The First Five Years of the Barnard ERC: A Model for Developing Comprehensive Undergraduate-focused Data Analysis Services

This paper will discuss the formative strategies of integrating an empirical service model into an undergraduate curriculum to support faculty and students. The Empirical Reasoning Center (ERC) implements Barnard College’s initiative to embed “empirical reasoning” across the undergraduate liberal arts curriculum. We define “empirical reasoning” as “thinking critically with data,” including qualitative, quantitative, and geospatial data. The ERC provides students and faculty with a variety of services, including a conventional drop-in help desk staffed by undergraduate fellows and graduate assistants. ERC staff also collaborate with faculty in developing curricular content for their classes and instructional workshops. In this paper, we will discuss best practices for scaling up a small center over five years beginning with one full-time staff member and five student fellows to a center with three full-time staff members and 17 student fellows. We will report on five years of assessment data, which show an upward linear trend from the first full year of operation, 2012-13, in which the ERC provided 218 walk-in consultations. In the 2017-18 academic year, the ERC provided 948 walk-in consultations, a 335% increase. Workshop participation has also grown, from 128 participants in 2012-13 to 1,416 participants in 2017-18, approximately a 1000% increase.