Introduction to Political Analytics

Intro Political Analytics

Analytics and data-driven decision-making are playing an ever-larger role in modern political campaigns, advocacy groups, and media coverage of politics. This phenomenon builds on the increasing availability of “big data” in politics: augmented voter files covering hundreds of millions of registered voters, databases of donors and volunteers, online clicks and likes, an explosion of polling options, and much more. As a result, data practitioners now play a key role in determining the direction of American politics.

This course familiarizes students with a range of foundational statistical and data analytic methods and shows how these techniques can be practically applied to politics and related fields. The course also serves as an intensive introduction to statistical programming in R. Students will learn about the role of big data and analytics in contemporary US politics, with a focus on key data sources and their uses. The course also focuses on causal inference methods to train students in evaluating the impact of political campaigns, policy initiatives, and other program interventions. This course lays the groundwork for more specialized courses and will help students consider which types of knowledge and skills they want to acquire as they progress through the degree program.

• Instructor: Michael Schwam-Baird
  Info
• 4 points

Strategic Thinking

Politics involves a complex interaction of competing interests.  For practitioners, it is crucial to understand how efforts are met with responses, and predicting those responses is critical to designing successful strategies.  Game theory is the formal mathematical analysis of strategic interaction across the social sciences.  This course provides a general theoretical language to the theory of games, examining the intentional thought process of rational actors in strategic environments.  Students will acquire tools for understanding the dynamics that lead to the success of a political campaign or policy-making effort.  Course topics include two-person games, dynamic games, bargaining, and signaling. Students will also examine a variety of cases.

• Instructor: Michael Ting
  CULPA: 4 Info
• 2 points

Campaign Finance & Fundraising Analytics

Campaign Fin & Fund Analy

Billions of dollars are raised and spent during U.S. presidential and congressional races each election cycle. Campaign expenditures play a critical role in election outcomes and political donations are used by corporations, unions, advocacy groups, and individuals to influence elected officials and public policy. Whether they are working for campaigns, advocacy groups, or consultants, political analysts need to have a sound understanding of campaign finance law and regulations, the chief strategies that contributors and recipients use to pursue their interests, and the incredibly rich data that is available to analyze and study campaign giving in the United States.

In this course, students will learn about the history and current state of campaign finance regulation, what motivates donors to give and what they may (or may not) receive in return, and how campaigns themselves fundraise and spend their billions. Students will become familiar with the ways data analytics have influenced how modern campaigns approach fundraising and the strategies used by candidates to finance a run for office. Finally, students will engage with the potential benefits and pitfalls of campaign finance reforms which, along with technological change, promise to keep political fundraising in a state of flux.

• Instructor: Michael Schwam-Baird
  Info
• 3 points

Internship Experience 2 - POAN

Internship in POAN

This asynchronous, 1.5-credit elective combines a supervised professional internship with guided analysis of workplace culture, ethics, and feedback practices. Students evaluate organizational values, inclusivity, and ethical decision-making while developing the skills needed to navigate professional environments and identify the workplace cultures in which they will thrive.

• 1.5 points

Capstone in Political Analytics

The capstone course is the culminating experience for students in the Political Analytics program. Students will have the opportunity to tackle a complex, real-world political analytics challenge for a sponsoring organization. The capstone provides students with analytics experience in a “live” setting and is intended to expose students to the problems, timelines, and communications needs of actual political decision-makers. Working in small teams while being mentored by a program faculty member, students will apply core knowledge, concepts, and frameworks acquired during the program and practice the hands-on skills they have developed in their classes. Throughout the semester, student project teams will interact with the sponsoring organizations as virtual consultants, scoping the problem, acquiring the data, conducting analyses, and ultimately presenting their findings and recommendations to the project sponsor.

• Instructor: Sara Yeganeh
  Info
• 3 points

Internship in Industry - POAN

Internship In POAN

This asynchronous, 3-credit elective provides an immersive, supervised professional internship experience paired with structured reflection and applied academic work. Students integrate theory with practice while assessing organizational culture, ethical decision-making, feedback practices, and professional competencies. Through guided analysis and reflective assignments, students deepen self-awareness, strengthen career readiness, and clarify how their internship experience shapes future professional goals.

• 3 points