Regional RSE Groups are beginning to form across the UK with the aim of creating a skills network, a local hub for advice, and a great way to network and form collaborations.
In 2021, the Regional RSE Groups Special Interest Group (SIG) was formed and launched. This SIG aims to support the forming of regional groups, and to give advice and guidance for the running of such a group. The SIG members can be contacted under [email protected] . Financial support can be requested through the SocRSE Events and Initiatives grant. At the launch workshop, RSEs from various regions discussed and planned first steps to form regional groups.
Existing regional RSE groups include:
Research Software London
The first regional group to be formed was Research Software London organised by Jeremy Cohen at Imperial College London.
Research Software London is a new community for researchers, developers and academics based at institutions in London and the South East of the UK who are involved in writing code as part of their research.
N8 CIR RSE Community
The N8 Centre of Excellence in Computationally Intensive Research (N8 CIR) RSE community is a network for RSEs working in the N8 Universities. Kirsty Pringle started to build up this community and lead the N8 CIR RSE Theme from 2018 to 2020. From November 2020, Marion Weinzierl took over the RSE Theme Leader role in N8 CIR.
Since September 2023 the RSE theme has been led by Sam Bland and continues to be an active community with quarterly N8 RSE leaders meetings and RSE community meetings.
Community of Edinburgh Research Software Engineers
The Community of Edinburgh Research Software Engineers comprises the RSEs of all Edinburgh Universities.
Supercomputing Wales
Supercomputing Wales has an active RSE group that plans to reach out to other RSEs in the region.
RSE Midlands
RSE Midlands is a community of people who use or develop research software and work in the Midlands area of England.
RSE South
RSE South is a regional network of Research Software Engineering groups in the South of the UK.
Northern England RSEs
The Northern England RSE group is a grassroots community group still in the process of forming. The focus of the group is to strengthen existing institution-based RSE links and build new relationships across the area. If you are interested in joining, please contact (group or individual emails). If the group grows to a point where it becomes unworkable, it might be split up into affiliated North-East, North-West and Yorkshire RSE associations. We welcome all those who consider themselves to be RSEs in practice, or in an RSE named role from across the North of England.
Research Software Engineering East of England (RSEEE)
Research Software Engineering East of England was formed in 2024 with the aim to be a regional community for networking and knowledge exchange in the field of research software development. See the webpage for details on how to join the mailing list and slack channel.
ScotRSE
The ScotRSE network is a new network aimed to bring together RSEs working across Scotland. It is just starting up and recruiting new members so please let us know if you are interested in finding out more.