Teaching undergraduates with quantitative data in the social sciences at University of California Santa Barbara

The interview data was gathered for a project investigating the practices of instructors who use quantitative data to teach undergraduate courses within the Social Sciences. The study was undertaken by employees of the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) Library, who participated in this research project with 19 other colleges and universities across the U.S. under the direction of Ithaka S+R. Ithaka S+R is a New York-based research organization that, among other goals, seeks to develop strategies, services, and products to meet evolving academic trends and support faculty and students. The field of Social Sciences has been notoriously known for valuing the contextual component of data and increasingly entertaining more quantitative and computational approaches to research in response to the prevalence of data literacy skills needed to navigate both personal and professional contexts. Thus, this study becomes particularly timely to identify current instructors’ practices and strategies to teach with data challenges and opportunities to help them advance their instructional efforts. The fundamental goal of this study is fourfold: 1) Explore the ways in which instructors teach undergraduates with data, 2) Understand instructors’ support needs going forward, 3) Develop actionable recommendations for stakeholders, and 4) Build relationships within UCSB and across higher education institutions. This research project was IRB-approved and exempted by the UCSB’s Office of Research in July 2020 (Protocol 1-20-0491).