Who Should Attend?
IndigiData is a one-week Indigenous data science education workshop each summer to introduce data science and informatics skills to tribal undergraduate and graduate students. We strive to educate Indigenous Scholars who are Undergraduates, Graduates, and Post-Docs who are striving to advance their education further.
We offer an Indigenous-centered curriculum led by Indigenous data scientists. Our workshop activities center on Indigenous data sovereignty and data ethics while also providing students valuable insight into the emerging data and technology career fields.
Flights, accommodation, and all meals are provided for workshop participants.
Workshop Topics
FOR 2024, IndigiData AZ, our theme is “Our Data Relations: Kinship, Stewardship, Sovereignty in Biocollections” and will take place on the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community in Scottsdale, AZ, with other tours around Central Arizona.
Past Workshops:
In 2023, we offered 2 workshops:
IndigiData MN – Gene editing and modification – Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Nation of Prior Lake, MN, just south of Minneapolis-St.Paul
IndigiData WN – Metabarcoding and qPCR – Lummi Nation in Bellingham, WA, between Seattle and Vancouver
For summer 2022, we conducted the workshop in-person in Mobridge, South Dakota, adjacent to the Standing Rock Reservation. That year’s topic was “Data of the Dakotas”, to address more specifically the types of data that can be taken from tribal lands.
Our first workshop (summer 2021) was conducted virtually due to the current and ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The workshop topic focused on environmental microbiomes and we walked participants through a guided demonstration of how to use computational skills to analyze sequencing data from soil microbiota.
Curriculum
IndigiData is a one-week summer workshop that will introduce participants to fundamental concepts and methods in data science and informatics. While the first 2021 year was conducted virtually for COVID-19 safety, future workshops will be held on US Indigenous tribal lands.
A strong emphasis will be placed on data ethics, contextualizing the importance and future of informatics skills for Indigenous peoples within the framework of health, culture, environment, and data.
The curriculum will require some participant reading and preparation prior to the workshop, and will focus on materials that stimulate participant interest to encourage subsequent learning in genomics and science. The “hands-on” training component will incorporate the latest techniques and analytical programs used in genomic laboratories today.