internships
The Data Rescue Internships are a way to connect data custodians to highly skilled graduate students who will work to tidy, document and archive priority Canadian datasets.
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WHAT IS DATA RESCUE
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FOR INTERNS
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FOR DATA CUSTODIANS
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Data rescue is the identification, preservation, and sharing of valuable data and associated metadata at risk of loss¹.
For data custodians, this internship provides qualified work force to archive important data that can potentially be lost due to inadequate preservation and contribute to the open data ecosystem in Canada.
For interns, this is an opportunity to build up your data wrangling skills portfolio, connect with researchers and organizations throughout Canada, be mentored on open science practices and help to breathe new life into legacy data. Examples of some of the data that have been rescued to date can be found on the Outputs -> Datasets page.
¹Read more about the data rescuing process in our paper: https://ecoevorxiv.org/ra6ze/
For data custodians, this internship provides qualified work force to archive important data that can potentially be lost due to inadequate preservation and contribute to the open data ecosystem in Canada.
For interns, this is an opportunity to build up your data wrangling skills portfolio, connect with researchers and organizations throughout Canada, be mentored on open science practices and help to breathe new life into legacy data. Examples of some of the data that have been rescued to date can be found on the Outputs -> Datasets page.
¹Read more about the data rescuing process in our paper: https://ecoevorxiv.org/ra6ze/
Benefits for interns
A fellowship of $6500 is provided for 6 weeks of full-time internship (or the equivalent part-time work spread over a longer time period; 240 hours total), which is intended to contribute to the annual stipend of the graduate student, and is inclusive of any benefits or costs.
This internship partially fulfills the requirements of the CIEE Certificate in Data Management and Reproducible Research. The intern will be encouraged to develop research questions that could be tested using the datasets in question and, if interested, pursue the analysis and publication of this research.
Eligibility to apply for internships
The internship candidate must be a registered graduate student at one of the following four universities: McGill University, University of British Columbia (Vancouver or Okanagan), Université de Montréal, and University of Regina. The candidates major area of research must be one of ecology, evolution, or environmental sciences, and the candidate must demonstrate that they have the conceptual training necessary to evaluate the ecological value of the data that they may encounter in this project. The candidate must be able to create computer scripts to manage digital data, including data validation, compilation, and quality control, and have the relevant scientific expertise to create useful metadata. The candidate should be enthusiastic about preserving legacy data and demonstrate a commitment to open science.
A fellowship of $6500 is provided for 6 weeks of full-time internship (or the equivalent part-time work spread over a longer time period; 240 hours total), which is intended to contribute to the annual stipend of the graduate student, and is inclusive of any benefits or costs.
This internship partially fulfills the requirements of the CIEE Certificate in Data Management and Reproducible Research. The intern will be encouraged to develop research questions that could be tested using the datasets in question and, if interested, pursue the analysis and publication of this research.
Eligibility to apply for internships
The internship candidate must be a registered graduate student at one of the following four universities: McGill University, University of British Columbia (Vancouver or Okanagan), Université de Montréal, and University of Regina. The candidates major area of research must be one of ecology, evolution, or environmental sciences, and the candidate must demonstrate that they have the conceptual training necessary to evaluate the ecological value of the data that they may encounter in this project. The candidate must be able to create computer scripts to manage digital data, including data validation, compilation, and quality control, and have the relevant scientific expertise to create useful metadata. The candidate should be enthusiastic about preserving legacy data and demonstrate a commitment to open science.
Criteria for legacy datasets
- The dataset includes biological data that is relevant to ecology, evolution or environmental science. The dataset does not need to be entirely biological; physical and chemical data is acceptable if in the context of an ecological or evolutionary process. For example, water chemistry is an important part of understanding aquatic ecology.
- The dataset should be important in one of the follow ways: (1) extensive in either space or time (e.g. bird surveys over more than a decade, or national surveys of caribou density); (2) describes a study that was ground-breaking in the history of science; (3) concerns a species or ecosystem that is considered at risk in Canada, or of high cultural or societal value.
- Priority will be given to datasets that concern a Canadian species or ecosystem, or have been collected by a Canadian researcher or Canadian organization.
- The custodian of the dataset commits the data to be permanently archived, and open and accessible. We realize that some dataset custodians may need to temporarily delay the publication of their data, and in such cases we may consider a short-term embargo.