The Department of Sociology, Queens College, The City University of New York will develop an undergraduate laboratory using high speed microcomputers and an ethernet network. The network will be bridged to the Queens College Academic Computer Center Network and from there to NYSERNET, the CUNY University- wide Computer and NSFNET. This laboratory will permit the department to significantly enhance its curriculum at the introductory and advanced level.Three major objectives of the project are: 1) Infusing the content of lower level methods and statistics courses with 'hands-on' laboratory exercises, thus upgrading the quantitative and scientific reasoning skills of students, especially those who major in sociology. Many of these students are women and many are members of racial and ethnic minorities. 2) Providing intensive independent research experiences for students considering scientific careers in sociology, through small laboratory-based upper level research courses closely supervised by senior faculty. Many students from the department have gone on to their Ph.D.s at graduate schools throughout the U.S. 3) Disseminating the results and products of our experience to other sociology and social science departments throughout the United States.
