QMSS RA Program (Faculty)

QMSS Research Assistantship Program: Faculty Application

Columbia University’s Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences (QMSS) program is pleased to issue a request for applications from faculty for research assistance in the curent academic year. Faculty applications will be accepted on a rolling basis throughout the academic year. Please note that students cannot be hired for more than one semester at a time.

This program is intended to provide you with research assistants trained in statistical analysis to help develop your research projects towards publishable work, increasing your aptitude for external grant support, tenure, and career advancement. In exchange, faculty agree to provide QMSS students with valuable research experience, opportunities to write or contribute to publishable papers, as well as guidance and mentorship throughout the period of hire. 

Per GSAS standards, QMSS RAs are compensated at a rate of $23/hr - of which your account will be responsible for $10.75/hr, in accordance with our 1:1 match. These funds must be distributable during the full period of work. You may not front-load or pay out an RA post facto if your research funds are not available for the full period.

While the salary is calculated based on an hourly rate, this is NOT an hourly position. As a supervisor, you will commit to a total number of hours at the point of hire, which you and your RA are responsible for tracking over the course of the semester. The compensation corresponding to this commitment will be earmarked for payout at that point. Please do not ask your RA to exceed this number. It is exceptionally difficult to adjust compensation after the point of hire.

Based on a maximum weekly commitment of 20 hours, researchers may request up to 280 hours/semester. QMSS will not accept requests for appointments of less than 40 hours.

QMSS students deliver a high level of sophistication and dedication as RAs.  They have strong quantitative and writing skills, and individually have experience in a number of the following programs:  SPSS, SAS, STATA, R, Excel, Python, Javascript, HTML, CSS, D3, ArcGIS, QGIS, Gephi, Bloomberg, SQL, Matlab, C++, Java, Perl, and/or Eviews.  

ALL APPLICATIONS MUST BE SUBMITTED BELOW 

Criteria

Projects are expected to teach various phases of — and skills within — the research process and should not include administrative tasks not relevant to the specific project.

QMSS seeks to fund projects from different departments. Please be specific about skills or subject expertise necessary, as well as potential opportunities that may result from their participation [for example, knowledge of a specific programming language, familiarity with data collection or conducting a literature review, opportunity to publish the paper, etc.].

In order to support as many projects as possible, QMSS follows a matching-funds structure with faculty: a $1-to-$1 match from the first dollar of the project.  We are very proud to be able to offer this tremendous value to faculty, and this shared funding structure allows us to support an even larger number of Columbia research projects.  Last year, our students worked on over 35 faculty projects. A partial list of past projects can be found here.    

All proposals will be reviewed by QMSS staff, affiliated faculty members, and ISERP, and approval is contingent on multiple factors, including the total number of applications received and the application's fit with overall QMSS and ISERP academic goals.

Only full-time students are eligible for the QMSS RA Program. We will only send out resume's from eligible students but if a student reaches out to you independently, note that they must be in compliance with this rule as well.

You can read more about the RA Program HERE.

For questions about this program, please contact qmss@columbia.edu.