860-0033-00L Big Data for Public Policy
Semester | Spring Semester 2020 |
Lecturers | E. Ash, M. Guillot |
Periodicity | yearly recurring course |
Language of instruction | English |
Comment | Only for MSc STP, MSc CIS, PhD students D-GESS and D-MTEC. STP students have priority. |
Abstract | This course provides an introduction to big data methods for public policy analysis. Students will put these techniques to work on a course project using real-world data, to be designed and implemented in consultation with the instructors. |
Objective | |
Content | Many policy problems involve prediction. For example, a budget office might want to predict the number of applications for benefits payments next month, based on labor market conditions this month. This course provides a hands-on introduction to the "big data" techniques for making such predictions. These techniques include: -- procuring big datasets, especially through web scraping or API interfaces, including social media data; -- pre-processing and dimension reduction of massive datasets for tractable computation; -- machine learning for predicting outcomes, including how to select and tune the model, evaluate model performance using held-out test data, and report results; -- interpreting machine learning model predictions to understand what is going on inside the black box; -- data visualization including interactive web apps. Students will put these techniques to work on a course project using real-world data, to be designed and implemented in consultation with the instructors. |