FULLY FUNDED PHD POSITION IN SPATIAL DATA SCIENCE AND CRIME

Admin

1 year ago

Organization: University of Canterbury – School of Earth and Environment Christchurch,
Location: Canterbury, New Zealand

Description (PHD POSITION|Student)

We are seeking a highly motivated and talented individual to join our research team as a PhD student in the field of Spatial Data Science and Crime at the University of Canterbury (UC), Christchurch – New Zealand.

THE PROJECT

The successful candidate will have the opportunity to work on cutting-edge research that aims to use human movement data, collected via smartphone apps, to understand the complex relationships between spatial data and crime both in New Zealand (Christchurch and Auckland) and Brazil (São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro). The first step of the project includes identifying potential biases of the mobility dataset and exploring its representativeness in relation to recent Census data. We are especially interested in developing metrics that enable detection of potential hotspots of illegal activities in residential areas and that can be operationalised by law enforcement partners.

TASKS INCLUDE BUT ARE NOT LIMITED TO

· Process, analyse, clean, and critically evaluate locational data from smartphone apps.

· Perform intermediate and advanced statistical and spatial analysis by incorporating multiple layers of information.

· Make connections between what is represented or missed by the data and how it affects the detection of potential illegal activities.

· Synthesising smartphone app data with other available datasets to obtain more information about (a) the population represented in the dataset and (b) the accuracy in detecting hotspots for potentially illicit activities.

· The candidate is also expected and encouraged to present and discuss their own ideas on how to analyse and use the data to achieve the purpose of the project.

THE TEAM

The successful candidate will be based at the School of Earth and Environment (Faculty of Science) at the University of Canterbury (UC) under the supervision of Dr Vanessa Bastos (UC). Dr Malcolm Campbell (UC) and Prof Gregory Breetzke (University of Pretoria).

THE IDEAL CANDIDATE

We are looking for people who fulfil the following requirements:

· Interest in spatial data science, crime geography, and spatial analysis.

· MSc degree (or equivalent) in GIScience, computer science, geocomputation, geography, data analytics or similar areas

· Grades (a minimum GPA of 5.5) that fulfil UC entry requirements (see the eligibility section)

· English level that fulfils UC requirements (See requirements here)

· Knowledge of programming (R and/or Python)

FUNDING DETAILS

The position is funded through a 3-year UC Doctoral Scholarship covering tuition fees and paying a stipend of $28,000 per annum.

HOW TO APPLY

Stage 1: Expression of interest

Send your CV and a 1-page (maximum) expression of interest (where you explain how you meet the above conditions and why you are interested in this topic) to Dr Vanessa Bastos at vanessa.bastos@canterbury.ac.nz no later than April 8^th 2023.

Stage 2: Interview

You will be contacted by the supervisory team and invited for an online interview if you are successful at the first stage.

ELIGIBILITY

To be eligible, potential students must:

1) Qualify for admission to the PhD at UC (see here)

APPLY NOW

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