Who we are
The Vera Institute of Justice, founded in 1961, is a nonprofit criminal justice organization that strives to build just government institutions and safe communities free from the scourge of racism, white supremacy, profit, and inequity that is pervasive in this country’s legal systems. We are an “inside” lane organization that drives change at scale with ambitious public sector leaders who share our commitment to building anti-racist, reparative systems that deliver justice. We leverage our access to government to transform these systems and work collaboratively with stakeholders across many movements—including advocacy, grassroots, and grassroots organizations. Our role is to pilot solutions that are transformative and achievable, harness the power of evidence to drive effective policy and practice, and use advocacy and communications to change narratives and norms.
Vera has a staff of almost 300 people and offices in New York City, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, and New Orleans. We are an equal opportunity employer with a commitment to diversity in the workplace. We expect our staff to embody respect, independence, collaboration, commitment, anti-racism, and equity—both in our outward-facing work and the internal culture of our workplace. We value a range of experiences in people’s educational backgrounds and encourage people who have been directly impacted by the criminal justice system to apply.
Who you are:
The Data Scientist Intern for In Our Backyards (IOB) is an opportunity for a college student or recent college grad to immerse themselves into working a full-time data role at non-profit organization. Their work on the In Our Backyards team within Vera will support federal, state and local advocacy and technical assistance meant to reverse the rise of incarceration in smaller cities and rural communities.
The data science intern will participate in all day-to-day team activities, ranging from project and sprint planning, code review sessions, pair programming, social activities, and more. They will be directly mentored by a data scientist on the team, who will help train the intern on a range of responsibilities, including data collection, processing and analysis, and building data analytics products.
In addition to day-to-day data tasks, the intern will develop a project that they will work on over the course of their internship that is relevant to their interests and experience. This might involve helping to design and manage large-scale software systems or it could involve creating data science models or new tools to empower our community partners to leverage and improve Vera’s existing repository of incarceration data. Other day-to-day tasks may include exploratory or predictive analyses, data ingestion and computational infrastructure, analytical software development, web scraping, and producing data visualizations.
Schedule
The intern should be available to work up to 35 hours per week during the summer. The dates will be between June 6th and August 12th with some flexibility to accommodate personal and academic schedules.
Compensation
The compensation range for internships is $16.00 - $25.00, per hour. Actual compensation will vary depending on factors including but not limited to experience and performance. Applicants may choose to receive academic credit. For those who need to earn academic credit, Vera will gladly assist in working with the school or program to make arrangements and meet requirements.
How to apply
Please submit cover letter and resume. In your cover letter, please explain why you are passionate about criminal justice reform and what you hope to gain from this internship.
In this role, you will:
Data analysis
Community Partnerships
Programming and code review
What qualifications do you need?
Required:
Preferred:
The Vera Institute of Justice, founded in 1961, is an independent nonprofit national research and policy organization in the United States.
Washington, D.C., USA
8-10 year
Brooklyn, NY, USA
8-10 year
Los Angeles, CA, USA
8-10 year
New Orleans, LA, USA
8-10 year