Efficient Vacationing, Summer 2007 

 With the ice melting and the birds chirping it’s the time again for planning the summer.  Here a few worthwhile reasons not to be stuck behind your desk all summer.  Maybe these are not the most exotic events and locations but at least they are ‘productive’ and you won’t feel guilty for being away. 

 The  Michigan Summer Institute in Survey Research Techniques  runs several sessions over a total of eight weeks from June 4 to July 27. The courses are mainly about designing, writing and testing surveys, and analyzing survey data.  The level of the courses differs but they have some advanced courses on sampling and analysis.  Because of a modular setup, it's possible to pick and choose broadly.  I've heard good things about this institute, particularly from people who want to collect their own data. 

 Also in Michigan is the  Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research  which runs two sessions from June 25 to August 17.  This program focuses on analytics and also caters for different levels of sophistication.  I only know a few people who attended this program, with mixed reviews.  Much seems to depend on what courses you actually take, some are great and others so-so. 

 The University of Chicago hosts this years’  Institute on Computational Economics  from July 30 to August 9.  The topics are quite advanced and focus on programming approaches to economic problems.  This seems to be quite worthwhile, if it's your interest. 

 Further afield is the  Mannheim Empirical Research Summer School  from July 8 – 20.  This event focuses on analysis of household data but also features sessions on experiment design and behavioral economics.  I didn't hear about previous schools but would be curious to find out. 

 There are other summer schools that don’t have a strong methods focus.  Harvard, LSE and a host of other universities offer a number of courses that might provide a quick dip into some of the substantive topics.