Making the Most of Student Resources Jane Fry Carleton University DLI Orientation April 5, 2004

1. Making the Most of Student ResourcesJane FryCarleton UniversityDLI OrientationApril 5, 2004

2. Outline • The Carleton University setup • Students – why, who, where, what • Training and Training Tools • Work Schedule • Benefits for the Students • Drawback of Hiring Students • The Other Student • Payoff of Hiring Students

3. Carleton University Data Centre • Our background • We are part of MADGIC • We only do data, that is, no gov docs, no GIS, no maps • Our Staffing Situation • Took a while to get our HR on board • 2 FT (WW and I), 5 PT (5-15 hr/wk @ $8hr), 1 TA (10 hr/wk) • Try to get OSAP students (to save the Library money)

4. Students! • Why do you need them? • To help the clients • To do the ‘grunt’ work • To cover the desk when both the FT are absent • Who are they? • At least 3rd year, undergrad • From a Social Sciences background • Must have taken a Stats course • Must know SPSS

5. Students (cont’d) • Where do they come from? • Trolling! From our class presentations • From our regular clients who know what they are doing • Word of mouth – our students who are currently working for us tell their friends • What do they do (once they are trained)? • Primary task - help clients • Secondary task – fix up/change labels for surveys to make them more user friendly

6. Training • Don’t scare them off! • Give constant reassurance • Steep Learning curve • They will be learning lots of new stuff in a short period of time • Keep shifts short for the first few weeks, 2-4 hr • Only train 1 student at a time - everyone learns at different speeds & has different questions • I do all the training • Ask other staff not to help the trainees when they are doing the exercises!

7. Training Tools • Training Schedule – a check-off list for me listing all the training steps • Training Book – to be read by all students • Request Sheet – the client fills it out • for all questions, requests, inquiries • Treasure hunt – to help learn the many different surveys – their names, locations, … • Familiarizes the student with our webpage

8. Training Tools (cont’d) • Subset Exercise (this is how our clients obtain their data) • Learn UNIX • Actual requests from clients • First few requests have no errors • The rest of the requests have an assortment of errors all based on real life cases • Cheat Sheets • Kept beside each computer listing the info most commonly asked for

9. Work Schedule • Based on their class schedule • Based on the hrs of the DC • Based on our busy time periods (afternoons, especially Friday) • December and April – the hours change according to their exams • Make sure all your students are not enrolled in the same course!

10. Benefits of Working at the Data Centre • Learn more skills • Increase computer, research and people skills • Makes the student more employable • All the skills they learn are useful • Helps them with their stats course • They have on-the-job help from our Stats Consultant • On-campus Job • Easy to get to in between classes

11. Benefits (cont’d) • Other Uses of the Data Centre • Can be used for own studies – quiet environment, private computers, … • Future Employment • We hire 1-2 full-time students every summer • Govt agencies have called us looking for people to fill full-time, permanent jobs

12. Drawback of Hiring Students • Your time investment • The training is Very time consuming

13. Our Other Student • Who is it? • A grad student from the Social Sciences with a stats background • Where do we get him/her from? • Talk to profs who teach stats • Past clients • Past employees

14. Our Other Student (cont’d) • Training – the same as for the undergrads • What exactly does s/he do? • Statistical consulting for undergrads and grads • Very broad - help with spss, help analyzing tables, reading over reports, … • Does NOT do assignments for students • Students book a 1 hr appt • Can be alone or in groups

15. The Payoff of Hiring Students • An investment in the future of the Data Centre • Able to serve more clients • The students fix up labels which allows our holdings to be user friendly • Our students tell their friends about us & encourage them to come in to see us • Our students make using data seem easy so more people actually like data & aren’t afraid of it

16. The Payoff (cont’d) • Gives Wendy and I more time for other activities because by January the students are able to be left on their own • Wendy is able to organize conferences, give presentations, … • Both Wendy and I are able to be away at conferences together (after January) because there is someone looking after the Data Centre

17. In Conclusion … • I highly recommend hiring students to work at your Data Centre. It has been an exciting and rewarding experience both for us and our students. And we will continue to do it in the future. • To help in training, check out the Training File that contains the reports mentioned in this presentation.

18. Contact Information Jane Fry Data Specialist Carleton University Ottawa, Ontario (613) 520.2600 x1121 jfry@ccs.carleton.ca