Senior Research Associate, Quantitative Team (Education Practice)

The Role:
The Senior Research Associate will be responsible for quantitative research reports and strategic briefings on a wide variety of education research topics. This position will allow for the swift development and refinement of applied set of research skills and provides the opportunity to develop a relationship with a young and rapidly growing enterprise. We expect all employees to be intellectually curious, ambitious, and interested in assuming increasing levels of responsibility. This is an entry/mid-level applied research position and candidates with greater experience may be considered for more senior roles which include supervising other researchers. This position will report to both the Director of (K-12 or Higher Education) Data Analytics and the practice area's Managing Content Director.  

High-Impact Education Research

K-12

• Projects: Program evaluations; equity in key student outcomes (academics, behavior, and program access); monitoring student assessment growth; career/college readiness; teacher retention and attrition; strategic planning in district outcomes and budget; etc.
• Work with hundreds of districts across the country, each with their own unique perspective and needs; draw insights from proprietary student-level data and aggregated public data; contribute to meaningful solutions; collaborate with colleagues who are passionate about education and social justice.

Higher Education

• Projects: Determinants of successful progression through academic career from inquiry to graduation; Donor analysis; Financial Aid Optimization; etc.
• Work with different types of higher education institutions from large public school systems with multiple campuses to small community colleges and everything in between; interact with various stakeholders in different programs and administrative departments, determine their unique needs, and decide on the methodology and real-world data required to address those needs (both from the client side and from publicly available sources like IPEDS); be ready to tackle "left-field" project requests which our Higher Education clients invariably come up with.

Responsibilities:

• Process and clean datasets for analysis;
• Create flexible and accessible data visualizations;
• Perform statistical modeling and regression analysis on education related data;
• Form hypotheses and locate compelling support for arguments under tight deadlines;
• Write up findings and key takeaways in a clear and concise manner.

Desired Skills and Attributes:

• Intermediate level user of statistical analysis software, particularly Stata and R;
• Knowledge of and ability to apply econometric and statistical methods to practical research problems;
• Experience working with and preparing real-world datasets for analysis, including identifying and reshaping or merging data;
• High comfort level with Microsoft Office applications, such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint;
• Willingness and ability to learn new quantitative skills as necessary and apply them in new contexts;
• Experience with, or ability to learn, data visualization software such as Tableau or Microsoft Power BI;
• Experience with other programming languages such as Python, with database systems and SQL, or with spatial mapping and analysis tools such as ArcGIS is a plus.

Other Skills and Attributes:

• Demonstrable problem-solving skills;
• Willingness to tackle complex, often unfamiliar research requests;
• Ability to collaborate and strategize with senior-level research directors;
• Excellent organizational skills and attention to detail;
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills;
• Ability to prioritize and manage multiple short and long-term projects to meet deadlines in a fast-paced environment;
• Demonstrable, strong work ethic;
• Ability to accept feedback and constructive critique positively;
• Strong command of the English language and demonstrated writing and editing skills, including experience writing or presenting for a business or non-technical professional audience.

Education Requirement:

Incoming level to be determined upon application. A Master’s or Doctoral degree in Statistics, a Social Science with quantitative training, or a related quantitative discipline is preferred, though promising candidates with a Bachelor’s degree in a related quantitative discipline may be considered for some positions
 
Experience Requirement:

Incoming level to be determined upon application. 2 - 5 years of full-time work experience (or equivalent academic work) conducting quantitative research and analysis is preferred. Experience working in the K-12 or Higher Education sector (for example, in institutional research, assessment, or evaluation) is a plus.
 
Location:
USA Remote

Office is located in Arlington, VA

#Remote #LI-remote 
 
Benefits:

• Starting at 18+ days Paid Time Off
• 12 observed holidays, including Juneteenth and Indigenous People Day and an additional 2 floating days in a calendar year (14 in total)
• 401(K) employer matching program
• Comprehensive health and dental benefits package
• Health and wellness packages with discounts to local gym
• Annual company-wide day of service and monthly events partnering with local organizations such as KidPower, Martha’s Kitchen, DC SPCA
• Community service opportunities
• Unlimited snacks and beverages (when in office)