Assistant or Associate Professor – Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian

Assistant or Associate Professor - Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian Research Partnerships, a unit within the University Libraries at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln that provides advanced support for information and data intensive research, seeks a Research Specialist Librarian to complement and extend its current staffing in evidence synthesis, research data management, and geospatial data and programs. The Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian will join with existing Libraries faculty members to create capacity to support digital scholarship, with an emphasis on the sciences, and will co-lead in the development and delivery of a focused set of research metrics services.

The Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian develops instruction and consults on research projects to leverage computational approaches, including using scripting tools, databases, APIs, large language models, social network analysis, and/or text analysis. Areas of support may include data analysis, data cleaning, and data visualization, and using programming languages or applications like Tableau or Flourish. This librarian will actively participate in the field of digital scholarship, leading our department engagement with efforts like Library Carpentries and Data Carpentries. Additionally, the Digital Scholarship Research Specialist will partner with other members of the department to help researchers and teams understand and use research metrics and other strategies to communicate the impacts of their research.

The Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian joins the UNL Libraries at a time of building. We have recently launched a new strategic framework and have been hiring ambitiously for the last several years. The Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian will join a cohort of new faculty members who have recently joined the Libraries. Reporting to the Chair of Research Partnerships, the Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian will actively participate in the organizational transformation of the UNL Libraries as we work to build a more equitable, accessible, and sustainable information ecosystem.

The University Libraries creates and fosters inclusive environments for teaching, learning, scholarship, creative expression, and civic engagement. The ability to find, access, evaluate, utilize, and create reliable information resources is central to higher education, the public good, and achieving equity and justice. Libraries faculty are empowered to provide an array of library services, collections, and spaces to meet the diverse needs of students, faculty, and researchers. The Libraries is committed to providing financial and other support for faculty professional development and travel. The Digital Scholarship & Sciences Research Specialist Librarian will undertake their efforts with attention to how social and structural biases and inequalities are manifest in information and data systems and in research systems.

**Responsibilities **

Working cooperatively with colleagues in Research Partnerships, Teaching Partnerships, Digital Strategies, and across the UNL Libraries, the Digital Scholarship Research Specialist Librarian will:

• Design and deliver workshops and other programming to promote data literacy (including AI literacy) and support skill development in digital scholarship tools and methods.
• Provide functional support through teaching, workshops, consultations, and small group instruction for all disciplines but with particular attention to questions and approaches in the sciences.
• Support researchers of all ranks in understanding and participating in the research lifecycle.
• Stay current with digital scholarship skill sets, technology trends, and emerging tools.
• Support the UNL Libraries in expanding into or adding capacity in additional research specialty areas, such as community/civic science, open science, data curation, or scientometrics.
• Provide guidance on the use of research metrics, identify and develop other measures of impact of research and teaching outputs, and consult on the presentation of impact evidence.
• Partner with other librarians in our sciences group to provide advanced reference consultation for information resources and grow in expertise in one or more areas of need within the agricultural and life sciences, engineering and/or physical sciences.
• Actively engage in antiracist work to develop inclusive excellence and redress systemic inequities.
• Contribute to the knowledgebase of the profession through research, publication, and professional engagement in line with a tenure-leading faculty appointment.
• Participate in library, university, and professional service activities.

Librarians in the University Libraries have faculty status. The successful candidate will be hired at the rank of Assistant or Associate Professor (tenure/tenure-leading). Salary will begin at $62,500.

Qualifications A vital qualification for this position is the ability and desire to grow in the knowledge and skills necessary to perform job duties with increasing excellence over time. We encourage applications from candidates who are unsure if they fully meet all qualifications. Applicants should use the cover letter to share how their particular combination of expertise, experience, and skills are relevant to the work described, addressing each of the required qualifications. We are open to a broad range of ways and contexts in which candidates might demonstrate how they meet these qualifications. For example, while candidates might document their demonstrated commitment, experience, and knowledge through work activities—including in positions outside of libraries—they might also speak to coursework, community service, participation in cultural or other organizations, and involvement with student groups, among other possibilities. Actual human readers, not AI software, will read all applications.

Minimum Required Qualifications

• Master’s degree in library and information science from an ALA-accredited institution (or international equivalent), or terminal degree in a relevant discipline and relevant experience, by the time of appointment/position start.
• Familiarity with the research lifecycle, research methods, study designs and needs of researchers in the sciences broadly or within a specific science (biological, environmental, agricultural, or physical sciences), as demonstrated through course work, employment experience, or some combination of education and experience.
• Demonstrated experience, familiarity, knowledge, and/or expertise with methods, software, tools, programming languages, and data sources for digital scholarship, including social network analysis, text and data mining, and data cleaning, visualization, or analysis.
• Openness and ability to learn new technologies and stay current with digital scholarship trends.
• Capacity and interest to grow in expertise in the information needs and resources in one or more disciplines within the sciences.
• Demonstrated experience thinking critically about bias and the ethical implications of data and digital technologies, and commitment to and support for a culture of diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Preferred Qualifications

• Minimum bachelor’s degree in life, environmental, agricultural, or physical science.
• Demonstrated teaching, instruction, or presentation skills and facility working with a diverse range of audiences.
• Experience supporting researchers in academic or similar advanced research environment.
• Experience working in an academic library setting.
• Knowledge of academic library trends within higher education.
• Working knowledge and understanding of research impact metrics such as citation counts, publication counts, journal metrics, h-index, altmetrics, etc.
• Awareness of algorithmic bias and accessibility issues in tools, outputs, and program design.

About Lincoln and the University of Nebraska The University of Nebraska-Lincoln seeks to attract and retain a high-performing and diverse workforce in which employees’ differences are respected and valued to better meet the varying needs of the diverse populations we serve. The university fosters a diverse and inclusive work environment that promotes collaboration so that all individuals are able to participate and contribute to their full potential.

Lincoln, Nebraska, is a city of nearly 300,000 people and the state capital, where residents enjoy a low cost of living, high-quality public schools, and more parkland per capita than most U.S. cities. See https://go.unl.edu/connections and https://aboutlincoln.unl.edu/.

As an EO/AA employer, the University of Nebraska considers qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, color, ethnicity, national origin, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, disability, age, genetic information, veteran status, marital status, and/or political affiliation. See https://www.unl.edu/equity/notice-nondiscrimination.