feature to type into your questions. I think one of the last questions that I want to insert from myself as alumni? What advice would you give to students who are considering this summer program?

Uh you know it. I would say to to apply if any of those things that are relevant that I mentioned about wanting to build this quantitative toolkit.

Are applicable to you know? I think it's a really to get arguments really intense. And it doesn't take up the whole summer and it really you know, I'd really just suggest that you apply now and kind of really think through that.

And just so you know just to put it in proper perspective, that now. This is something that you know it really kind of helped me and a couple of other friends. I've made 2 friends from Brazil in this program that you know, I was talking to on WhatsApp, either day under like it. You know, we still use it for our research and one of them is I'm I think he's getting into consulting. Now he's like. Yeah, you know, I'm doing it for that. So it's applicable to a wide variety of fields and it just really helpful.

And I know you know it might seem a little bit short, but you know the intensity really gives it a certain flavor that I really recommend.

Thank you Kevin.

Uhm well, I agree with Kevin I would highly recommend students to apply apply as soon as I can if any of the perspective. Students heard something that resonated in them that they're very attractive or its policy part coding.

The academics, it's a program that can.

In which a lot of your areas that you're interested too.

I believe it's also a very, very good way to spend your summer.

And to reflect on what a future career, perhaps in policy or a professional.

Could could leave you I would recommend that there is nothing wrong about spending 4 weeks meeting your friends engaging with the community and with your peers and exploring the city and exploring what your future career path looks like.

Wow.

Thank you alumni so much for joining us today. Uh we have no further questions coming in, so in a big. Thank you for Kevin and Javier for answering our questions. I also want to thank Maria Anne Rachel for trying to connect with us. So we had some trouble connection troubles, but well, we can try again another day. But for all your perspective students. I also echo haviar in Kevin. If this resonated with you then please. Please start your application submit your application.