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Digital research Technical Professionals (dRTPs) teach a great deal. Research software engineers run programming courses, data stewards and librarians train researchers in data management, and research computing staff introduce people to HPC and the cloud. Yet we know surprisingly little, as a community, about what that teaching looks like: who delivers it, to whom, in what setting, and whether dRTPs are leading it or supporting someone else.

A DisCouRSE NetworkPlus-funded project led by Carlos Cámara-Menoyo and Timothy Monteath at the University of Warwick has set out to answer exactly those questions, and Carlos has written about their early findings in a blog post for the Institute for Research Software. Here is a quick summary of the project, what it has found so far, and why it matters for the wider DRI landscape.

Why this matters

Research has taken a firmly computational turn over the past decade. Data-driven research has grown rapidly, computational methods are spreading into fields such as the social sciences and humanities, Open Science and FAIR principles are now expected, and software and datasets are increasingly recognised as research outputs in their own right. AI is accelerating all of this and adding new complexity on top.

Working effectively in this landscape depends on a broad set of Digital Research Competencies (DRCs), as set out in the DIRECT Framework (which we wrote about recently after DisCouRSE funded the v2.0.0 web app). Those competencies have to be taught somewhere, and dRTPs, with their deep technical and specialist backgrounds, are natural candidates to teach them. That is the theory, at least; the project, Mapping and evaluating dRTPs’ contributions to computing skills pedagogies in HE, aims to find out what happens in practice and what distinctive value dRTPs bring compared with other educators and training platforms.

The survey and early findings

The team ran an anonymous survey of anyone who has been involved in delivering DRC training, in any capacity and regardless of job title. It asked about the respondents themselves (role, career stage and so on) and about the training they had been involved in: its context, the respondent’s role, the content covered, the technologies used, and the use of AI.

The preliminary picture is that most dRTP-delivered training is:

  • Informal, sitting outside degree programmes and not leading to any accreditation or certification
  • Technology-focused, teaching a particular tool, piece of software or programming language
  • Aimed at PhD students and research staff
  • Led by dRTPs themselves, except where the training is part of a formal curriculum, in which case dRTPs tend to take a supporting role
  • Mostly about software engineering and development skills, followed by information and data technologies and then professional skills

The team is now digging into how these patterns vary with job title, career stage, the training respondents have themselves received and the audience being taught, and is bringing in further variables such as delivery mode and attitudes towards a set of statements. A more detailed set of preliminary results is available in Carlos’s RSECon26 talk slides.

Broadening the evidence base

The survey was open until 12 October, and one of the challenges the team highlighted was a lower response rate than hoped, along with a respondent pool weighted towards some dRTP roles more than others. They were particularly keen to hear from groups who are often underrepresented in these conversations, such as data stewards, librarians, PRISM staff and academics who teach digital skills. If you teach digital research skills in any of these roles and would like to contribute to future phases of the work, do get in touch with the project team.

From CAKE’s perspective, this is an important piece of the jigsaw. Much of the digital skills training across UK research happens informally, delivered by dRTPs alongside their day jobs, and it is largely invisible to institutions and funders. Evidence about who is doing this teaching, and how, is exactly what is needed to recognise that contribution properly, and it complements the wider skills and training work happening across the DRI programme, including the Digital Research Skills Catalyst and the DIRECT Framework itself.

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