My project used data from Elections Canada to analyze the correlation between population density and vote choice. This project aimed to use these two variables to study whether political polarization has increased along geographic lines. If population density appears more related to how an elector votes, that would indicate increasing polarization between urban and rural areas.
I initially applied to the ARIA program to help me find direction after graduation. After this summer, I will be going into my fourth and final year at McGill. After my first three years at the university, I still had very little clue of what I wanted to pursue afterwards. I considered beginning careers in urban planning, public service, biostatistics, business, or a thesis-based master’s degree. My main anxiety around graduate school is whether I would enjoy conducting research and creating my own project. Thus, I applied to the Arts Internship Office to fund my ARIA project for the summer. I hoped to spend my summer building my project, investigating the topics I was interested in, and seeing if academic research was appealing to me.
Aside from getting a better idea of what research looks like, I also had the objective of becoming more proficient in technical skills. My project required me to use GIS and the statistics language R. I had some experience in these programs from my Geography and Statistics classes but wanted to further my knowledge. Both are extremely useful skills to have after graduation, regardless of whether I pursue grad school or another path. I explained to my supervisor before the summer that I hoped to grow these two skills, and we designed a project methodology that would challenge me accordingly. I was initially nervous about the amount of R required for my project, but thankfully I was able to overcome all my coding obstacles. I found the problem-solving aspect of learning the R language quite enjoyable, it was far more engaging than learning R in the classroom. I am very happy to now conclude my ARIA experience with two new skill sets in my toolbox.
The highlight throughout my eleven-week ARIA project was the lab meetings I got to sit in. My supervisor, Professor Forest, has many honours undergraduate students, research assistants, masters students, and postdoctoral students. Every week, Professor Forest has all of us meet together as part of his Forest Lab meetings. We all worked on different projects in different fields, so it was interesting hearing about the progress and challenges of the other students’ summer work. It was also eye-opening to see the other possible fields of Geography that I could pursue. Additionally, when someone ran into issues with their project, they could share with the group and we all brainstormed solutions together. We had a few students familiar with R on the team, so I would ask them for ideas when I ran into roadblocks with my R code. I also presented my poster to the entire lab in my final ARIA week, so that everyone could give me feedback and suggestions. I am so grateful to Professor Forest for including me in his lab meetings.
The biggest challenge I ran into was the amount of data I needed. Since I chose to focus on the micro-scale level of Canadian elections, my data frames contained more than 2 million observations. My usual practices in R were no longer efficient, I had to be precise with my operations and keep track of all my data. With so many columns, it’s easy to accidentally lose data and not even notice. My computer also struggled at times with running large operations. My workaround was to use McGill’s Geographic Information Centre (GIC), which has computers equipped with R that are much more powerful than my laptop. Professor Forest helped me get after-hours access to the GIC so that I could follow my own schedule working on the project.
It was a joy working on my ARIA project this summer. I got to build connections and learn new skills while conducting research in my interests at my own pace. ARIA has given me a better idea of what academic research looks like in the fields of Geography and Political Science. My increased knowledge in R and GIS will also help in many future career paths, as well as graduate studies should I choose to pursue it. Thank you to the Arts Internship Office and Dr. Joan Eakin & Christopher Hoffmann for affording me this wonderful opportunity.
