Onboarding

Accounts and research training

1. Register as an OSUMC volunteer and get an email account. Complete the volunteer survey.

   • Submit the survey even if you intend to take research for credit in future semesters.

   After you register, Margaret Robinson will send you an email with the following steps to get started as a volunteer with the James Comprehensive Cancer Center:

   1. Guest Medical Center account setup. Medical Center IT will send instructions to your personal email address to set up your guest account. Before that email is sent, Margaret’s director must review and approve your request. This may take a few days, so please be patient.
   2. Background check. You will receive another email with instructions to complete your background check at Doan Hall. Complete this step after your guest account is set up.
   3. Notify Margaret when complete. Let Margaret know once you have completed the background check; she does not receive automatic notifications. You do not need to pick up a Medical Center badge unless you will be working inside hospital facilities.
   4. Computer and network access. After your background check is complete, Margaret will request your computer and network access and send you your Medical Center ID, which you will use to log into CCC computers and networks.
   5. Swipe access to research buildings. Ask the lab to submit a request through the OSUCCC portal to enable swipe access on your BuckID for research buildings.

2. Complete the relevant research training. Confirm with Dan whether you need wet lab training.

Collaboration tools

1. Join the lab’s Slack workspace and your project’s channels.
2. Join the Spakowicz Lab team in Microsoft Teams.
3. Join your collaborator’s Microsoft Teams team, if applicable.

Regular meetings

1. Add group meeting (gpmtg) to your calendar. Confirm the current time; it is most often Tuesday at 3 p.m.
2. Join the relevant project meetings, typically arranged at group meeting.
3. Add Thoracic Oncology Research Collaborative Hub (TORCH) meetings to your calendar, as appropriate: Monday and Wednesday at 2 p.m.

Computational training

1. R and RStudio: If you’re new to coding, we recommend working through chapters 1–4 of ModernDive, and continue further if it’s useful for your project.
2. GitHub account: Create an account and send your username to Dan so he can add you to the spakowiczlab organization.
3. GitHub Desktop: Install, authenticate, and clone a repository. We recommend GitHub Desktop for working with Git.
4. Ohio Supercomputer Center (OSC): Ask Dan to invite you to the relevant project.
   • Use only the Ascend cluster when requesting resources (lab guidance as of June 2025).
5. Set up Zotero, our preferred citation manager, or Mendeley if you prefer.

Optional resources if you have questions

These tutorials are available for help as needed; they are not required for everyone.

• Git push/pull tutorial
• OSC’s tutorials and training
• Connecting GitHub to OSC video. This video is stored in Microsoft Teams. You can access it once you have an OSUMC email address and have been added to the SpakowiczLab team. Use the Ascend cluster when following the video.

Data and project organization

Read Where Lab Files Live, then confirm access to the locations your project needs:

1. Teams: Manuscripts, figure packs, and submissions.
2. GitHub: Code.
3. T: drive: PHI data and archived large data files.
4. OSC: Large active files and computing.

Meet with Dan

Once you have completed the “Training that is required for everyone” section of the research training page and have an OSUMC email address, schedule a 30-minute meeting with Dan to review your progress and next steps. See Scheduling meetings for how to book a time.