Part-Time Student Research Assistant (Undergraduate) – Department of Sociology and Criminology, Criminal Justice Research Center.

Penn State University • University Park, IL

9d • Hybrid

About The Position

The College of the Liberal Arts at Penn State is seeking two part-time undergraduate research assistants for the Department of Sociology and Criminology. The role will be supervised by Dr. Jeffrey Ulmer. Work will primarily be conducted online with periodic in-person meetings. Junior or senior students who are knowledgeable about the field are preferred, but all Penn State undergraduate students are encouraged to apply. The research assistants will be responsible for cleaning court actor names and searching online for the background information of these court actors. This work is part of an ongoing project focused on how the background of court actors may contribute to racial disparities in sentencing decisions, utilizing 10 million PDF court dockets from the Pennsylvania Courts.

Requirements

• Must be a full-time Penn State undergraduate student living in State College over the summer.
• Available to work at least 10 hours per week.
• Familiarity or interest in learning about the court system and court dockets.
• Familiarity or interest in basic R coding.
• Strong attention to detail.
• Ability to follow instructions accurately.
• Strong organizational and communication skills.

Nice To Haves

• Junior or senior students who are knowledgeable about the field are preferred.

Responsibilities

• Clean court actor names by reading tables in R and court dockets to determine whether two court actors are the same person, accounting for name misspellings and/or nicknames.
• Identify instances of a court actor being the same person and fill out a template in R to group the various names of that one court actor under one Pennsylvania Supreme Court number.
• Search online websites including LinkedIn, the Disciplinary Board of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, attorney firm websites, and news articles to collect background information of each court actor.
• Collect background information including race, ethnicity, gender, undergraduate university, law school, year of admission to the Pennsylvania Bar, and any disciplinary action.
• Attend periodic meetings (online or in-person) to review progress.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Part-time
• Career Level: Entry Level
• Education Level: No Education Listed