Postdoctoral Scholar in Black Child & Youth Wellbeing

Description

Area: Black Child & Youth Wellbeing

Duration: 1 year with high possibility of extension

Start Date: July 1, 2024

Salary:  $60,000 CAD per annum plus University of Calgary Plan C Health Benefits

The Department of Community Health Sciences in the Cumming School of Medicine at the University of Calgary is accepting applications for a Postdoctoral Scholar in Black Child and Youth Wellbeing.

Job Description:

This position reports to the Principal Investigator, Dr. Bukola Salami. The individual will have a central role in the completion of the SSHRC Partnership Grant funded project: Transforming Lives of Black Youth. The project seeks to create a national network and a centre to build capacity and mobilize knowledge on Black children and youth in Canada. Specific objectives are as follows: 

1. To co-create knowledge, solutions, and interventions to address their overrepresentation in the criminal justice and child welfare systems, educational outcomes, and settlement issues—via participatory action research (PAR)
2. To create an interdisciplinary, intersectoral, and bilingual network, centre, and knowledge hub to mobilize evidence to improve their wellbeing—by engaging researchers, trainees, policy-makers, Black communities, and service providers across Canada
3. To train students and postdoctoral researchers, including Black youths—while facilitating their transition to academic and non-academic workplace settings

Their role will include data collection, data analysis, knowledge mobilization, undergraduate and graduate student training, and knowledge hub development. 

The first year of the project will be largely completing systematic reviews and quantitative data collection and analysis. The second to fifth year will be largely qualitative data collection and analysis. 

This position is located in Calgary, Alberta. The applicant must also be able to travel across sites.

Application to postdoctoral scholarships, such as SSHRC and Banting award will be expected.

Duties will include the following

• Assisting Principal Investigator in the design and development of research project
• Applying advanced theoretical and/or analytical techniques
• Writing papers for publication
• Developing presentations for events, conferences and other knowledge mobilization products
• Complete quantitative and qualitative data collection
• Contribute to and assist in submitting research grants proposals
• Manage ethics submissions, modifications and renewals
• Mentor and train research assistants
• Develop data collection instruments including survey and interview instruments
• Conducts literature reviews, literature search, article selection, data extraction and data analysis for systematic and scoping reviews
• Collect interview and focus group data
• Recruit research participants
• Conduct complex analysis including with NVivo data analysis software
• Manage project documentation including protocol development, project planning, evaluation, and reporting
• Assists with research data management
• Develop and maintain a knowledge hub
• Contribute to the development of a center related to Black people
• Liaise with researchers, community members, service providers and policy makers across multiple sites
• Coordinate and participate in community and stakeholder engagement session
• May also coordinate and engage in research activities that broadly improves the lives of Black people in Canada

Qualifications:

• PhD degree in social sciences, education or a relevant discipline
• PhD must have been awarded within the last five years
• Track record of publication in areas related to critical race theory and/or Black people’s wellbeing. This may include completing graduate research or working as research assistant/associate on one or more of these topics
• Experience working on research projects with Black communities in Canada
• Ability to perform detailed design, documentation, and implementation of moderately complex quantitative and qualitative analysis
• In-depth theoretical knowledge of intersectionality theory and critical race theory
• In-depth knowledge of mixed methods including survey design, interviews and quantitative research
• Ability to mentor undergraduate and graduate student
• Intermediate software and database experience required with proficiency in Microsoft Office
• Experience with NVivo and STATA software is desirable
• Experience with specific research activities: participant recruitment, data collection, data analysis, developing and maintaining ethics applications, writing manuscripts and reports, assisting with grants and funding applications
• Experience with qualitative and quantitative research activities: developing survey instrument, developing interview guides; conducting interviews, focus groups, observations; transcription, coding and data analysis
• Ability to perform detailed design, documentation, and implementation of moderately complex research project
• Track record of building positive relationship with Black and racialized communities is required
• Outstanding writing and communication skills
• High level of effective time management, personal initiative, and teamwork
• Demonstrated leadership, communication, organization, problem solving, and interpersonal skills
• Able to recognize and resolve routine problems in the research process
• Intermediate to advanced skills in Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Outlook, Excel, PowerPoint), Internet skills

Application Details:

Application deadline is May 3, 2024.  Send cover letter, CV, contact information for 3 references and a writing sample (e.g. peer reviewed publication) to Dr. Bukola Salami at [email protected]

The terms and conditions of employment are covered under the UCalgary and PDAC Collective Agreement. To find out more about postdoctoral scholar program at the University of Calgary visit our Postdocs website.  

To learn more about postdoctoral scholar opportunities at the University of Calgary, view our Postdoc Careers website.

About the University of Calgary

UCalgary is Canada’s entrepreneurial university, located in Canada’s most enterprising city. It is a top research university and one of the highest-ranked universities of its age. Founded in 1966, its 36,000 students experience an innovative learning environment, made rich by research, hands-on experiences and entrepreneurial thinking. It is Canada’s leader in the creation of start-ups. Start something today at the University of Calgary. For more information, visit ucalgary.ca.

About Calgary, Alberta

Calgary is one of the world's cleanest cities and has been named one of the world's most livable cities for years. Calgary is a city of leaders – in business, community, philanthropy and volunteerism. Calgarians benefit from the strongest economy in the nation and enjoy more days of sunshine per year than any other major Canadian city. Calgary is less than an hour’s drive from the Rocky Mountains and boasts the most extensive urban pathway and bikeway network in North America.

The University of Calgary has launched an institution-wide Indigenous Strategy committing to creating a rich, vibrant, and culturally competent campus that welcomes and supports Indigenous Peoples, encourages Indigenous community partnerships, is inclusive of Indigenous perspectives in all that we do.

As an equitable and inclusive employer, the University of Calgary recognizes that a diverse staff/faculty benefits and enriches the work, learning and research experiences of the entire campus and greater community. We are committed to removing barriers that have been historically encountered by some people in our society. We strive to recruit individuals who will further enhance our diversity and will support their academic and professional success while they are here. In particular, we encourage members of the designated groups (women, Indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, members of visible/racialized minorities, and diverse sexual orientation and gender identities) to apply. To ensure a fair and equitable assessment, we offer accommodation at any stage during the recruitment process to applicants with disabilities. Questions regarding [diversity] EDI at UCalgary can be sent to the Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion ([email protected]) and requests for accommodations can be sent to Human Resources ([email protected]).