Announcements

QSS students receive honors at 2023 graduation    

The Program in Quantitative Social Science is happy to announce our Majors and Minors have made the valedictorian and Phi Beta Kappa lists:

Valedictorian:

Megan Ren '23 (QSS Minor)

Phi Beta Kappa:

Marco Allen '23 (QSS Major)

Devan Fink '23 (QSS Major)

Julia Herman '23 (QSS Major)

Griffin Kozlow '23 (QSS Major)

Claire Meli '23 (QSS Major)

Bess Neiblum '23 (QSS Major)

Isabel Pantle '23 (QSS Major)

Tara Pillai '23 (QSS Major)

Megan Ren '23 (QSS Minor)

Ryan Wu '23 (QSS Major)

Amy Zaretsky '23 (QSS Major)

Surge of student interest in game theory

We are excited to announce that a record-breaking 248 students enrolled in Associate Professor of Mathematics Feng Fu's Evolutionary Game Theory class in Spring 23. Associate Professor Fu is a member of the steering committee of the Program in Quantitative Social Science.

Please see Dartmouth's article on the big record-breaking enrollment and what it's all about: 
Game Theory Scores Big at Dartmouth

QSS Colloquium with Assistant Professor Seo-Young Silvia Kim

The Program in Quantitative Social Science hosted a colloquium with Assistant Professor Seo-young Silvia Kim from American University on Friday, February 17, 2023. The title of the talk was, "When Do Voter Files Accurately Measure Turnout? How Transitory Voter File Snapshots Impact Research and Representation."

Read the full article HERE!

Professor Nyhan on the incoherence of Facebook's Trump decision

"Attacking the legitimacy of past elections is of course a way to cast doubt on future elections. It's absurd to pretend otherwise," Professor Brendan Nyhan tells The Atlantic about Meta's decision to lift the Facebook ban on former president Donald Trump. Professor Nyhan is a Professor of Government and is on the QSS Steering Committee.

Read the full article HERE!

Isabel Pantle '23 presents QSS research project on Analysis of Holding Penalties in the NFL

In November 2022, Isabel Pantle '23 presented a statistical analysis of holding penalties in the National Football League (NFL).  Every undergraduate majoring in Quantitative Social Science (QSS) at Dartmouth College must complete a research project as part of the program's curriculum, and Isabel's project was carried out this past fall quarter. Isabel's research used data from the NFL data bowl, a national contest sponsored by the league. The topic of this year's data bowl was offensive lineman and holding penalties, and the winners of the contest receive a cash prize and the opportunity to present their work at the NFL Scouting Combine. 

Isabel found that time between ball snap and throw, whether a defender was outside of his block, and whether a defender was double-teamed significantly increased the likelihood of a holding penalty being called against an offensive lineman. Isabel also uncovered some limited evidence that differences in the rates at which offensive and defensive lineman accelerated when a play began affect the probability of a holding penalty. Isabel presented her findings in November to peers and QSS faculty at Dartmouth College as well as to members of the analytics department at the Baltimore Ravens.

For more information, read the full article here.