The Environments Designed for Gender Equity in Sport & Physical Activity (EDGE) Lab (edge-lab.org) is seeking an undergraduate University of Manitoba student who shares our EDGE Lab mission and values to join our team as a potential Undergraduate Research Award Summer Student.
Girls and women experience anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) ruptures up to 6 times the rate of boys and men. Historically, the reason why this gender disparity exists has been blamed on women's anatomy and biology. In 2021, our research team published a novel Gendered Environmental Approach that suggests we need to also consider the social and cultural environments that could be influencing injury risk (bjsm.bmj.com/content/55/17/984). Since the publication of that paper, we have perceived a change in how ACL injuries are discussed in the media and across the sports medicine community. We now want to undertake data collection and analysis to objectively support our observations.
We are seeking an undergraduate student from the University of Manitoba who is eligible to apply for the URA for summer 2026. The student needs to have a computer and/or data science background and an ability to work independently. The student will be central in the development and application of a methodological approach to collecting and analyzing data, largely retrieved through web scraping, to assess how our Gendered Environmental Approach has changed the ACL injury conversation.
Please feel free to contact Dr. Joanne Parsons with any questions you have, and/or submit a cover letter (describing how your experience and expertise specifically align with the requirements for this position) and resume to Joanne.Parsons@umanitoba.ca.
