Part-Time Student Research Assistant (Undergraduate) – Department of Sociology and Criminology, Criminal Justice Research Center.
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 project focuses on how the background of court actors may contribute to racial disparities in sentencing decisions. The research assistants will be responsible for cleaning court actor names and searching online for background information of these court actors, using data from 10 million PDF court dockets from the Pennsylvania Courts, specifically those associated with the Court of Common Pleas. This involves data cleaning and collection pertaining to court attorneys involved in these cases.
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
- Reading tables in R and court dockets to determine whether two court actors are the same person, accounting for name misspellings and/or nicknames.
- Identifying instances of a court actor being the same person and filling out a template in R to group various names under one Pennsylvania Supreme Court number.
- Searching 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 (race, ethnicity, gender, undergraduate university, law school, year of admission to the Pennsylvania Bar, and any disciplinary action).
- Attending periodic meetings (online or in-person) to review progress.
Benefits
- Employment with the University will require successful completion of background check(s) in accordance with University policies.
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Part-time
Career Level
Entry Level
Education Level
No Education Listed
