Rubric for Open Instructor Training

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The Software Carpentry Foundation’s Steering Committee recently resolved to run four open online instructor training sessions per year in order to help support people whom we otherwise might not be able to reach. Since there are likely to be many more applications than spaces, we have developed a rubric for ranking requests for training. This applies only to people who are applying for spots in open training sessions: people who are receiving training through institutional partnership agreements will continue to be nominated by their institution as before.

Note that as a condition of being trained, people must:

1. Abide by our code of conduct, which can be found at http://software-carpentry.org/conduct/ and http://datacarpentry.org/code-of-conduct/.
2. Complete three short tasks after the course in order to complete certification. The tasks are described at http://swcarpentry.github.io/instructor-training/checkout/, and take a total of approximately 8-10 hours.
3. Help teach a Software Carpentry, Data Carpentry, or Library Carpentry workshop within 12 months of the course.

• Personal (given) name: [________]

• Family name (surname): [________]

• Email address: [________]

• GitHub username: [________]

• What is your current occupation/career stage? Please choose the one that best describes you.

  • [_] Prefer not to say
  • [_] Undergraduate student
  • [_] Graduate student
  • [_] Post-doctoral researcher
  • [_] Faculty
  • [_] Research staff (including research programmer)
  • [_] Support staff (including technical support)
  • [_] Librarian/archivist
  • [_] Commercial software developer
  • [] Other [_______]

• Affiliation: [________]

• Location: [________]

• [_] This a smaller, remote, or less affluent institution.
  Software and Data Carpentry strive to make workshops accessible to as many people as possible, in as wide a variety of situations as possible.

  Award +1 for outside Europe/UK/US/Canada/Australia/New Zealand.
  or +1 for being in smaller/remote/less affluent institution within EU/UK/US/Can/Aus/NZ.

• Areas of expertise:

  • [_] Chemistry
  • [_] Civil, mechanical, chemical, or nuclear engineering
  • [_] Computer science/electrical engineering
  • [_] Economics/business
  • [_] Education
  • [_] Genetics, genomics, bioinformatics
  • [_] High performance computing
  • [_] Humanities
  • [_] Library and information science
  • [_] Mathematics/statistics
  • [_] Medicine
  • [_] Organismal biology (ecology, botany, zoology, microbiology)
  • [_] Physics
  • [_] Planetary sciences (geology, climatology, oceanography, etc.)
  • [_] Psychology/neuroscience
  • [_] Social sciences
  • [_] Space sciences
  • Other areas of expertise: [________]

  Award +1 for being in economics or social sciences, arts, humanities, or library science (domains where we wish to expand).

• [] I self-identify as a member of a group that is under-represented in research and/or computing, e.g., women, ethnic minorities, LGBTQ, etc.
  Details: [_______]

• [] I have been an active contributor to other volunteer or non-profit groups with significant teaching or training components. Data and Software Carpentry.
  Details: [_______]

  Optionally award +1 for each response (maximum of +2).

• How often have you been involved with Software Carpentry or Data Carpentry in the following ways?

  • [_] Helper
  • [_] Instructor
  • [_] Workshop host
  • [_] Learner
  • [_] Workshop organizer
  • [_] Contributed to lesson materials

  Score +1 for each previous involvement up to a maximum bonus of +3.

• Previous formal training as a teacher or instructor.

  • [_] None
  • [_] A few hours
  • [_] A workshop
  • [_] A certification or short course
  • [_] A full degree
  • [] Other: [_______]

  Description of your previous training in teaching: [________]

  Award +1 for “a certification or short course” or “a full degree”

• Previous experience in teaching.
  Please include teaching experience at any level from grade school to post-secondary education.

  • [_] None
  • [_] A few hours
  • [_] A workshop (full day or longer)
  • [_] Teaching assistant for a full course
  • [_] Primary instructor for a full course
  • [] Other: [_______]

  Description of your previous experience in teaching: [________]

  Award +1 for “TA for full course” or “primary instructor for full course”.

• How frequently do you work with the tools that Data Carpentry and Software Carpentry teach, such as R, Python, MATLAB, Perl, SQL, Git, OpenRefine, and the Unix Shell?

  • [_] Every day
  • [_] A few times a week
  • [_] A few times a month
  • [_] A few times a year
  • [_] Never or almost never

  Award +1 for “every day” or “a few times a week”.

• How often would you expect to teach on Software or Data Carpentry Workshops after this training?

  • [_] Not at all
  • [_] Once a year
  • [_] Several times a year
  • [] Other: [_______]

• How frequently would you be able to travel to teach such classes?

  • [_] Not at all
  • [_] Once a year
  • [_] Several times a year
  • [] Other: [_______]

• Why do you want to attend this training course? [________]

• What else should we know about you? [________]

  Award -3 to +3 based on responses to “why do you want to attend” and “what else should we know”.