June 17 to June 28, 2024 | ODISSEI | Rotterdam, Netherlands
The Summer Institute will bring together people from many fields and backgrounds. In order to use our time together efficiently, there are a number of things that you should do before participating in SICSS-ODISSEI 2024.
TAs will host office hours through Slack to support you as you work through these pre-arrival materials.
This workshop introduces Python programming for researchers. The workshop builds on learners’ existing knowledge to enable them to quickly apply skills learned to their own research. You will learn the basics of Python, how to use control statements and functions, and how to write clear and reusable code. The largest part of the workshop focuses on data: data import, exploratory data analysis, and visualization. We will make use of popular Python packages such as Pandas and Matplotlib.
This workshop uses a tabular interview dataset from the SAFI Teaching Database, we use a single dataset throughout the workshop to model the data management and analysis workflow that a researcher would use. There are no prerequisites, and the materials assume no prior knowledge about the tools.
Before the Boot Camp it is required to set up the Python environment and download the data. Please, find the instructions here. As the Boot Camp will take place online, having a videoconferencing tool installed is required. Please, find the instructions below.
If you haven’t used Zoom before, go to the official website to download and install the Zoom client for your computer.
Set up your workspace Like other Carpentries workshops, you will be learning by “coding along” with the Instructors. To do this, you will need to have both the window for the tool you will be learning about (a terminal, RStudio, your web browser, etc..) and the window for the Zoom video conference client open. In order to see both at once, we recommend using one of the following set up options:
This blog post includes detailed information on how to set up your screen to follow along during the workshop.
09:00: Welcome and introduction
09:15: Introduction to Python and Python basics
10:15: Coffee break
10:30: Python control structures
11:30: Coffee break
11:45: Creating reusable code
12:45: Wrap-up
13:00: END
09:00: Recap of Day 1
09:15: Reading data from a file using Pandas
10:15: Coffee break
10:30: Extracting row and columns and data aggregation using Pandas
11:30 Coffee break
11:45 Data visualization using Matplotlib
12:45 Wrap-up
13:00 END
In order to prepare for SICSS-ODISSEI 2024, you should read Matt Salganik’s book, Bit by Bit: Social Research in the Digital Age (Read online or purchase from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, IndieBound, or Princeton University Press). Parts of this book, which is a broad introduction to computational social science, will be review for most of you, but if we all read this book ahead of time, then we can use our time together for more advanced topics.
The SICSS Boot Camp is an online training program created by Chris Bail to provide you with beginner level skills in coding so that you can follow the more advanced curriculum we teach at SICSS. The videos and materials are designed for complete beginners and are best viewed as a sequence since each video builds upon content introduced in previous tutorials. If you are already familiar with the topics in these videos, you do not need to complete them.
If you would like more practice after completing the Boot Camp videos, some other materials that we can recommend are:
Please note that the majority of the coding work presented at SICSS-ODISSEI 2024 will employ Python. You are welcome to employ a language of your choice, such as R, Julia, or other languages that are commonly used by computational social scientists. However, we cannot support those languages.
SICSS-ODISSEI 2024 will be using a flipped classroom model. Therefore, you should watch videos of lectures before our meetings, and then we will use our time together for discussion and group activities.
Some of the activities will require coding, and we will support Python. You are welcome to use other languages, but we cannot guarantee that we can support them.
Before participating at SICSS-ODISSEI 2024, you should have an account in the SICSS 2024 Slack workspace. If you have not used Slack before, you should review these getting started materials. Slack can be hard to use at first, but we’ve found that it is the best way to enable everyone to collaborate.
Many participants at SICSS use GitHub to collaborate. If you do not yet have one, you should create a GitHub account. If you are a student, we recommend that you apply for a GitHub Student Developer Pack.
You can host a partner location of the Summer Institutes of Computational Social Science (SICSS) at your university, company, NGO, or government agency.