Rayna Harris on The Carpentries

Gratitude to the Growing Trainer Community

Fri, 13 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000

History

The origins of the Trainer Community as we know it today can be traced back to 2012 when Greg Wilson invited a handful of experienced Software Carpentry Instructors to improve their teaching skills as part of a multi-week, online reading group and training course. Within a year, about 50 instructors completed the course to become certified Software Carpentry Instructors. In 2014, the first 3-day instructor training workshop was hosted in Toronto, Canada. Transitioning the course from weeks to days didn’t go as smoothly as Greg hoped, but Warren Code provided a lot of valuable advice that was used to refine the material, and by the end of 2014, the instructor training curriculum had the basic structure that is used today (1, 2, 3). In 2015, Data Carpentry and Software Carpentry began using the same curriculum to train new instructors, and this set the stage for transforming the curricula to serve train all future Carpentries Instructors. At this point in time, the demand for workshops was rapidly increasing and it was clear that our community needed a process for training new trainers.

Workshop Participant Fees

Thu, 20 Jun 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Workshop Participant Fees

A frequently asked question by people running their first Carpentries workshop is whether or not they can (or should) charge people to attend.

This blog post outlines some of the workshop organisation logistics that can help determine whether or not it makes sense to charge for a workshop.

Workshop Costs

One of the major reasons to charge for a workshop is to cover costs. Common costs for a workshop can include:

Traducción al español de Ecología con Python, una lección de Data Carpentry

Tue, 22 Jan 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Read the English version of this blog post here.

Entre septiembre de 2017 y mayo de 2018 desarrollamos una iniciativa impulsada por la comunidad para traducir las lecciones de Software Carpentry al español. Su resultado fue la producción de tres lecciones de alta calidad, que pueden utilizarse para enseñar un taller de Software Carpentry consistente de La Terminal de Unix, Control de Versiones con Git, y R para Análisis Científicos Reproducibles.

El siguiente paso lógico para potenciar la cartera de lecciones en español de The Carpentries era traducir una lección de Data Carpentry basada en Python. En noviembre de 2018 iniciamos y completamos un esfuerzo comunitario para crear Análisis y visualización de datos usando Python.

Data Carpentry Python Ecology Lesson Translated into Spanish

Thu, 17 Jan 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Lee la versión en español de esta publicación aquí.

From September 2017 to May 2018, there was a community-driven effort to translate the Software Carpentry lessons into Spanish, and the result was the production of three high-quality lessons that can be used to teach a Software Carpentry Workshop consisting of La Terminal de Unix, Control de Versiones con Git, and R para Análisis Científicos Reproducibles.

The next logical step to enhance The Carpentries portfolio of Spanish lessons was to translate a Python-based Data Carpentry lesson. In November 2018, we initiated and completed a community-driven project to create Análisis y visualización de datos usando Python.

Instructor Training Curriculum Updates

Mon, 03 Dec 2018 00:00:00 +0000

The Instructor Training Curriculum is a centrepiece among The Carpentries workshops. It is constantly in use as we bring new Instructors on board, and our engaged Instructor Trainer community brings a steady stream of new ideas for its improvement. This makes for a fun community, interesting discussions… and a lengthy to-do list! In the month of October we organised a “push” on the Instructor Training curriculum, in which we made good progress on backlogged issues, organisation, and usability for new Instructor Trainers. This is not a full “release” – we’re about halfway to where we’d like to be for our next published update – but we are pleased with what we’ve accomplished and hope you will be, too. We are particularly grateful to the community of Instructor Trainers whose feedback and contributions have both inspired this work and helped to complete it!

Three Years in the Making for Instructor Training in Latin America

Mon, 27 Aug 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This month I (Rayna Harris) co-taught a remote The Carpentries Instructor Training Workshop for 25 Spanish-speaking trainees in six countries in Latin America. It was awesome! One thing that made this workshop so special for me is that it has been three-plus years in the making. So, I thought I would tell the story, from my perspective, about all the things that came into play to make this workshop a reality.

Carpentries for Latin America

Mon, 12 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The idea of translating Carpentries’ lessons into Spanish and other languages is not new [1, 2, 3]. At the end of 2017, a group of volunteers (see Initial Group members below) embarked on the goal of making Spanish translations a reality. We are very happy that many more volunteers joined us in this effort. We did it, and today we can make the fruit of these months of work known to the entire community!

My Favourite Tool - Videoconferencing

Mon, 13 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

My favorite tool: Videoconferencing

I know most of the blog posts so far in this series have been about the tools people use to enable them to conduct research. However, I feel quite strongly that the video conference systems that allow me to speak to other people have had the most profound impact on my development as a researcher and educator over the past three years.

Joint future for Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry

Sat, 02 Sep 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry are sister organizations focused on teaching computational best practices to scientists. They are currently independent organizations with their own fiscal sponsorship, Steering Committees, governance model, and bank accounts. However, as is perhaps no surprise the organizations’ operations have evolved to share memberships, infrastructure for workshop coordination, an instructor training program, and even some staff members. This ‘separate but collaborative’ organizational structure has allowed us to build a shared community of instructors with more than 1000 certified instructors and 47 current Member Organizations around the world.

Joint future for Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry

Sat, 02 Sep 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Data Carpentry website

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

Motions approved for Data Carpentry & Software Carpentry Merger

Mon, 07 Aug 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

I am happy to announce that the Steering Committees of both Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry have approved 4 motions regarding the structure and leadership of the mergered Carpentries organization. The approved motions are:

Motion 1

The Board of Directors for the combined organization will be composed of 9 members, each serving a two year term without limits on the number of terms. Five members will be appointed through a process of nomination to the board followed by voting by board members. The other four members will be elected by the membership of the organization.

Motions approved for Data Carpentry & Software Carpentry Merger

Mon, 07 Aug 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Data Carpentry website

Motion 1

New monthly updates from the secretary

Tue, 20 Jun 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

After 6 months, I feel that I’m settling into my role as Software Carpentry Steering Committee Secretary. In an effort to improve communication and transparency between the Steering Committee and everyone else, I am commiting to writing or co-writing a montly blog post to keep you abreast on news from each meetings.

Check out these new blog post summaries of the in-person Software Carpentry Steering Committee Meeting and of the in-person SWC/DC merger group meeting.

Timeline for the Data Carpentry & Software Carpentry Reorganization

Sat, 17 Jun 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On Jun 8 & 9, we met in-person to continue discussing how to proceed with the merger of the Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry organizations to best achieve our strategic goals and serve our communities. We are happy to report that is was a very productive meeting.

We spent most of the meeting discussing the structure of the future organizational leadership. We have drafted a number of motions that we will present to our respective steering committees for approval at our next meetings. Among the motions, we will propose that the combined Carpentries governing structure be made up of both appointed and elected members. Additionally, we propose that it is in the best interest of the organization to seed the future steering committee with bylaws, which will be enumerated, written, and approved in the coming months.

Timeline for the the Data Carpentry & Software Carpentry Reorganization

Sat, 17 Jun 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Data Carpentry website

What is the reward for empowering others?

Sun, 14 May 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

Following a few round-table discussions with Software Carpentry instructors, I gained some insight into what drives so many of us to volunteer our time so enthusiastically. I came to the conclusion that many of us share a sense of accomplishment when we empower others through mentoring and education. Software Carpentry gives us a fountain-full of opportunities to contibute through community developed lessons, community supported workshops, and world-wide community conversations. We start out volunteering a little when there is time, but we soon carve out more and more space in our schedule for Software Carpentry events and activities that provide the opportunity to empower others.

Instructor Training in Puerto Rico

Mon, 24 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On March 24-25, Rayna Harris, Sue McClatchy, and Tracy Teal co-taught an instructor training workshop at the University of Puerto Rico (UPR). This was a very special workshop in many ways, and we are excited to share some of the highlights with you.

Also, be sure to check out an accompanying blog post by Humberto Ortiz Zuazaga about the combined Replicathon and Instructor Training events.

Instructor Training in Puerto Rico

Mon, 24 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Data Carpentry website

Also, be sure to check out an accompanying blog post by Humberto Ortiz Zuazaga about the combined Replicathon and Instructor Training events.

Reproducible Data-Driven Discovery

Fri, 24 Feb 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Data Carpentry website

I spent the two weeks in January hanging out with some awesome scientists who are all passionate about the future of science. I was participating in two professional development events with support from Data Carpentry, and I’d like to share some of the highlights.

A Curriculum Development Hackathon for Reproducible Research using Jupyter Notebooks

On January 9–11, 2017, I attended my first hackathon at the Berkeley Institute for Data Science! The event was organized jointly by Data Carpentry and the Jupyter Notebook project. The goal of the hackathon was to develop a two-day workshop curriculum to teach reproducible research using the Jupyter Notebook. There attendees were a group of 25 scientists from the US, Canada, and the UK with diverse backgrounds with a unique set of skills and expertise. I was one of a handful of attendees that uses R Markdown more than iPython or Jupyter Notebooks; however, after seeing the notebook’s power and utility, I’m really excited about adding this to my reproducible workflow.

Beginning the conversation: Potential merger with Data Carpentry

Wed, 22 Feb 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

Newcomers to our community frequently request clarification regarding the distinction between Software Carpentry (SWC) and Data Carpentry (DC). SWC and DC are two independently established and operated organizations that share a common goal of promoting education in reproducible science skills, both in data literacy (DC) and software development (SWC).

Despite our separate organizational structures, SWC and DC maintain close ties, and have begun moving over the last year or so towards increased connectivity. Staff interact with leadership and members of both communities, and are sometimes shared hires between both groups. We offer joint institutional memberships. We’ve worked together to implement shared policies, and have released statements which reflect our commitment to shared values.

Announcing the CarpentryCon Proposal

Wed, 04 Jan 2017 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

To date, we have not yet had an opportunity to bring together all the members of our communities. Enter: CarpentryCon! We are proposing a two-and-a-half day conference, tentatively held in May 2017 at the University of Michigan.

We envision an event that brings together members of the Carpentry community, including instructors, partners, advocates, and staff, together with people sharing similar interests from around the globe. We will have a “come and learn” format that is different from most conferences with session on topics such as teaching methods, curriculum development, community organization, and leadership skills. Opportunities will be provided for participants to come together informally to share stories about challenges and successes. There will be at least one session where attendees can share how they have incorporated Carpentry techniques into their own research and teaching, and/or how they have grown their local Carpentry community. The final list of sessions will be determined by the program committee in consultation with the community, balancing “who wants to learn what?” with “who’s willing to teach what?”.

2017 Election: Rayna Harris

Mon, 19 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

I am really excited to stand in election for the 2017 Software Carpentry (SWC) Steering Committee so that I can continue to serve this amazing community.

##Software Carpentry Involvement I was first exposed to Software Carpentry by April Wright, who suggested that I attend the Instructor Training Workshop at UC Davis in January 2015. In 2015 I co-taught workshops at UT Arlington and New Mexico State University, I co-organized the Austin-based Instructor/Helper Retreat, served on the Mentoring and Assessment Subcommittee.

Rayna Harris's Year in Summary 2016

Mon, 19 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

A year in review

I want to thank you for giving me the prilege to serve on the Software Carpentry Steering Committee. Here is a very brief recap of the year. Click this link to read my 2017 election post.

A year ago, I said I would focus my efforts on:

integrating data from the mentoring and debriefing sessions with the assessment surveys to understand the degree of workshop effectiveness

A Comparison of Online and In-person Instructor Training Workshops

Sat, 22 Oct 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

I have co-taught three instructor training workshops this year (one online and one in-person with Christina Koch and one online with Greg Wilson.

Overview

Too long to read? Here’s an overview in tabular form.

Feature	In-person	Online
networking	excellent	poor to very good
Etherpad use	poor	excellent
displayed on screen	the web? slides?	the instructor webcast view of other learners
time commitment	prep + class time + travel + paperwork	prep + class time
private communication	in-person	Slack & email
technical difficulties	medium	high

Networking

In-person: I think the most amazing feature of an in-person workshop is the networking. There is something about face to face conversation during activities and over coffee, beer, and dinner that really solidifies personal relations. I became a certified instructor in January 2015 at UC Davis instructor training workshop taught by Greg Wilson, Tracy Teal, Bill Mills, and Aleksandra Pawlik; I consider all four of these people to be close colleagues now, and I’m going to be visiting a handful of other workshop participants in November when I visit California. Also, I regularly talk to SWC/DC instructors on-line, but there is something about meeting them in-person that feels like its the first time we’ve met face-to-face.

2016 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefings, Rounds 04 and 05

Thu, 10 Mar 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On February 23, Rayna Harris, Sheldon McKay, and Tiffany Timbers ran the 4th round of post-workshop instructor debriefing. On March 8th, Rayna Harris, Raniere Silva, and Belinda Weaver ran the 5th round of post-workshop instructor debriefing.

New lesson materials

Data Carpentry Genomics Lesson. Greg Wilson recently sent out an email about updating the lesson maintainer roles for Software Carpentry to jump-start finalizing the Ecology and Genomic lessons. These aren’t final yet, but the Iowa State University instructors spent about considerable time putting together a genomic lesson. You can view the Git repository with their lessons here.

3rd Annual Big Data in Biology Summer School

Tue, 08 Mar 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics at The University of Texas at Austin is hosting the 3rd Annual Big Data in Biology Summer School May 23–26, 2016.

The 2016 Summer School offers eleven intensive courses that span general programming, high throughput DNA and RNA sequencing analysis, proteomics, and computational modeling. These courses provides a unique hands-on opportunity to acquire valuable skills directly from experts in the field. Each course will meet for three hours a day for four days (either in the morning or in the afternoon) for a total of twelve hours.

2016 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 03

Thu, 11 Feb 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On Tuesday, February 9th, we ran the 3rd round of Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing Sessions. Rayna and Raniere hosted the morning debriefing session. The even session was cancelled due to low attendance.

New lesson materials

Blogging as a Collaborative Git Exercise. The SFU group created a new Git exercise in which pairs of learners wrote guest blog posts for the others site. Then learners experienced conflict resolution with a controlled lesson where paid edited the same line of the guest blog post. This was an engaging exercise that allowed learned to see successful collaboration and conflict resolution. Stay tuned for a dedicate blog post from Bruno Grande about the exercise.

What worked well

A 5-day Hybrid Data / Software Carpentry Workshop. The 2016-01-25-Utrecht group covered a lot of material in this 5 day workshop (Spredsheets, OpenRefine, Python 3, Unix, SQL, Git, Make, and HPC)! While most of the materials were used as is, updates to the Data Carpentry Python lesson have already been pushed and merged.

2016 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 02

Fri, 05 Feb 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On January 26, we ran the 2nd round of Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing Sessions. Rayna and Christina hosted the morning debriefings while Bill and Raniere hosted the evening debriefing. A topic of interest today was on installations. Read on for details.

Thoughts on the “check installation” scripts

There is in an ongoing discussion about whether or not the “check installation” scripts for workshop pages should be updated. So, we asked the attendees how often these were being using and how useful they were. Some comments we received were:

2016 Election: Rayna Harris

Thu, 14 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

##Background

I am pursuing a PhD in Cell and Molecular Biology at The University of Texas in Austin. My thesis research in Hans Hofmann’s lab focuses on understanding transcriptional responses to spatial learning with single neuron resolution.

Since 2012, I’ve been deeply involved with enhancing graduate student education through 1) the Neural Systems and Behavior (NS&B) course at the Marine Biological Laboratories and 2) the Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics (CCBB) at UT Austin. At NS&B, I teach molecular approaches to neuroscience and supervise student research projects. With the CCBB, I organize workshops and symposia to promote sharing of ideas and expertise across departmental boundaries. It’s been awesome to see theses, manuscripts, tweets, and blogs acknowledge these programs for advancing student’s professional development.

2016 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 01

Tue, 12 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On January 11, 2016 we ran the 1st round of post-workshop instructor debriefing of the calendar year! The mentoring committee ran 22 debriefing session in 2015, and we are exciting about continuing to host and improve these sessions this year.

Interestingly, all instructors present participated in 3-day format Software Carpentry workshops. Read on to find out more about the changes made, what worked well, and what didn’t.

2015 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 20

Sun, 01 Nov 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

On October 13th, the mentoring subcommittee held the 20th round of debriefing for instructors. At this round, we have a great discussion text editors, workshop organization and challenges for learners.

Adrianna Pińska wrote a great post about the workshop in Johannesburg that you should check out.

Assessing Assessment

Sat, 10 Oct 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

Jason Williams and I met with two consultants at the University of Texas at the end of September to get feedback on Software Carpentry's post-workshop survey. They gave us detailed suggestions for improving six of the questions, and felt the rest were OK as they are. The feedback is given below; even without the whole questionnaire (which we will post shortly), we hope it's helpful.

Data Management Plans: A Role for Software and Data Carpentry

Wed, 07 Oct 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

I spent the better part of the last three weeks working on an NSF-IOS Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant (DDIG) proposal. Pretty much daily, I consulted this list of publically available grant proposals in the biological sciences to look at other people's proposals. It's an awesome resource if you want to see how people write their project description, but there are no links to example data management plans, facilities, summaries, etc. Where does one go for examples of or advice on these supplementary documents?

At least part of the answer is "here". The last page of NSF's information about Data Management Plan requirements, updated on October 1, urges readers to check out Data Carpentry and Software Carpentry for resources and training. This is a huge shout-out (see these tweets), so how can SWC and Data Carpentry do more?

2015 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 17

Wed, 09 Sep 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The mentorship committee held their latest round of debriefing for instructors of recent workshops on Tuesday, September 1. Then, on Friday September 4th mentorship committee met for a regular bi-weekly meeting. Some comments from the committee meeting have made their way into this debriefing post.

2015 Post-Workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 8

Fri, 08 May 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

The mentorship team met last week for a discussion with instructors who recently taught, including workshops at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and University of Texas at Arlington (the latter of which was taught by both authors of this post). Three important issues emerged during our discussion: recording the instructor's shell code, using example scripts to model increasing complexity in coding, and preparing instructors/helpers with answers to challenges.

2015 Post-workshop Instructor Debriefing, Round 5

Fri, 13 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

This post originally appeared on the Software Carpentry website.

At our fifth round of post-workshop debriefing this week, we discussed workshops held at the New York Academy of Sciences, the University of Oslo, and the University of British Columbia. This was a very instructive meeting with important lessons learned from the perspective of both new and veteran instructors. One of the key take-home lessons is that new instructors would benefit from attending an instructor debriefing prior to doing their first workshop.