UNews - academic director

Data centre open to all faculty

trevor.kenney — Thu, 25 Oct 2012 20:53:24 +0000

Dr. Tom Perks (Sociology) is turning his enthusiasm for data into a four-year term as the academic director for the Statistics Canada Research Data Centre (RDC) here on campus. And, he wants to encourage as many researchers as possible to take advantage of the unique data clearinghouse.

As a long-time user of other data centres in Edmonton and Calgary, Perks understands the convenience of having
access to significant amounts of StatsCan data, close to home. He is currently working on a project that matches changes in participation in sports with the recent Vancouver Olympics, and is able to do that using General Social Survey data.

"While use of the RDC has been steady, we're hoping that we can expand its availability to even more faculty, students, and members of the U of L community," says Perks. "The RDC provides access to detailed microdata including unaggregated data (at the individual, household or family levels), sensitive variables, precise geographic variables and longitudinal survey results."

"In addition, the RDC offers a great opportunity for graduate students and senior undergraduate students looking to become more familiar with how Statistics Canada works and to make use of Canadian data that otherwise would be not available to them," he adds.

To access the data at the RDC, researchers must submit a project proposal justifying the need to use microdata files, as opposed to the public-use versions of the data. Individual researchers, research teams led by the principal applicant and graduate students may apply.

"In the future we'll be looking to host campus-wide seminars to introduce potential users of the RDC to Statistics Canada datasets, as well as the process of applying," he says.

The Centre is currently open from Tuesday through Thursday, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Perks says there is a great deal of flexibility in scheduling.

Interested researchers are welcome to contact either Perks (thomas.perks@uleth.ca) or Statistical Assistant Amber Zary at rdc@uleth.ca

This story first appeared in the October 2012 issue of the Legend. To see the full issue in a flipbook format, follow this link.

Real-world experience

trevor.kenney — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 20:15:16 +0000

The Faculty of Management is preparing to launch an exciting initiative connected to the Centre for Financial Market Research and Teaching (CFMRT).

On Tuesday, Nov. 15, representatives from the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ, the community and various stakeholder groups will gather for the official launch of the Student-Managed Investment Fund (SMIF) – $100,000 of real-money to be traded by finance students.

"The fund has been established so that participating students can gain invaluable practice managing a real-life investment portfolio," says Dr. Robert Ellis, dean of the Faculty of Management. "This will give them the opportunity to interact and network with industry experts and other business students interested in finance."

The Student-Managed Investment Fund allows students to trade stocks with a real-money account.

The Faculty has provided the initial $100,000 seed capital for the SMIF, which will be invested under the direction of CFMRT academic director, Dr. Pei Shao. Students will conduct the actual trading of funds as part of a new course designed specifically for the program.

"Students participating in the course are selected based on their academic performance and an interview," says Shao. "Eight students have formed our inaugural group and will play the role of either portfolio manager or financial analyst and work within various research teams focusing on different industry sectors."

One of the portfolio managers is finance and marketing major Taylor Nanton.

"Being part of the SMIF fund will allow us to gain hands-on industry experience in our chosen career path," says Nanton, who will graduate in spring 2012. "Having this opportunity provides us with experience we'll use every day in our future positions. It might also help us invest our own money more wisely."

In addition to supervision by Shao, guidance on trading activities will come from an advisory board comprised of external investment professionals, internal faculty members and legal experts. This will ensure compliance with laws, regulations and ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ policies/guidelines.

Kevin Sassa (BMgt '93), an investment advisor with CIBC Wood Gundy, is one member of the advisory board. He believes the opportunities the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ affords through the fund is invaluable.

"From an industry perspective, the fund provides experience that may not be available at other institutions. When I was in university, students didn't have a fund and courses like this, so we had to acquire our expertise once we were out in the professional environment," says Sassa.

"Anytime you can get experience hands on, it bridges that gap between theory and real-world practice."

The SMIF has generated a very positive buzz in the financial community. Potential employers see it as an excellent training exercise, possibly reducing their own training expenses, as new recruits would be better prepared for the full responsibilities of their position coming out of school.

The SMIF advisory board is also a huge advantage for students, allowing them to begin establishing a business network before even entering the workforce.

Beyond the initial capital invested by the Faculty, it is expected that the SMIF will continue to grow through prudent investment by the students and continued fundraising efforts.

"Our goal is to increase the SMIF to $400,000 in the next three years," says Shao. "To achieve this goal, we've launched a fundraising campaign and expect that future funds will come from individual and corporate donors, professional organizations and a portion of ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ endowment assets. Our long-term vision is that the SMIF will become self-sustaining."

Ellis is enthusiastic about what the SMIF can do for the Faculty's students.

"These students will be exceptionally well prepared for careers in finance," says Ellis.

This story first appeared in the November issue of the Legend. For a look at the Legend in a flipbook format, follow this link.

StatsCan Research Data Centre a valuable resource

trevor.kenney — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 17:35:32 +0000

It's a tiny, plain research space, with four small workstations and no Internet access. It requires, among other things, an RCMP security clearance to access the information located within it, and has steel reinforcement built into the walls – so forget about cell phone use. Card key access is tightly controlled and someone is on-site to monitor attendance and carefully screen all notes and results that leave.

So, with all this fuss to access, why is Abdie Kazemipur (sociology) so happy? He and other approved researchers now have access to the entire Statistics Canada (StatsCan) database system – a new initiative that will help ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers gain significant ground as they work on projects that require raw data sets normally not available to the general public.

Dr. Abdie Kazemipur, (l) and graduate student Martin Russenberger (r) are the people to contact if your research project requires extensive Statistics Canada data.

The U of L recently flipped the 'on' switch to launch a StatsCan Research Data Centre (RDC) Branch, one of just two dozen all-access points in Canada – mostly in larger institutions – for people who are working with data provided by StatsCan for approved projects.

U of L administration (VP-Academic, VP-Administration, and VP-Research) and the dean of Arts and Science supported the $70,000 project. It also received significant input and assistance from the library, campus facilities and IT departments as the space was created.

Kazemipur, the academic director of the U of L Research Data Centre and a sociology researcher who uses StatsCan data in his work on immigration, says the chance to access rich individual and household data in Lethbridge saves both time and money, offering an opportunity to significantly increase research productivity.

"I would previously have to go to Calgary, and spend intense days analyzing the data," he says. "There were many limitations on my time, and on what I was able to do during the time I had."

Kazemipur says the new centre should expand research opportunities for many faculty members in social sciences, health sciences and management who, like him, want to go deeper into their research and beyond the data available for public use.

Local access should also be an enticement to other researchers to come to the U of L to work or conduct research, in particular the 22 research affiliates of the Prentice Institute for Global Population and Economy, which is expected to be one of the more frequent users of the facility.

"Researchers in the Prentice Institute – more than 20 faculty, post-docs and students – are delighted to have access to micro-level data in our new Research Data Centre," says
Dr. Susan McDaniel, the institute's director. "Our mission is to examine population change in shifting economic environments. One of the best ways to do this is to follow individuals over time rather than compare different sets of people at two points in time."

McDaniel says that the RDC enables researchers in one of her SSHRC-funded projects to follow Canadians at seven points of time as they move from mid-life into their older years.

"It is really, as famous hockey player Wayne Gretzky was fond of saying, skating to where the puck will be. I am certain that having the RDC here will help us recruit new faculty and junior research chairs to work in the Prentice Institute."

The process to gain access to the data is not as challenging is it might first sound, Kazemipur says. Projects must go through several steps, including an
online application to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), which triggers a request to StatsCan for access to the appropriate dataset – and that's where the security checks come in.

Once approved, a researcher gains access to the data centre with a swipe card, and can sign in and out as needed to complete their work.

Anyone wishing to use the centre, or who has a project they feel could benefit from access to the StatsCan data, can contact Kazemipur for more information on the process.

Contact him at 403-329-5132 or e-mail abdie.kazemipur@uleth.ca. Or, you can contact site supervisor Martin Russenberger, a part-time StatsCan employee and current Geography/Economics graduate student at the U of L (rdc@uleth.ca).

This story first appeared in the Legend. To view the Legend in a flipbook format, follow this link.

UNews - academic director

Data centre open to all faculty

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Real-world experience

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StatsCan Research Data Centre a valuable resource

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