Data Services Librarian

Posted to IASSIST on: 2016-07-27

Employer: University of Northern British Columbia

Employer URL: http://www.unbc.ca/

Description

The Geoffrey R. Weller Library at the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) invites applications from qualified candidates for the position of Data Services Librarian.

The incumbent will play a leadership role in the provision of data services to the University of Northern British Columbia community. This position is key in ensuring that UNBC students and researchers have access to high quality data to support their teaching, learning and research activities and that UNBC researchers have support in managing their research data according to international best practices and the growing expectations of funding agencies. To meet these expectations, the Data Services Librarian will be expected to maintain strong connections with the Canadian data community and to collaborate with colleagues at other institutions.

Primary responsibilities:

• Work with UNBC colleagues, and collaborate with colleagues at other institutions, to select, acquire, manage, and provide access to licensed, free, and researcher-generated numeric and geospatial data from across the disciplines.
• Promote and enable data discovery and use amongst UNBC students and researchers through the development of online material, online and face-to-face presentations, and one-on-one consultations.
• Serve as the University representative to Statistics Canada’s Data Liberation Initiative (DLI), ICPSR, the DMTI Data Consortium, the ICIS Data Sharing Initiative, and other data-related organizations and consortiums.
• Take the lead in developing research data management (RDM) services at UNBC in the context of regional and national initiatives (e.g., Abacus, the CARL Portage Network).
• Represent the Library on the RDC Steering Committee and work closely with the RDC Academic Director to promote the RDC amongst UNBC researchers.

Other responsibilities:

• Work with colleagues to guide and support the development of the UNBC Institutional Repository as part of the British Columbia Electronic Library Network’s Arca digital repository initiative.
• Manage the Library’s map and air photo resources and supervise a student assistant in the organization of these resources.
• Participate in shared responsibilities, including reference consulting, information literacy instruction, and collection development.

Required qualifications:

• ALA-accredited MLS or equivalent.
• Minimum three years experience working in an academic library.
• Ability to articulate a vision of the services, infrastructure, and skills required to support the data needs of academic researchers.
• Understanding of trends in data management throughout the research lifecycle, including the creation, processing, analysis, preservation, access, and reuse of research data.
• Demonstrated knowledge of, and keen interest in, data and statistical sources.
• Aptitude for teaching in an academic environment and for developing instructional content and documentation.
• Ability to work courteously and effectively with patrons and colleagues in a collaborative team environment.
• Effective analytical, organizational, oral and written communications and interpersonal skills.
• Strong public service orientation.

Desired qualifications:

• Experience with metadata standards related to the description, access, and preservation of numeric data (e.g., DDI).
• Basic knowledge of, and interest in, web applications for sharing, preserving, citing, exploring, and analysing research data (e.g., Dataverse).
• Applied knowledge of issues and technical challenges related to data management/curation, including format migration, preservation, metadata, and data retrieval and use issues.
• Experience helping researchers with data management planning.
• Basic understanding of, and experience with, data analysis software (e.g., SAS, SPSS, Stata, R, and ArcGIS).
• Knowledge of, and interest in, data visualization tools (e.g., Excel, Google Charts, Tableau, Google Fusion Tables).
• Demonstrated ability to successfully manage, or contribute substantially to, collaborative projects involving many stakeholders.

Archived on: 2016-08-01