IDSA Membership

Fellows of the Institution

IDSA honours individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the development of data science, data analytics, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and software development and information technology in Nigeria, Africa and across the globe. There are three different categories of fellowship of the Institution of Data Scientists and Analyst. The honour path is through election and the other two paths are by admission and research work(s), i.e. Honourary Fellow, Research Fellow and Fellow. None of these paths is higher than the other, our fellowship remain the highest honour of the Institution.

Fellow (Expert-level) Membership

Applicants must have 10 years work experience in chosen field with minimum qualification of M.Sc., MBA, in addition to having skills and experience in database management (at least one of the following: Talend, IBM Data Studio, Informatica, Dataflux, SAS Data Integration, and Abinitio), Analytics (at least one of the following: R, IBM SPSS, SAS, Alteryx), Visualization (Tableau, Spotfire, Qlik, PowerBI, SAS Visual Analytics), Languages (at least one of the following: Python, SQL, T-SQL(stored procedures and functions), PL/SQL, pgPL/Sql, Pig, Hive, Impala, Java, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, C, C#, VBA), Databases (at least one of the following: SQL Server, PostgreSQL, Teradata, Oracle, IBM DB2, MySQL, SAP HANA, Mongo DB), Shell Scripting (at least one of the following: DOS batch, Power Shell, BASH (UNIX/LINUX Utilities), Other Softwares (at least one of the following: JIRA, MOVEit, SVN (subversion), Git).

Knowledge in Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Cloud Computing, Big Data Technologies, Data Governance, Data Storage, Data Mining, Data Architecture, Data Protection, Data Security among others.

This is expert level that requires wide knowledge experience with the multiple data analytics, engineering and data management areas, and related tools, platforms and Big Data infrastructure services. Expert level is typically required from the lead Data Scientist, manager of the Data Science team, or similar.

Become a Fellow

We'd love for you to apply if you've reached the peak of your data science profession and believe Fellowship is the next natural step for you.

Getting started with your application

Although the application procedure is simple, it is important to ensure that you are completely prepared.

Determine your application criteria by looking over our 'Criteria for Fellowship' and deciding which two or three of the qualifications most closely match your background.

Choose a referee: One referee will be required to verify that you meet the eligibility requirements. S/HE must be a Fellow of any relevant institute, or be your supervisor or someone with professional knowledge of you.

Complete the Online application: make sure you read all the upfront information before you start. IDSA is simple and straightforward to complete, you will only need to submit your CV, reference letter and one-off membership fee in one (1) file (doc, pdf or jpg).

Pay your application fee: before you complete your application, ensure you pay your fellowship application fee (non-refundable). As soon as we receive your application, an fellow assessors will review your application within five (5) working days. You can as well check your portal for details about your application progress.

So, what's next?

Our colleague assessors, who are made up of fellows, will analyze your application and evaluate it before making a suggestion to the chairperson, who will make the final decision.

There are four scenarios that could occur:

Election

We'll send you an election packet in the mail, along with your official confirmation letter.

Interview

We may invite you to an interview so that we may ask you more questions (online or physical).

Defer

We may ask you to reapply after a longer time of employment.

Decline

If you do not have enough experience for Fellowship, we will deny your application.

It may take 10-15 working days for your application to be reviewed.

What if you wish to file a complaint?

We hope you'll respect our judgement and accept it in good conscience, but you have three months from the day you received your decision letter to file an appeal. You must submit your claim together with proof that demonstrates a severe flaw in how we processed or handled your application, or, if you came for an interview, serious or extraordinary, unanticipated personal mitigating circumstances that caused you to underperform., to fellowship@tidsaglobal.org

We’ll send you an application appeal form to fill out, and you’ll need to pay an appeal fee which will be refunded if your appeal is upheld.