Research Ambassadors
Shea Thorpe '27
Email me at: sthorpe2@u.rochester.edu
Discipline(s) of Research
- Social Sciences
Major(s) and Minor(s)
- B.A. in Data Science
- B.A. in Financial Economics
- Minor in Music
Areas of Interest/Research Focus
- 20th century American state legislation
- Causal inference to model bill success using legislator demographics
- Text-scraping to analyze legislative journals and newspaper archives
PI: Gerald Gamm, Department of Political Science
Areas where I may be particularly helpful
- Public speaking
- Introduction to economics/data science/political science professors
- Cold emailing
- Interviews
What advice do you have for prospective or new researchers?
Humanities research is extremely flexible, as it doesn't have to be performed in a specific location like a lab. So don't let a busy schedule dissuade you from getting involved -- use small blocks of downtime for mundane tasks like cataloguing data or file organization. Completing these "administrative" tasks provides a surprisingly helpful head start on conducting meaningful research.