US-RSE Newsletter

February 2021 Newsletter

newsletter elections DEI training stories

Published: Feb 16, 2021

In this bi-monthly newsletter, we share recent, current, and planned activities of the US-RSE Association, and related news that we think is of interest to US-RSE members. Newsletters are also available on our website alongside the growing resources and information on the US-RSE Association. A sign-up option for our newsletter is available here.

In this issue:

Steering Committee Elections

Our first formal elections for 4 seats on the steering committee were held in December. Congratulations to the newly elected steering committee members: Julia Damerow, Chris Hill, Daniel S. Katz, and Lance Parsons. A special thank you to all the candidates and everyone who voted.

First Annual General Meeting

We held our first US-RSE Annual General Meeting (AGM) on December 4th, 2020. It included an update on US-RSE happenings along with statements from the steering committee candidates. If you missed it, the meeting recording is available on the US-RSE YouTube channel.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Working Group

The US-RSE Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Working Group (DEI WG) needs YOU!

Things we’re actively working on include:

  • Organizing invited speakers to discuss DEI initiatives and related topics
  • Engaging with DEI in Technology groups such as Women in HPC and Code 2040
  • Guidance on and examples of how to write inclusive RSE job descriptions to ensure they attract a diverse audience

If you’d like to help us out, or have ideas about other things we should be doing, please contact us on the #dei-discussion Slack channel or contact Lance Parsons (lparsons@princeton.edu) and we’ll help get you involved.

Community Meeting on Education and Training

We recently held our February Community Meeting on “Education and Training: How RSEs gain skills, learn the field.” The discussions were lively and we think it raised momentum for building a working group on education and training. We encourage you to join the #education-training Slack channel to continue the conversation.

ADSA/US-RSE Career Panel

On Thursday, February 23rd we are teaming up with the Academic Data Science Alliance to host an Early Career Panel: “What do data scientists and research software engineers do in academia?“ This career panel will offer attendees the opportunity to hear from data scientists and research software engineers about their career paths, the skills expected of these positions, where and how to seek these types of positions, and what to expect when working in these fields. This event will focus on students, postdocs, and those early in their careers, but all are welcome to attend. Please pass along the registration link to anyone who may be interested.

Interesting Events

Some other events coming up may be of interest to RSEs:

RSE Stories

The Research Software Engineer Stories podcast just released its 51st episode! Here are some recent episodes to check out:

51: The Shop: Blaise Thompson
50: We are Here for a Purpose: Alys Brett
49: For the Long Haul: Greg Becker
48: Teach People How to Code: Olivia Guest
47: The Purple Pythonista: Tania Allard
46: All Things R: Maella Salmon
45: Founding Fathers: Rob Haines
44: Equal Footing: Nooriyah Lohani

RSE Stories is looking for feedback from you and interested community members who might like to try editing or hosting and recording an episode. Please take this three question survey to let RSE Stories know what you think!

Recent Job Postings

These opportunities were recently posted to the RSE Careers page:

Interesting Reads

Items you may have missed on the blog and Slack:

US-RSE Outreach

Do you have a meeting, event, or community that might be interested in hearing more about US-RSE? We are happy to come talk to your group! Send an email to contact@us-rse.org or reach out via @sc on slack.

Get Involved

There are lots of ways to get involved with the US-RSE community. Of course, you can join us on Slack or volunteer for an interview with the RSE Stories podcast. But we’re also looking for ideas and help in many other places. See our list of projects and let us know how you’d like to help. Help with things like the Website Committee, Social Media, and Community Engagement are all needed.

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