RDC News: March 2026

MCMASTER RDC SHOWCASE 2026!

5th McMaster Statistics Canada Research Data Centre Showcase 2026
Thursday May 14, 2026 10AM to 3PM
Community Room, main floor L.R. Wilson Hall, McMaster University

The event is open at no cost to all McMaster students, staff and faculty. Please reserve your spot here via our Eventbrite page.

The Statistics Canada Research Data Centre (RDC), located in L.R. Wilson Hall, houses a large number of confidential micro-data files. These include the census, numerous surveys related to society, health and education, as well as business (including firm level), immigration, taxation, health and vital statistics administrative data. There are also numerous linked micro-data files including survey and administrative.

The showcase has two parts. The morning session will describe the RDC and its partnership with Data Services in the Mills Library, followed by other brief presentations on various data sets.

Following lunch (which will be provided), the afternoon session will consist of a series of brief presentations from current RDC researchers highlighting their work.

The event is open to all McMaster students, staff and faculty and will be of interest to those working in the RDC as well as potential researchers who are considering making use of Statistics Canada’s micro-data files. RDC staff will be available throughout the day to answer questions on the data files highlighted and others in our collection.

RDC Showcase 2026 – Call for Presenters!

The McMaster RDC will be holding its 5th ‘Showcase’ on Thursday May 14, 2026 in the Community Room of L.R. Wilson Hall (main floor) – see announcement above.

The afternoon session (1PM to 3PM) will highlight the work of researchers. We have space for 4 to 5 presentations of about 20 minutes each.

The criteria are that presenters (students or faculty) be currently active in the centre, and be at a stage to discuss on-going or nearly completed work. The session is an opportunity for students to sharpen their presentation skills and get valuable feedback prior to the Spring 2026 conference season.

If you are interested, please send Peter a 150-word abstract (including title and name of the data-set(s) you are using) by Friday, April 3rd to rdc@mcmaster.ca.

Hours Changes

This month we will have the following changes to our usual operating hours:

• NO extended hours on Tuesday March 10th and Thursday March 12th.

Saturday Hours – On Demand

We will be offering Saturday hours this month, Saturday, March 21st – 12pm to 4pm. We will be open on an ‘appointment’ basis, only if requested. Please sign up via the online booking system.

New data sets at the RDC:

Living with a Life-limiting Illness: Access to Care and Related Experiences (LLLI-ACRE)

The Canadian Food Environment Database (Can-FED) 2024 is now available for download and can be accessed by researchers with approved projects.

The Living with a Life-limiting Illness: Access to Care and Related Experiences (LLLI-ACRE) study aims to better understand the experiences and access to care for individuals with life-limiting illnesses and their unpaid caregivers.This data aims to provide information on the experiences and satisfaction with the care received, and any gaps and barriers to supportive care for those living with a life-limiting illness and their unpaid caregivers in the provinces and territories. This is the first time a study of this kind, on this topic is being conducted by Statistics Canada.

This study is conducted as a crowdsource, which is a non-probabilistic method of collecting data by inviting members of the target population to voluntarily participate in the study. The open nature of a crowdsource allows participation by those who would not otherwise be included in the frame for a probabilistic study.

The information collected and resulting analysis will help health care organizations and providers improve the development, planning and delivery of palliative care in Canada and ensure that those living with a life-limiting illness have access to high-quality care and support for their unpaid caregivers.

For more information about this data set, visit https://www23.statcan.gc.ca/imdb/p2SV.pl?Function=getSurvey&SDDS=5416 

If you would like more information on how to submit a proposal for access to this data see https://www.statcan.gc.ca/eng/microdata/data-centres/access.

For more information about the RDC program please contact your local RDC analyst.

For a list of all the most recent data releases, see https://crdcn.ca/publications-data/data/.