Research Support

SSW IT helps our researchers navigate the dynamic campus IT landscape, providing information and building relationships to assist SSW in awareness and use of existing campus services. We strive to build relationships between researchers facing similar issues to find common solutions and share knowledge. For any of the services below, please contact [email protected] for more information.

SSW IT Services

Data Management

SSW-IT staff are happy to assist with understanding, selecting, and managing your storage. Considerations include size of data, data security or regulatory requirements, and access requirements. We can help finding the resources for storing your active data, archival data, or backup options.

Procurement and Integration

SSW-IT staff can assist with the evaluation, design and acquisition of IT hardware, software, or services for research needs. With recent changes to the University of Michigan SPG on Information Security, please contact SSW IT well in advance of any potential purchase for online software or cloud services from third party vendors, as the process may take sigificant time. 

Consulting for Grants and Proposals

SSW-IT staff can help with wording regarding data security or services, obtaining quotes, estimates, and costs needed for grant and proposal requests.

Access Liaison for Michigan Medicine Level-2 Accounts

SSW-IT staff are access liaisons, able to sponsor School of Social Work researchers with Michigan Medicine Level-2 accounts, the first step for access to REDCap and other Michigan Medicine systems. If you are a School of Social Work faculty or staff member in need of a Level-2 account as part of your access and authorization to a Michigan Medicine service, please email [email protected].

High Performance Computing Consultation

SSW-IT maintains an allocation on Great Lakes, the University of Michigan's High Performance Computing (HPC) cluster. Familiarity with the Linux command line is necessary to use the cluster, and we recommend attending an in-person training if available, or watching pre-recorded training videos from the Advanced Research Computing Technology Services (ARC-TS) team.

If you'd like to schedule a consultation or find out more information about HPC options, please email [email protected] for more information.

Other Research Support Services on Campus

SSW IT can also help connect SSW researchers and other research support units on campus.

Consulting for Statistics, Computing and Analytics Research (CSCAR)

CSCAR provides consulting services and training opportunities in data science, statistics, and advanced research computation. CSCAR consultants have deep expertise in R, Python, SAS, SPSS, Stata, C++, and Fortran.

SSW IT recommends contacting CSCAR for assistance with their statistical analysis. Some of the areas that CSCAR can help are listed below, but we encourage you to contact them even if you are not sure whether your needs fit into one of these areas:

• Formulation of research aims and development of plans for data collection and analysis
• Statistical study design issues including power analysis and sample size assessment
• Management of very large datasets using advanced tools and computing infrastructure
• Profiling, optimization, verification and debugging strategies for data analysis and numerical code
• Modeling of data, including regression techniques, and advanced modeling techniques for dependent and partially observed data
• Data visualization, interpretation and presentation of statistical findings
• Issues related to missing data, biased sampling, and causal inference
• Design and analysis of sample surveys, including analysis of complex sample surveys and methods for assessing survey error
• Text mining and statistical text analysis
• Analysis of categorical data
• Data mining, including clustering and dimension reduction
• Strategies for management of large and complex data
• Statistical analysis of images, sound and video

To contact CSCAR:

Submit an appointment request online, or call their front desk (734) 764-7828 to request an appointment. Some questions can be addressed by e-mail. Statistics questions can be sent to [email protected]; research computing questions to [email protected]; and data science questions to [email protected]. Please use your U-M email address when contacting CSCAR.

Library Research Data Services

Research Data Services is a network of services throughout the Library to assist you during all phases of the research data lifecycle. More information about these services can be found at https://www.lib.umich.edu/research-data-services.