The Clarke research group is currently in need of undergraduate research assistants interested in sport sociology, sport management and policy, musicology - particularly students interested in issues of race and culture in international and olympic sport. The first phase of this project will involve analyzing information about the International level judges in figure skating. The second part of the project will be a content analysis of music selections for all World Championship and Olympic Ice Dancing teams from 1976-present. The purpose of the project is to analyze music selection trends over time in relation to available demographic information about the judges.
They are seeking 2-4 undergraduate research assistants to assist with data collection and coding for course credit for the academic year. These students will need to be proficient in deep-searching websites such as YouTube and relevant Ice Dancing and Figure Skating websites (beginning with a list provided by me and expected to expand upon the list). Students will possibly need to spend time watching recordings of Ice Dancing programs performed for competition in previous Olympics and World Championships in order to assist with coding the data. Students will be responsible for entering the collected data into a provided template in excel.
Ideally, students should be able to spend 3-9 hours per week on this task. Students may earn 1 credit hour for every 3 hours per week of research assistance. This means students will need to carefully consider how many hours per week they can reasonably spend on this research project as an assistant before agreeing to a set number of credit hours for the semester.
Selected student research assistants will be trained in content analysis using Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis as well as traditional hand-coding. Students will have the opportunity to work with my colleagues as well: Dr. Synthia Sydnor (Kinesiology & Community Health), Dr. Nari Shin (Texas Tech Sport Management), and Doo Jae Park (PhD Student in KCH at Illinois). If students contribute significantly to manuscript preparation (e.g. editing, references, assistance with literature review), they would also earn the opportunity to be listed as co-authors on any resultant publications.
Minimum requirements:
Proficiency in library searches using complex search term combinations and multiple search engines (NOT Google)
Basic experience in reading peer-reviewed journal articles Sophomore status or higher
Preferred qualifications:
Junior or Senior status
Completion of qualitative methods course(s)
Familiarity or experience with
Figure Skating Familiarity or experience with Ice Dancing
Sociology or related social science field majors
Interested students should send a CV or resume, cover letter (include relevant course and research experience), and 1-2 letters of recommendation to Dr. Caitlin Vitosky Clarke: vitosky@illinois.edu
