Greetings, my name is Talisha, and I am an MLIS student at San Jose State University and a Library Public Services Assistant of 11 years at an academic library located in Central Florida.  A few years ago, I started learning about data science and data librarianship. While I was conducting my own research on these topics, I learned about RDAP, so when the organization announced their annual RDAP Summit, I wanted to attend. 

As someone who is new to RDAP, I signed up for the RDAP Summit Buddy Program and was paired with a great mentor. We spoke via Zoom ahead of the summit and had a great discussion on various aspects of librarianship and we are going to continue to stay in touch. I recommend new members to sign up for the program when they get a chance. 

I attended each day of the summit and had the opportunity to attend two of the workshops that occurred on Monday before the summit officially kicked off. The two workshops I attended were “Communication Skills for Data and Information Science Professionals” and “What if It [Didn’t] Happen: Data Management and Avoiding Research Misconduct.” Both were very informative and insightful. I also liked that we were able to break out into smaller groups and interact with other attendees. 

Throughout the summit, I found myself learning about new things regarding data science and data librarianship. I will say that because I am still a newbie on these topics, there were many times where I was not fully understanding the terminology being discussed, but aside from that, I did enjoy the sessions I attended. It was hard to pick a session because of my curiosity regarding the topics presented, but I did appreciate that for most of the sessions, slides were available for almost each presentation. 

One of the sessions that I found enjoyable was the “Social: New Members and First-Time Attendees” session. It was helpful in explaining more about RDAP and there was a game portion of the session which was fun! In every session, the presenters did an excellent job of conveying the information that they wanted to share with us. They were very passionate about what they were doing and even answered the many questions that came their way effectively. One speaker that I was inspired by was the opening keynote speaker Dominique David-Chavez-who spoke on “Indigenous Ethics and Data Stewardship: Enhancing Protocol, Policy, and Practice for Our Shared Data Futures” - as she was passionate about her work.

Overall, I enjoyed the RDAP Summit, and I would like to attend next year. It was an excellent experience and it got me more interested in learning more about data science and data librarianship. I encourage RDAP members to attend.