From August 18 to 29, 2025 the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Division of Social Sciences and the California Center for Population Research will sponsor the Summer Institute in Computational Social Science, to be held at the University of California Los Angeles. The purpose of the Summer Institute is to bring together graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and faculty interested in computational social science. The Summer Institute is for both social scientists (broadly conceived) and data scientists (broadly conceived).
The instructional program will involve lectures, group problem sets, and participant-led research projects, with a special emphasis on causal inference. There will also be outside speakers who conduct computational social science research in a variety of settings, such as academia, industry, and government. Topics covered include causal inference with observational data, text analysis, network analysis, survey experiments, and machine learning. There will be ample opportunities for students to discuss their ideas and research with the organizers, other participants, and visiting speakers. Because we are committed to open and reproducible research, all materials created by faculty and students for the Summer Institute will be released open source.
Participation is restricted to advanced Ph.D. students, postdoctoral researchers, and junior faculty (within 7 years of their Ph.D). We welcome applicants from all backgrounds and fields of study, especially junior faculty from neighboring institutions near Los Angeles. About 25-30 participants will be invited. Most participants are expected to fully attend and participate in the entire 8-day program, but we are open to alternative arrangements for faculty members.
Application materials are due April 5, 2025. {2025 materials coming soon!}