Internship Opportunity at the Massachusetts Department of Public Health

The Massachusetts Center for Birth Defects Research and Prevention has an internship opportunity open for graduate level students looking to exercise statistical and data management skills in public health. Tasks include:

• Help write SAS code for the development of a public health surveillance system using a variety of existing data sources.
• Help with data cleaning, labeling, and formatting of an analytic dataset.
• Document programs and produce codebooks for datasets.
• Help with other data-related tasks as needed.

Learning time:
Meet with Birth Defects Center staff for at least one hour/week to learn about the work of the Birth Defects Center (surveillance and research) and support the staff in its daily activities. This internship will be under the supervision of a senior epidemiologist/data analyst who will provide mentorship and guidance.

Schedule:
The work hours as well as duration of the internship will be agreed on between Center staff and intern. The weekly work schedule could range from 8 – 20 hours over few or several months. It can be spread over any number of days in the office; the schedule could further vary from week to week.

Location:
All work will have to be performed at DPH’s central office in downtown Boston (250 Washington St., Boston MA 02108) between the hours of 8am – 8pm, Mon – Fri.

Compensation:
There is no monetary compensation from the Commonwealth. This is a non-paid internship and the Commonwealth is not responsible for any travel or other expenses incurred by the intern. Nor will the Commonwealth provide any workers compensation to the intern. (However, future compensation at $17/hour is a possibility pending availability of funding.)

Potential for school credit towards a master’s thesis, practicum, or the like will be supported.

For questions, contact Alejandro Cajigal at alejandro.cajigal@state.ma.us or 617-624-5515.

To apply, send resume and cover letter by email as soon as possible, but no later than Friday, January 24, 2014. Submitted resumes will be reviewed as soon as they come in.