The Berkeley Institute for Data Science (BIDS) invites applications for its Data Science Fellow Program.
Successful applicants will join the current cohort of fellows in helping make data analysis easier in the research sciences. BIDS data science fellows are postdoctoral scholars, graduate student researchers, or staff with excellent credentials in their fields as well as strong interests in advancing data-analysis approaches with a community of like-minded individuals from across campus.
Your data does not have to be “big data” to become a fellow. If you find your data-related problems to be at all unique and challenging, we welcome you to work with us. In particular, we are interested in applications from cross-disciplinary groups and from individuals exploring topics that may broaden the research diversity of our community (e.g., genetics, economics, and the Internet of Things).
Each data science fellow will become part of and contribute to a growing ecosystem that brings together faculty, postdoctoral researchers, students, staff, and alumni to form a strong network that assists researchers in advancing data-analysis methods and inquiry, expanding and building new software and analytics tools, sharing best practices, and more.
Eligibility and Funding
We seek data science fellow applicants in three categories:
- Joint campus appointment
These positions are based on a joint funding model between BIDS and either a UC Berkeley or Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL) department or research center/institute in each applicant’s domain. Each joint campus data science fellow position will be funded by BIDS at 50% of existing salary (and benefits). The 50% funding provided by BIDS will be administered in a flexible fashion and averaged over the entire two-year period (i.e., could translate into one year of salary provided by BIDS and one year by the matching source or a 50/50-split arrangement over the course of the two years).
- Graduate student researcher appointment
Advanced graduate students currently enrolled at UC Berkeley are eligible to apply to become a BIDS data science fellow as a graduate student researcher (GSR). In particular, we welcome applications from individuals whose departments do not typically work with postdoctoral researchers. We will consider shared-expense graduate students and fully funded graduate students.
- Full-time postdoctoral researcher appointment
A small number of full-time postdoctoral positions will be available in addition to joint campus appointments.
BIDS will select a mix among these categories in a flexible fashion depending on merit and available funds. Initial appointment terms are expected to last up to two years with the possibility of renewal assuming the fellows will be able to raise additional grant resources to support their activities in the medium and long term. Data science fellows will receive staff support with the development of extramural grant and funding proposals.
Applications are currently limited to individuals with backgrounds and research interests in the social, physical, and life sciences and/or statistics, applied math, and computer science. Eligibility will be determined by the applicants’ research focus, not their home department.
Expectations of a Data Science Fellow
Data science fellows should be highly qualified individuals suited to work in teams to develop productive research collaborations among each other and with other researchers across campus, including those at existing centers of excellence, such as the AMPLab, the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing, D-Lab, and the Computing Division of LBNL. Data science fellows will be expected to participate in regularly scheduled BIDS activities.
Data science fellows may use their BIDS-funded time to work on problems that connect their own research to the larger goal of building data science at UC Berkeley. This work will be done in part within BIDS working groups, including Software Tools and Environments, Open Science and Reproducibility, Education and Training, and Ethnography and Evaluation. The data science fellows will also be able to take advantage of UC Berkeley’s alumni and industry networks to help facilitate connections to relevant industry communities in their specific areas of interest.
Newly appointed fellows should expect to start their term with BIDS in July 2015.
Application Process
Those interested in becoming a BIDS data science fellow are asked to submit a single-page letter of intent and a CV. Based on this solicitation, we will then invite a select group of applicants to prepare a more detailed application.
Please submit the following form and attachments by March 8, 2015:
