Description
The Unconventional and Asymmetric Threats Division of START is seeking motivated interns with an interest in irregular warfare, asymmetric threats, and emerging challenges to support multiple research projects in support of the Irregular Warfare Center of Excellence. Interns will be responsible for collecting, cleaning, and coding relevant data, as well as contributing to the production of analytical reports and data visualization products. This internship requires strong attention to detail, a solid understanding of data management processes, and effective collaboration with analytical teams to ensure the delivery of high-quality outputs in assessing emerging threats and irregular warfare dynamics. Interns will gain practical experience in dataset development, data analysis, and creating practitioner-oriented products.
Supervisors: Megan Rutter (mrutter@umd.edu)
Deadline: October 24, 2024 at 11:59pm ET
Required application materials: Resume, cover letter, and unofficial transcripts
U.S. Citizenship Required: Yes
Team Meeting Times: Tentatively Tuesday a.m.
In-person Days: Tentatively Tuesday, Wednesday, and/or Thursday
Internship Start Date: February 17, 2025 (work 12 hours each week)
Internship position contingent on project funding
Responsibilities:
- Data Collection on incidents relevant to Irregular Warfare (subject dependent on project funding):
- Gather and compile data relevant to irregular warfare, including insurgent activities, asymmetric conflicts, and asymmetric threats, ensuring the data is sourced from reliable academic, private industry, and governmental repositories.
- Track and update ongoing incidents, emerging conflict zones, and evolving tactics associated with irregular warfare.
- Data Cleaning:
- Review and clean collected data, removing inconsistencies, duplicates, and errors to ensure data integrity and accuracy for subsequent analysis.
- Standardize data formats to maintain consistency across datasets, enabling seamless integration for analysis.
- Data Coding for Irregular Warfare Datasets:
- Code cleaned data into predefined irregular warfare datasets, ensuring that all entries are categorized according to established classification systems and analytical frameworks.
- Ensure proper tagging and labeling of data to facilitate efficient retrieval, organization, and use in analytical processes.
- Assist with Data Analysis:
- Collaborate with analysts to support data-driven research, providing cleaned and coded datasets for use in the analysis of irregular warfare and cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure.
- Assist in generating reports, visualizations, and summaries that highlight key trends and insights from the data.
Required/minimum qualifications:
- Experience or coursework related to international affairs, international security, irregular warfare, unconventional threats, or a related program
- Coursework or experience with open-source research and social science research methods
- Knowledge of systematic literature reviews and social science datasets
- Excellent attention to detail and organizational skills
- Proficiency with Microsoft Excel and Google Workspace
Preferred/Ideal qualifications:
- Functional expertise in a relevant topic (e.g., insurgent activities, asymmetric conflicts, unconventional threats, emerging technology, cybersecurity, etc.)
- Experience with social science coding schemes and codebooks
- Previous experience working with large datasets
- Experience conducting systematic literature reviews
- Relevant and applicable technical expertise (e.g., data science, dataset management, complex system modeling, R, Python, SQL, etc.)
General Information for all START Internships
Location:
START is headquartered at the University of Maryland, College Park, all internships are in person.
Schedule Requirements:
Orientation Date: January 23, 2025. All interns are required to attend orientation. You may be required to attend an additional day of orientation on January 24, 2025. Your supervisor will inform you if you are required to attend both days.
Internship Duration: January 23 - May 9, 2025. All interns must be able to commit to the duration of the whole program.
Work Hours: All interns must work at least 10 hours per week during the spring 2025 program. Work hours are scheduled from Monday to Friday, 9:00am-5:00pm. Interns may not work longer than 8-hour or shorter than 2 hour shifts.
Conditions of Employment:
The University of Maryland has made the safety of our students, faculty and staff, and our surrounding communities a top priority. As part of that commitment, the University System of Maryland (USM) recently announced that students, faculty, and staff on USM campuses, including UMD, are required to be vaccinated against COVID. Accepted interns will be required to comply with the University's vaccination protocol or to request and be approved for a medical or religious exemption in order to work at any University of Maryland location. Internship offers are contingent upon admitted candidates providing proof of full vaccination or obtaining approval for a medical or religious exemption.
Intern offers are contingent on completion of a background check. A prior criminal conviction or convictions will not automatically disqualify a finalist from employment. Prior to any adverse decision, individuals will have an opportunity to provide information to the University regarding their background check. Individuals will also be provided an opportunity to appeal any decision prior to a final outcome.
Additionally, accepted interns will be required to complete an I-9 Employment Eligibility Authorization, which may require in-person delivery. Lastly, accepted interns will be required to complete a Federal W4, State W4, and Direct Deposit forms. Non-U.S. Citizens will have additional tax/payroll paperwork to complete. The inability to complete any of these documents or processes may result in the internship offer being rescinded.
Other Information:
- All internships include a stipend of $2,250 for the fall and spring semesters, and $3,000 for the summer term.
- The University of Maryland has several opportunities for students to apply for other internship stipends. Please note that START is not involved in the application or review process for these stipends, with the exception of the Paul Gallo Memorial Scholarship for Non-Traditional Student Interns. Non-UMD students are encouraged to check with their home institutions for other stipend opportunities.
- The Ammerman Foundation Student Veteran Professional Development Fund: http://sagiving.umd.edu/ammermanvetsfund/index.html
- Paul Gallo Memorial Scholarship for Non-Traditional Student Interns: https://www.start.umd.edu/education/paul-gallo-memorial-scholarship-non-traditional-student-interns
- We strongly encourage and recommend that interns seek academic credit for their internship through their home institution or department, if possible.
- If undertaking the internship for credit, please indicate this on your application form. Be sure to notify your internship supervisor if you need to work more than 10 hours per week for this reason.
- Applicants interested in applying for an internship for any semester other than or in addition to spring 2025 must submit a separate application for each semester with the correct application form for that semester.
How to Apply for START Internships:
START is currently accepting applications for the spring 2025 semester. Please make sure you check the dates for the project you’re interested in to make sure they’re available during the semester you intend to apply. The spring 2025 application form will be open until 11:59pm ET on October 24, 2024. Late, incomplete, or applications not submitted correctly will not be considered. To access the application: click here.
Notes:
- Due to the high volume of applications, only top candidates selected for interviews will be contacted.
- All internships include a stipend of $2,250 for the fall and spring semesters, and $3,000 for the summer term.
- Applicants must pay close attention to the requirement of the internship they are applying for, including attendance to team meetings and the minimum time commitment. Inability to attend compulsory meetings or work the minimum required hours will result in rescinding of offer.
- Applicants who identify two additional internship projects of interest may be considered for those projects if they are not selected for the project in which they are applying.
- Any successful applicant will be asked to respond with a firm acceptance within 48 hours of the offer being made. Failure to respond could result in your place being given to another applicant.
- Failure to complete this form in full or submit the proper materials according to the directions provided above could result in your application being rejected without further consideration.
- All interns must attend START Intern Orientation.
- All interns must be able to participate in the internship program for the duration of the program/semester dates.
- Questions about specific internships, their requirements or subject matter should be directed to the supervisor contact listed for each project on the START internship web page.
If you have difficulty submitting your application or have questions about your application status, please contact us at internships@start.umd.edu. To request an ASL interpreter or other accommodations, please email diverseterps@umd.edu.
Application Materials:
All internship applicants must submit all materials in one .pdf file using the file name format:
LastName, FirstName_InternCandidate.pdf or .doc.
The internship application packet should include the following documents in the following order:
- One page cover letter
- One page resume
- Official or unofficial transcript(s)
Note for International Students:
START welcomes applications from international students for all of our internships where US citizenship is not a requirement (see the qualifications listed for each project for details).
It is, however, the responsibility of the applicant to ensure that their visa or immigration status permits them to undertake a paid internship. It is also the responsibility of the applicant to ensure that all proper paperwork, like documented approval from your home institution, is available and processed in time for the start of the internship. Failure to comply with these stipulations, or provide the paperwork required to verify your status, will result in your internship offer being rescinded without further consideration. START is unable to sponsor visas for non-US Citizens due to the short timeline of our program and the lengthy processing time for visas. Unfortunately, this largely limits our ability to accept anything other than F-1 visas on regular, not OPT, status.