Can you use your knowledge of politics, statistics and data science to predict a Japanese election result? Waseda University will be holding its inaugural Data Science Competition this semester, challenging students from across the university to apply their skills to forecast the results of July’s Upper House election.
Teams will be asked to forecast the vote share of political parties in the PR ballot as well as the winning candidates in the country’s electoral districts. What sort of data you use to make your forecast is up to you – any publicly available data set can be used, such as past election results, demographic data, opinion polls, newspaper articles, social media trends… (Note that teams must not publish their forecasts until after the election day.)
Forecasts must be submitted on the day before polling day and prizes will be awarded based on (1) the accuracy of the forecast and (2) the quality and originality of the forecasting model the team has created.
The best team will be awarded the Grand Prize (100,000 yen). There are many more prizes, including the SPSE prize (50,000 yen) and sponsor prizes. It is possible for a team to win multiple prizes.
We’ll hold an information session in May, and teams will present their models for judging and prize-giving after the election in July. For more details, you can read the flyer or check out the competition website below.
Flyer: https://dswaseda.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/dscompetition_flyer_en.pdf
Competition Website: https://dswaseda.com
Schedule
Information Session
(No Registration Required; you may bring your lunch)
- Date/Time
May 14 (Tue) 12:10～13:00 - Location
Kikuicho Campus, Building 40 : 102 Presentation Room
(Near Waseda Station)
Presentation Session, Prize-Giving, and Reception
- Date/Time
27 July (Sat) 14:30～17:30 - Location
Waseda Campus, Building 3 (TBD)
