Expand+SPOL10030 Understanding Social Problems and Policies

Academic Year 2021/2022

This module seeks to equip you with basic research and analytical skills that are needed to understand and respond to social policy problems. Its main focus is on stat...

Hide-SPOL10030 Understanding Social Problems and Policies

Academic Year 2021/2022

This module seeks to equip you with basic research and analytical skills that are needed to understand and respond to social policy problems. Its main focus is on statistical data available in online databases that are widely used to describe such problems and design policy solutions to them. You will learn about major relevant databases for Ireland and the EU and will receive guidance and hands-on experience on how to access those databases, search through them for data on specific social policy topics, select and extract particular relevant indicators into Excel spreadsheets, present the data in graphs and tables, and write brief descriptive commentaries on what the data reveal. For illustrative purposes, the module will focus on unemployment as a representative social problem and will concentrate on analysing that problem and policy responses to it in Ireland and in the EU. A special focus will be on the impact of Covid-19 on the labour market and its effects on employment and unemployment among younger cohorts in particular.

Learning Outcomes:

What will I learn?

On completion of this module, you should be able to:

1. Identify the key social policy data sources that are available online for Ireland and the EU;

2. Understand what kinds of information those sources contain;

3. Access these sources and locate information within them on particular social policy topics;

4.Extract and download data on these topics;

5. Use Excel spreadsheets to organise the data and present them in graphs and tables;

6. Apply basic descriptive statistics in Excel;

7. Write short descriptive accounts of what the data reveal.

How will I learn?
The course delivery is a mix of lectures and hands-on computer workshops in small groups. In the blended format live sessions are supported with in-depth pre-recorded lectures and tutorials online.

Indicative Module Content:
The key aim of the module is to introduce students to social science data analysis. Throughout the module the main example are drawn from analysing the labour market which includes unemployment, education level, gender pay gap, occupational segregation, female managers and the effects of Covid-19 on employment levels. With a focus on Ireland all data analysis has a European perspective.