Community Engagement & Recruitment Team, Hope Clinic

Opportunity Description

Join the Community Engagement and Recruitment Team at Emory’s Hope Clinic! They are looking for a few candidates to join their team and help recruit for ongoing sexual health clinical trial studies. Duties include recruiting, screening, identifying, and interviewing participants for data collection in clinical research projects. Positions are available for temporary, full- and part-time work.

How to Apply 

• Send your resume and cover letter to hope [dot] community [at] emory [dot] edu!

Research Assistant, EpiModel Research Lab

Lab Description 

The EpiModel Research Lab at Emory, led by Assistant Professor Samuel Jenness in the Department of Epidemiology (http://samueljenness.org/), develops innovative epidemiological methods and software tools (http://epimodel.org/) to investigate infectious disease transmission dynamics. 

Our research areas are at the intersection of mathematical modeling, infectious disease epidemiology, network science, health economics, and computer science. We solve public health problems related to the drivers of transmission of infectious diseases and the optimal strategies for their prevention & control. Our current applied research focus includes both sexually transmitted diseases (HIV, gonorrhea, chlamydia, syphilis) and respiratory infectious diseases (TB, SARS-CoV-2, influenza).

Past EpiModel RAs have used their experiences with our lab to successfully advance to the next stage of their public health careers as PhD doctoral students, CDC fellows, and data analyst staff. EpiModel RAs have also directly grown their CVs by co-authoring scientific articles with lab members that have been published in the top epidemiology and infectious disease journals.

Opportunity Descriptions 

We are currently hiring multiple Research Assistants to support both the technical work and the project management of our research portfolio.

The Scientific RA would perform these duties:

• Software code development and review, including computational optimization techniques for existing code and unit testing new code;
• Literature reviews and summaries related to the research products;
• Analysis, summarization, and writing of results.

The Project Management RA would perform these duties:

• Organization and maintenance of our online repositories for the project, including management of the Github study home and study websites
• Coordination of meetings and work across our study sites at Emory University, University of Washington, University of Minnesota, and Northwestern University
• Editing scientific products, including journal articles, software documentation, and workshop materials.

Both RA positions may be performed entirely through remote work (online).

Application Details 

• Click here to read more about this position and apply on Handshake! 
• Applications for this position will be accepted from students who have qualified for REAL program and those who have not.
  • If you have qualified for REAL, please indicate that in your application cover letter; we will ask for verification of REAL status if we proceed with an interview.
• Please submit a cover letter explaining your interests in the position and a current CV.
  • In your cover letter, you should specify which RA position you are interested in, and detail all experiences or skills specifically related to job duties outlined above.

Data Analyst Intern – Chronic Viral Diseases Branch, CDC

Opportunity Description

In light of the COVID-19 situation, it is expected that this position will largely involve telework, subject to CDC’s most current flexibility policies. The student should have sufficient resources to work remotely and independently (adequate computing equipment, electronic library access, etc.). Presentations will be given via Zoom (or some other technology easily accessible to CDC employees). If the situation improves, it may be possible to hold in-person meetings and presentations, although it is likely that presentations will continue to be given via Zoom/or other technology. The position is located within the Chronic Viral Diseases Branch at CDC. The core activity of the human Immunology team is to conduct assays to monitor human papillomavirus antibody response to natural infection or vaccination.

Duties and Responsibilities 

As part of the team, the analyst will help streamline and automate by creating scripts to handle specific areas of data management, analysis and reporting in support of national and international HPV seroepidemiology and vaccine implementation studies. The analyst will have the opportunity to observe a public health lab in action as well as participate/attend in branch and CDC-wide scientific seminars. It would be beneficial if the applicant had knowledge and skills in R and Microsoft Excel. The position will help develop on core public health competencies of Analytical Skills, Communication skills, leadership and thinking skills. 

How to Apply 

Click here to read more about this position and apply on Handshake! 

Graduate Research Assistant: Impact of SARS-CoV-2 on PLWH in Atlanta, Emory

Role Description

African Americans in Georgia are disproportionately impacted by HIV, comprising 72% of the total number of individuals with HIV disease in this state. Tragically, African Americans who have contracted SARS-CoV-2 also bear a disproportionate burden of death from COVID-19. The overlap of the current COVID-19 pandemic and the HIV epidemic creates a syndemic (or the aggregation of two or more concurrent or sequential epidemics interacting synergistically and contributing to excess burden of disease in a population) for African Americans with HIV.

By using quantitative and qualitative data gathering and syndemic and community-based participatory approaches, this research project seeks to understand how perceived susceptibility to COVID-19 morbidity and mortality affect the health seeking behaviors of African Americans with HIV. This project is a new collaboration between a multi-disciplinary and ethnically diverse group of HIV investigators affiliated with the Emory University and Healthcare Systems. Our team includes medical doctors, epidemiologists, and social and education scientists who are committed to a collaborative approach in which community members are seen as partners in the research process.

The student will be presented the opportunity develop, improve, and refine qualitative research skills in project implementation, management, and analysis.

The REAL Student will assist with the following activities:

• Development of qualitative research tools through the creation of a focus group discussion guide to be used during data collection.
• Data collection during focus group discussions between the research team and project participants.
• Iterative editing to focus group discussion guides used during qualitative data collection.
• Communicating with potential research participants through recruitment and focus group scheduling.
• Conducting informed consent conversations with research participants and obtaining consent from research participants.
• Scheduling of data collection, logging of data collected, incentives tracking, and overall management of research materials in collaboration with the research team and primary investigators.
• Participation in regular team update meetings.
• Development of qualitative codebook for use during analysis.
• Assistance with focus group discussion transcription review.
• Qualitative coding of focus group discussion transcriptions.
• Presentation of qualitative analysis research findings and results; participation in manuscript drafting and preparation.

This REAL position will enhance student skills in:

• Qualitative research methods including development of qualitative data collection tools, qualitative coding and analysis.
• Qualitative research analysis and results presentation
• Participant recruitment and effective communication with study participants. This would include explaining the research study to participants as well as obtaining informed consent from research participants.
• Preparation of research articles and/or conference abstracts/presentations for submission.

Ideal REAL Student Qualities:

• Current 2nd year MPH student, or 1st year with significant Qualitative research experience, at Rollins School of Public Health
• Concentration in Epidemiology, Global Health, or Behavioral Science and Health Education
• Interest in and understanding of qualitative research methods and analysis. Experience in either strongly desired.
• Strong independent working skills alongside ability to work efficiently in a team.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills.
• Ability to participate in the facilitation of virtual and in-person focus group discussions
• Willingness to be flexible

How to Apply 

Click here to read more about this REAL opportunity and apply on Handshake! 

Surveillance Research Intern, American Cancer Society

Role Description