Oscar Torres-Reyna                                    e-mail: otorres@princeton.edu / oscartreyna@gmail.com

Goal

Development, coordination and implementation of research studies, courses and strategic initiatives in the areas of public opinion, electoral campaigns, poverty reduction, public policy and data analysis.

Profile

- Work productively both in teams and independently. - Effectively manage multiple projects, meet deadlines, supervise others and set priorities. - Able to present complex material in a persuasive, clear, and concise manner. - Proven abilities to quickly become expert in new issues, software, and techniques to identify most relevant concepts, data and information, and to troubleshoot problems. - Creative, focused, analytical and detail-oriented. - Comprehensive experience in both Latin America and the United States.

Education

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY (New York City)

·         Ph.D. studies in Political Science (ABD) / Master of Philosophy in Political Science (May 2002).

SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS/ COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY (New York City)

·         Master in Public Administration. Economic Policy / Quantitative Techniques (February, 1998).

ITAM (Mexico City). Diploma in Applied Statistics (November, 1993)

SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS/UNAM (Mexico City). Bachelor of Arts (Honors). 1992.

Professional Experience:

 

 

academic

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY (5/1/2007 - present, Princeton NJ)

·         Data Consultant. Provide statistical and software consulting for undergraduates, graduate students and faculty engaged in quantitative analysis of electronic data in a variety of academic disciplines. Assist in the choice, application, and interpretation of quantitative methods, and with the use of statistical software needed to implement these methods. Retrieve/manipulate complex data from a variety of physical sources. Engage in individual consultation and group instruction. For a list of courses taught/co-taught/assisted see Appendix A at the end. Developed the following online tutorials:

·         Online Training Section (Fall 2007-2011):

o        Stata online interactive. What to do first, exploring data, do-file, date and time variables: http://www.princeton.edu/~otorres/Stata/

o        Data 101. Definitions and types of data: http://www.princeton.edu/~otorres/data101

o        Descriptive statistics using Excel/Stata. What are descriptive statistics?  http://www.princeton.edu/~otorres/Excel

·         Getting Started series (2008/2011). Tutorials:

o        Getting Started in Data Analysis using Stata. Topics include reading data in Stata, data management, frequencies, crosstabs, merging, recoding, graphs: http://dss.princeton.edu/training/StataTutorial.pdf

o        Factor Analysis. Basic introduction to factor analysis: http://dss.princeton.edu/training/Factor.pdf

o        Exploring poll data. General procedures and tips on how to analyze public opinion data: http://dss.princeton.edu/training/pubop.pdf

o        Logit & Ordered logit regression. Introduction to logit and ordered logit regression: http://dss.princeton.edu/training/Logit.pdf

·         Data Analysis 101 Workshops. 2009. See Appendix A for a list of the 2010/2011 workshops:

o        Data Analysis 101: Finding data (10/02/2009). Prepared the tutorial: Finding Data w/comments on crafting research questions). http://dss.princeton.edu/training/FindingData101.pdf

o        Data Analysis 101: Data preparation and descriptive statistics (10/09/2009). Prepared the tutorial: Data Preparation and Descriptive Statistics (Excel, Stata, R). http://dss.princeton.edu/training/DataPrep101.pdf

o        Data Analysis 101: Regression Analysis (10/16/2009). Prepared the tutorial: Linear Regression. http://dss.princeton.edu/training/Regression101.pdf

o        Data Analysis 101: Times Series (10/16/2009). Prepared the tutorial: Time Series. http://dss.princeton.edu/training/TS101.pdf

o        Data Analysis 101: Panel data analysis (10/23/2009). Prepared the tutorial: Panel Data Analysis. Fixed and Random Effects. http://dss.princeton.edu/training/Panel101.pdf

o        Data Analysis 101: Multilevel analysis (11/13/2009). Prepared the tutorial: Multilevel Analysis. http://dss.princeton.edu/training/Multilevel101.pdf

·         DSS Libguides (2008-2011), see: http://libguides.princeton.edu/dss

UNIVERSIDAD DE GUADALAJARA (Guadalajara, Mexico)

Visiting Professor (10/1/05-3/31/07). Public Policy Department at Centro Universitario de Ciencias Económico Administrativas (CUCEA). Courses:

·         School of Economics, (08/06-12/06), Structure and Organization of the Public Sector..

·         Master in Public Administration, (01/06-06/06), Impact Analysis and Index Development.

·         Master in Public Administration, (01/06-06/06), Applied Research in Public Administration.

ITESO (Guadalajara, Mexico)

·         Adjunct Professor (Spring 2006). Course: International Negotiations.

·         Adjunct Professor (08/05-10/06). Course: Political Systems and Contemporary Governments.

·         Professor (05/29/06). Diploma in Civil Service, mod: Public Administration and Development, 8 hrs.

·         Professor (July 29-30, 2005). Diploma in Public Policy, mod: Institutions and Development, 10 hrs.

Jalisco´s state government (short courses) (Mexico)

·         Speaker (06/21/06). Auditoria Superior de la Federación. Theme: Measuring Accountability. 4 hrs.

·         Speaker  (07/4/06). Gobierno de Jalisco. Theme: Transparency, Development, Institutions: A Link, 5 hrs

·         Speaker  (07/5/06). C.de Cap. del Gobierno del Estado. Theme: Measuring Transparency, 5 hrs

·         Speaker (Sep/27/06). Servicios y Transportes. Theme: Accountability Indicators, 6 hrs.

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY (New York City)

·         Teaching Assistant (1/03-5/04). Conducted review sessions, counseled students, graded papers and exams for courses in American government, urban, Latino politics, public opinion and political behavior.

ELECTRONIC DATA SERVICE/COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY (New York City)

·         Data consultant (5/1/03 – 12/10/04) – Assisted in a range of research studies analyzing data from Census, CPS, World Value Survey, World Development Indicators, Ipums, IFS, UNSTATS, among others. Software HLM, MLWIN, SPSS, Stata, ArcGIS, Allocate, Geolytics.

INSTITUTE FOR SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC RESEARCH AND POLICY/Health & society scholars program/Columbia University (New York City)

·         Consultant (9/04-12/04). Participated in a GIS analysis to study the impact of land use on child obesity.

Research Center for the Arts and Culture, Teachers College/Columbia University

·         Data consultant (1/03- 8/04). Coordinated, organized and analyzed a variety of research studies for the understanding of artists’ socioeconomic and working conditions in the United States. (New York City)

Journalism School/najp/Columbia University (New York City)

·         Consultant (9/03-4/04). Participated in a content analysis media project reporting on the arts.

Professional Experience:

 

government

 

 

 

 

 

Secretary of state (10/06-12/06) (Mexico City)

·         Advisor to the Undersecretary for Legislative Affairs. Analyzed public policies and initiatives proposed by the President requiring Legislative approval. Designed models and simulations on different political and social contexts. Analyzed survey/poll results to improved the decision making process.

Presidency of the Republic. Technical Advisor’s Office (3/12/90-1/31/96) (Mexico City)

·       Director for Economic and Special Studies (7/1/95-1/31/96). Coordinated and designed research projects to evaluate presidential image and performance and to assess the people’s perception on public and economic policies to improve policy-making process. Drafted weekly reports to the President of Mexico.

·       Assistant Director for Economic and Special Studies (9/16/93-6/30/95). Designed research projects to evaluate presidential performance and image to assess the people’s perception on public and economic policies. Designed electoral polls to forecast electoral results at all government levels (Local, State and Federal). Drafted weekly reports to the President of Mexico.

·       Head of the Department of Research and Evaluation (10/1/91-9/15/93). Forecasted electoral results and evaluated its political consequences using electoral polls, public opinion and focus groups studies.

·       Analyst (3/12/90-9/30/91). Participated in the elaboration of public opinion studies for the President of Mexico.

Professional Experience:

 

 

private sector

bgc Beltran y Asociados (1/1/06-4/30/07) (Mexico City)

·         Consultant. Analyzed public opinion data on a variety of topics (media usage, environment and education, corruption, public safety, religion) for corporate, academic, non-profit and governmental clients to improve their decision-making process.

Altria Corporate Services Inc. (New York City)

·         Consultant (1/1/03-5/03). Conducted research on corporate social responsibility and corporate image.

Philip Morris Management Corporation

(Public Policy and Opinion Internship, 5/00-12/02, New York City)

·         Conducted research related to corporate responsibility and societal alignment to aid in the development of corporate affairs strategies leading to a reposition of the company’s image among stakeholders. Engaged in numerous phases and types of public opinion research including issue-advertising development, strategic issue research, communications research and omnibus tracking studies.

Interdisciplinary Consultant Group (San Salvador, El Salvador)

·     Consultant (8/93-3/94). Designed, analyzed and coordinated pre-electoral polls for the government of El Salvador. Forecasted electoral results and analyzed and evaluated the performance of the president.

Publications

·         Brigitte L. Nacos and Oscar Torres-Reyna. (2006). Fueling Our Fears: Stereotyping, Media Coverage, and Public Opinion of Muslim Americans, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers,Inc. ISBN: 0742539830,160p.

·         Brigitte L. Nacos and Oscar Torres-Reyna "Framing Muslim-Americans before and after 9/11" in Framing Terrorism The News Media, Government & the Public. Edited by Pippa Norris, Montague Kern and Marion Just. New York: Routledge. Fall 2003

·         Oscar Torres-Reyna and Robert Y. Shapiro, “The Polls—Trends: Women and Sexual Orientation in the Military”, in Public Opinion Quarterly, vol. 66:618-632, spring 2002.

·         Oscar Torres-Reyna and Robert Y. Shapiro, “The Polls—Trends: Defense and the Military”, in Public Opinion Quarterly, vol. 66, pp. 279-303, summer 2002.

 

·         Mariana Servin-Gonzalez and Oscar Torres-Reyna, “The Polls-Trends: Religion and Politics,” in Public Opinion Quarterly, vol. 63, pp. 590-619, winter 1999.

·         Jose Aleman, Oscar Torres-Reyna, “Solving the Robin Hood Paradox: Inequality, the Median Voter, and Redistribution”, paper presented at APSA, 2011, Seattle, Washington.

·         Jose Aleman, Oscar Torres-Reyna, “The Politics of Inequality: Distribution and Redistribution Reconsidered”, February 2009, [working paper].

·         Oscar Torres-Reyna, Serban Iorga, Robert Y. Shapiro, “Confidence in Major Companies: A Comparative and Multilevel Approach”, December 2003, study supported by supported by a grant from the Center for International Business Education at Columbia University. [working paper]

short courses

·         APSA 2011 Short curse: Understanding Complexity I: Simple Applications for Political Science and Policy Research & Theory Development, August 31.

·         APSA 2011 Short curse: OPOSSEM: A Web Portal for Social Science Methods Education, August 31.

·         ICPSR Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research: Social Network Analysis: An Introduction. University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC. July 18-22, 2011.

·         ICPSR Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research: MLE, Advance regression, Intro to R, Data Mining, Multi-Dimensional Scaling, Latex, University of Michigan, Jun/21-Jul/16, 2010

·         Conflict Management 101, Princeton University, Aug7/Aug 21, 2009

·         Dealing with difficult people, Princeton University, 8/5/2009.

·         Advance Quantitative Research Methodology, Harvard University, Online, spring 2008.

·         PROC SQL in SAS and Techniques for Large SAS Data Sets, UPENN (Philadelphia, PA, 10/19/07)

·         Introduction to PHP and MySQL (Online, 10/17/07 to 12/17/07)

·         2007 North American Stata Users Group meeting/workshop (Boston, Ma, 8/12/07 to 8/15/07)

·         Programming using SPSS scripts (New York, NY, 9/10/07 to 9/11/07)

·         MATLAB Fundamentals and Programming Techniques (Parsippany, NJ, 7/23/07 to 7/24/07)

·         NetCourse 151: Introduction to Stata Programming (Online. 6/15/07 to 7/27/07)

Collaborations

·         Research Center for Arts and Culture, Teachers College/Columbia University, Taking Note: A Study of Composers and New Music Activity in the U.S. 2008.

·         Research Center for Arts and Culture, Teachers College/Columbia University, Information on Artists III: Bay Area, 2004.

·         Chicago Council on Foreign Relations (CCFR), American Public Opinion and Foreign Policy, 2004.

·         CCFR, Comparing South Korea and American Public Opinion and Foreign Policy, 2004.

Talks

·         The College of New Jersey. Mexico/United States, current affairs. Coordinated by Professor Marimar Huguet. The talk was in Spanish. September 17, 2010.

membership

·         American Political Science Association.

 

 

 

APPENDIX A

·         Taught/co-taught(ct)/assisted(ta) in the following workshops at Princeton University:

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to Panel Data Analysis (using R). 12/09/2011.

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to Linear Regression (using R). 12/02/2011.

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to Panel Data Analysis (using Stata). 11/18/2011.

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to Linear Regression (using Stata). 11/11/2011.

o        Data Analysis 101: Exploring Data and Descriptive Statistics (using R). 10/21/2011.

o        Data Analysis 101: Exploring Data and Descriptive Statistics (using Stata). 10/14/2011.

o        Data Management workshops (ta). Economics department. November 7 and 14 2011.

o        Cross-Sectional Analysis. Economics Department (2/7/2011, 1.20 hrs.).

o        Times Series Analysis (ta). Economics Department (2/9,14/2011, 1.20 hrs.).

o        Data Management Workshops (ta). Economics Department. (11/8,10,22/2010, 1.20 hrs. each).

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to panel data analysis (using R). Session 5 - 12/10/2010.

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to linear regression (using R). Session 4 - 12/03/2010.

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to panel data analysis (using Stata). Session 3 - 11/19/2010.

o        Data Analysis 101: Introduction to linear regression (using Stata). Session 2 - 11/12/2010.

o        Data Analysis 101: Loading data into Stata and/or R. Session 1b - 10/29/2010.

o        Data Analysis 101: Loading data into Stata and/or R. Session 1a - 10/22/2010.

o        Data analysis using Stata, February, 23, 2010/ March 9, 2010

o        Public Opinion and Voting (ct, 9/29/2010).

o        Data Management workshops (ta). Economics department. Spring 2010. February 8 (two sessions)/ February 10 (two sessions) / February 15 (two sessions). 1.20 hrs each.

o        Data analysis using Stata. Woodrow Wilson School (2/23/2010 & 3/9/2010)

o        Time Series Analysis (ta). Economics Department (2/8,15,17/2010)

o        Cross-Sectional Analysis (ta). Economics Department (2/8,15,17/2010)

o        Data Analysis 101: Multilevel analysis (11/13/2009)

o        Data Analysis 101: Panel data analysis (10/23/2009)

o        Data Analysis 101: Regression Analysis and times series (10/16/2009)

o        Data Analysis 101: Data preparation and descriptive statistics (10/09/2009)

o        Data Analysis 101: Finding data (10/02/2009)

o        Data Management Workshops (ta). Economics Dept. 11/9,11,16,18, 23/2009). 1.20 hrs each.

o        Politics of China and Southeast Asia (ct, 10/22/2009)

o        Politics of Anti-Americanism (ta, 10/16/2009)

o        Politics and Mass Media (ct, 10/15/2009)

o        Public Opinion and Voting (ct, 10/13/2009)

o        Institutions and International Politics (ct, 10/13/2009)

o        Politics of Epidemic Control in Sub-Saharan Africa (ta, 10/8/2009)

o        Campaign Strategy and Effects (ct, 10/6/2009)

o        Data Analysis Workshops (ta). Economics department (2/9,11/2009). 1.20 hrs each.

o        Senior Thesis Writing seminar (ta, 12/10/2008)

o        Data management workshops (ta). Economics Department (11/10, 12/2008). 1.20 hrs each

o        Research Methods in Political Science (ct, 11/5/2008, two workshops)

o        Research Methods in Political Science (ct, 11/4/2008)

o        Introduction to Factor Analysis (10/28/2008)

o        Public Attitudes & Responses to War & Terrorism (ct, 10/16/2008)

o        Public Opinion & Public Policy (ct, 10/16/2008)

o        Productive Scholar presentation: Getting Started in Data Analysis using Stata (9/25/2008)

o        Politics & the Media (ct, 10/14/2008)

o        Data Analysis workshop (2/4/2008)

o        Online Training Section (Data/Stata/MATLAB/SPSS/Excel). Fall 2007. Ongoing.

o        Data Management Analysis using Stata (11/7/2007, 11/712/2007). 3 hrs.

o        Descriptive Statistics using Excel/Stata (9/25/2007). 4 hrs.

o        Introduction to Stata (9/12/2007). WWS. 2 hrs

o        Introduction to Stata/Graphics (8/7/2007). DSS lab. 2 hrs.

pdf version/Links

http://www.princeton.edu/~otorres/OscarT-En.pdf  / http://www.princeton.edu/~otorres/LigasWeb.htm