Student Research Assistants
Both graduate and undergraduate students may be hired as research assistants. Student research assistants are hired as employees of TRU. If you wish to hire a research assistant who is not a student, please see the Finance Procedure Manual on this topic for details.
What is a student research assistant?
A student research assistant does work directly related to the mandate of the research funding and is expected to be engaged in one or more of the following types of work:
- Preparing materials for an experiment, setting up experimental equipment, monitoring and recording experimental results, inputting and formatting data for analysis, conducting preliminary analyses of the significance of the results, carrying out a review of pertinent literature and assisting with the preparation of a manuscript;
- Collating and entering pre-existing data for statistical analysis, carrying out preliminary statistical analysis or meta-analyses, creating and conducting computer simulation models (which could entail some basic programming), monitoring and summarizing the results of a computer simulation;
- Searching the published literature on a particular thematic area and determining the relevance of articles for copying and later inclusion in a summary database, cataloguing and filing précis and keyword summaries for the most important literature under the theme, discussing recurrent concepts discovered with the grant holder and preparing draft manuscripts;
- Developing a knowledge of the techniques used to identify and monitor species of plants or wildlife, locating geo-referenced sites and recording field data on the occurrence or activities of plants and wildlife, assisting in the capture, handling and collecting of specimens, collating and entering data and preparing databases, carrying out preliminary statistical analyses.
Please note:
- A student research assistant must be enrolled as a student or, in the case of summer employment, returning as a student in the fall semester.
- Students may not work beyond the completion of their degree requirements unless this is required for the completion of a research project, in which case the position may be extended by a maximum of three months.
- Undergraduate students must carry a minimum 60% course load within the current academic year.
- Extensions beyond original end date require approval of the AVP Research & Graduate Studies.
- International Students must have a SIN in order to work as a student research assistant. For further information on the requirements, see http://www.servicecanada.gc.ca/eng/sin/employers/contract.shtml.
Application Process
Electronic employment requisitions are completed via HRsmart Solutions and are managed by Human Resources. Hard copy forms will no longer be accepted. Please see the attached documents to help guide you through this process. Should you require assistance with HRSmart, please email, hrservices@tru.ca.
