"As part of the American Statistical Association project assessing and monitoring the health of the federal statistical agencies, the project team is launching a “Citizen Science” project. This project aims to help track changes in federal statistical data releases (e.g., granularity, frequency, timeliness, and other characteristics), which could be improvements or deteriorations."

"We especially need volunteers for products from the following agencies:
    BJS (Bureau of Justice Statistics)
    BTS (Bureau of Transportation Statistics)
    EIA (Energy Information Administration)
    ERS (Economic Research Service)
    NASS (National Agricultural Statistics Service)
    NCES (National Center for Education Statistics)
    NCHS (National Center for Health Statistics)
    NCSES (National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics)
    ORES (Office of Research, Evaluation, and Statistics)
    SOI (Statistics of Income Division)"

Read the complete call online (Google Form)

From the Consortium of Social Science Associations

Why Social Science?
Because Research-Informed Policy Strengthens Children and Families

By Suzanne Le Menestrel, Juan Romero-Casillas, and Eva Lettiere (Society for Research in Child Development)

The path from research to policy is rarely straightforward; it takes collaboration between researchers and policymakers at every stage. In child-centered policymaking, where the goal is to improve the lives of children and families, these partnerships are especially vital. Evidence helps policymakers better understand complex issues and identify effective solutions, while researchers gain the opportunity to demonstrate the value of their work in addressing real-world challenges.

Read the complete blog post online

From the Federal Register (Sep 25): "The Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 established the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) as the research, evaluation, and statistics arm of the U.S. Department of Education. IES is responsible for generating, disseminating, and promoting the use of rigorous evidence to improve education outcomes nationwide. IES is undertaking a comprehensive reexamination to ensure that its core functions—research, statistics, evaluation, and dissemination—are carried out in ways that maximize relevance, timeliness, and usability for the education stakeholders who rely on them. Specifically, the goal is to ensure that IES' high-quality work is translated in ways that inform teacher and practitioner practice and has a meaningful, positive impact on students' academic achievement and other outcomes. Through this RFI, we seek public input on how IES can modernize its programs, processes, and priorities to better serve the needs of the field and American students."

Comments accepted until 10/15/25.

View the Federal Register notice

Comment link is also here.

This request comes in the context of dramatic reductions in staffing and funding as part of the Trump administration's attempt to dismantle and eliminate the US Department of Education. See a compilation of news reports on our DCSS resource page. 

"Inside Pete Hegseth’s Civilian Purge at West Point" By Jasper Craven, Politico (8/28/2025)

"Days after his confirmation, Hegseth blasted out a memo to military school faculty prohibiting instruction that could be in any way construed as promoting 'Critical Race Theory, Gender Ideology, and DEI.' Then he gathered service academy leaders on a teleconference. Beamed into each campus was a clear order: Focus on history, warfighting and engineering, and hobble much of the rest. Department heads moved quickly, requesting faculty review their syllabi for materials potentially in conflict with Hegseth’s dictate.

"... West Point ultimately banned Parsons’ entire list, part of a broader sweep across the service academies that scrubbed hundreds of books from courses and library catalogs, including work by James Baldwin and Toni Morrison, plus a slate of texts interrogating masculinity. West Point also dissolved its sociology major and abolished at least a dozen student diversity clubs, including a chapter of the Society of Women Engineers and the Latin Cultural Club. They also removed history and English courses, including one called 'Power and Difference.' ”

[Read the complete article online]

From the Consortium of Social Science Associations:

Because It Gives Educators and Policymakers the Tools to Improve Education

By Tabbye Chavous, Executive Director, American Educational Research Association

Wearing my hats as a social science scholar and academic leader, I have studied trends in the development of science over the past 150 years. Over that time, scholarly science has focused on the continual advancement of knowledge. As such, the science produced has become more precise—theoretically and empirically—more sophisticated in its methods, more interdisciplinary, and more connected to practice and policy. To the last point, in this century science, including education research, has demonstrated a growing capacity for refining evidence-based approaches to address important issues and concerns in our schools, communities, and broader society.  

Education scholars are deeply committed to making a tangible impact on classrooms and communities across the country. Their work offers not just knowledge, but actionable solutions. It informs classroom practice, shapes district and state policies, and enhances community well-being. It ensures accountability, stimulates and guides innovation, and allows for careful assessment of which interventions truly move the needle for students. And for many years, a strong partnership among the federal government, universities, and philanthropic organizations sustained this work, fostering a national ecosystem in which research could thrive and be applied. 

That partnership is now in grave danger. [Read the complete essay online]

[Update, Aug 25] "GMU President Refuses to Apologize for Diversity Efforts, Lawyer Calls Ed. Dept. Claims ‘Absurd’ The Chronicle of Higher Education [Link to lawyer letter here (PDF)]

[Update, Aug 1] "Despite federal investigations, GMU president will remain in role, receive pay boost" Virginia Mercury

[Update, Jul 30] "DOJ to review staff texts, emails after faculty praise of GMU president" The Washington Post (Jul 29) "...the Justice Department sent a letter to George Mason University saying it planned to review a Faculty Senate resolution that praised the school’s president. ... On Tuesday, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chair of the House Committee on the Judiciary, and committee member Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) sent a letter to Washington saying they were requesting five years of records and staff communications related to GMU’s DEI policies."

"Alumni, students, faculty, business leaders, and community members who care deeply about Mason" have created a website, "I Stand With Mason," that includes a form to sign a resolution in support of GMU and its president.

"Fairfax court says some Youngkin appointees can’t serve on university boards — for now" WAMU (Jul 29)

[Update, Jul 17] "George Mason Is the Latest University Under Fire From Trump. Its President Fears an 'Orchestrated' Campaign." ProPublica (Jul 10) "When university president Gregory Washington received notice that the Trump administration had opened an investigation into complaints of antisemitism, he was 'perplexed.' But there are signs it may be part of a coordinated campaign to oust him." [Announcement from US Dept. of Education is here.]
"George Mason professors say governing board failed to defend president, university" Virginia Mercury (Jul 23) GMU Board of Visitors meeting notice, August 1.

[Update, Apr. 11] A group of faculty members at universities on the March 10 list have issued a call to action, "We Must Leverage the Strength of Our Institutions and Stand Together." (New URL) It states in part, "These measures are not principally about protecting students and combating discrimination; they are about political control. ... the federal government is using the language of civil rights enforcement as a cover for authoritarian overreach and encroachment, dictating what can be said, studied, and debated in our institutions. These measures represent a direct assault on the mission of the university as a space for independent thought, free speech, and democratic engagement. ... We ask all sixty institutions under government threat to unite in a coordinated, proactive defense." More than 4,500 faculty members at these 60 institutions and others have signed the call to action, which remains open for signature as of this date.

[Original, Mar. 15] The US Department of Education announced March 10 that it "sent letters to 60 institutions of higher education warning them of potential enforcement actions if they do not fulfill their obligations under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act to protect Jewish students on campus...." (See also the report from Inside Higher Ed on March 11.)

The list includes American University, George Mason University, Johns Hopkins University, and the University of Virginia.

At the same time, the Antiracist Research and Policy Center at American University released an action-resource guide: Student Speech, Education Policy, and College Campuses Today. (PDF) "This guide provides an accessible introduction to historical and ongoing policy debates on students’ freedom of expression around Palestine, Gaza, Israel, and anti-Zionism. It is intended to inform and empower students, faculty, administrators, and free speech advocates working in this area."

Johns Hopkins University also "is planning for staff layoffs after the Trump administration canceled $800 million in U.S. Agency for International Development grants...."

See additional news and resources related to the actions of the Trump Administration on our "Resources" page.

"Learn about exciting jobs for sociology graduates! The American Sociological Association’s Pathways booklets and brochures offer aspiring sociology students, their families, and advisors valuable information on how a bachelor’s degree in sociology prepares students for rewarding and meaningful careers. Resources include examples of how students can focus their sociology major depending on their interests and goals, and insights from several sociology graduates to help students imagine how they might put their own sociology degree to work."

View resources on the project website

Hope in High Water:
A People’s Recovery Twenty Years After Hurricane Katrina

A documentary from Pulitzer Prize- and Emmy Award-winning journalist Trymaine Lee, supported by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation (WKKF).

"Released days before the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, “Hope in High Water: A People’s Recovery Twenty Years After Hurricane Katrina” highlights the leadership of communities in New Orleans and along Mississippi’s Gulf Coast working to rebuild and reimagine more equitable systems.

"The feature-length documentary marks Trymaine Lee’s return to the region, where he first reported on Katrina as part of The Times-Picayune newsroom in 2005. The film traces the arc of recovery through the voices of those who never left — educators, organizers, farmers and families who have spent two decades not only rebuilding but transforming the systems that failed their communities long before the storm."

Watch the trailer or the entire film via the project website

Special Issue of The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science: "The Public's Science–A New Social Contract for American Research Policy"

Editors: Alondra Nelson (Institute for Advanced Study) and Jenny Reardon (University of California, Santa Cruz)

Abstract Deadline: Friday, September 19, 2025

"Seventy-five years after Vannevar Bush's Science—The Endless Frontier established the foundational social contract for publicly funded research in the United States, we face an unprecedented crisis in American research policy. The original arrangement of government funding in exchange for research autonomy, with the expectation of broad societal benefits, has produced remarkable scientific achievements and world-shaping technologies, from life-saving medicines to weapons of mass destruction. Yet this arrangement has consistently lacked robust mechanisms for genuine public accountability, a weakness now exposed as publicly funded institutions face systematic attacks and declining public trust."

Read the complete call here.

"NAFSA: The Association of International Educators is inviting current international students and postdocs to complete a survey on the Trump administration’s new proposal to end duration of status for F, J, and I nonimmigrant visas. On June 27, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security submitted the proposed rule to the Office of Management and Budget. This new proposed rule would establish a 2- or 4-year timeframe for individuals on F-1 and J-1 visas to stay in the United States. This proposed rule is a departure from the current duration of status policy which allows F-1 and J-1 visa holders to stay in the country for the length of their educational program. For more information, please visit the NAFSA website.

The deadline for the completion of the survey is September 12, 2025. The survey link is here.