This internship opportunity will provide assistance to an on-going research project funded by the Department of Homeland Security office of Science and Technology (DHS-S&T), focusing on illicit smuggling and acts of violence carried out by Transnational Criminal Organization’s (TCO’s) and Cartel groups located in Central America and Mexico. Interns will code information that has been collected through field surveys, and analyze the data to identify trends and/or patterns related to these activities.

START is excited to be able to offer a limited number of highly selective intern positions to students interested in working on projects for the U.S. State Department using START data (such as the GTD) and other open sources. Students will be tasked with developing materials that create a realistic scenario based on extensive research on history, geopolitical situations, and internal religious or ethnic cleavages in a region in support the Bureau of Counterterrorism training efforts.

The purpose of this internship is to grant students the opportunity to better understand the threat that emerging and disruptive technologies pose to national security and advantages it may provide to adversaries. Students will be performing research on topics related to CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear) technologies research and development. Students will also be involved in the conceptualization and testing of novel research methodologies. 

This internship will support START research focused on the processes of extremist radicalization within the United States. The core component of this research portfolio is the Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the United States (PIRUS) dataset, the largest dataset of US-based cases of radicalization of its kind, which contains information on the trajectories, mechanisms, and consequences of violent and non-violent extremism at the individual level.