Data for Looking Under the Hood: How Research is Utilized in 2020 Presidential Postsecondary Education Campaign Platforms

Beginning in January 2020, we tracked the front-running democratic presidential candidates’ (Biden, Sanders, Warren) campaign platforms related to higher education to examine how academic research is used to frame prospective postsecondary education policies in presidential elections in the United States. This is a multi-level dataset of the gray literature cited on Biden, Sanders, and Warren's 2020 presidential campaign websites’ postsecondary education subpages. Level One of dataset: All sources cited by Biden, Sanders, and Warren's postsecondary education subpage on their campaign website. The metadata for each source included the URLs hyperlinked in the body of the text, sponsoring organization, the first and last names of the first six authors and whether the first author was affiliated with an institution of higher education at the time of publication. Level Two of dataset: reference information for each Level One reference. Reference information included the Level Two reference’s sponsoring organization, its type and subtype, and the first and last name of the first author and whether the first author was affiliated with an institution of higher education at the time of publication.