The impacts of COVID-19 have forced researchers to adapt quickly to working under unprecedented restrictions. Here we discuss a new toolkit for Remote Data Collection, gathering researchers’ solutions on everything from replacing face-to-face interaction to greater use of secondary data. The toolkit promises to be a useful resource for the research community, and a guide to improving the efficiency of data collection. … Mindel van de Laar: Over the last few months, with a team of four rese...
A new decade begins with the promise of a global rebrand, a new website, and a new director for UNU-MERIT. All three are currently being decided, so now is a good time to look back on 2019 – a year that featured two major developments in our outreach activities. First, European membership of The Conversation UK, which calls itself “an independent source of news and views, sourced from the academic and research community and delivered direct to the public”. Second, a non-profit account with Short...
Diversity, visibility and impact are three of the biggest buzzwords of the media landscape, especially for the UN family. They feed into various questions, including: Who is shown and who is seen? Who should set the spotlight? What is shared and what is gained? So on and so forth. This post aims to explode a few myths by drilling down the data while explaining our basic approach. … Here at UNU-MERIT we have two big advantages for communications. First, as a UN institute, diversity is in our DNA,...
Being so close to the borders of both Belgium and Germany gives Maastricht University a truly international character – and this is one of our best marketing tools. Maastricht is the most international university in the Netherlands and, without scientific proof, I dare say that our institute is the most international part of the university. Yet, just as we study other countries for any number of reasons, our fellows or students may also choose to study Dutch society, not least because the statis...
Big data doesn’t necessarily mean great insights. Thorough data analysis is at the core of many innovations in business, economics and the sciences in today’s world. Econometrics can be described as the art of gaining new insights from complex data sets with model-driven thinking (meaning you confront data with ideas about how they are actually generated). Key aspects: This course aims to provide an accessible, practical and hands-on introduction to econometrics and its workhorse, regression ana...