Temporary Research Scientist - US Based Remote Opportunity

ABOUT US

Do you have a passion for higher education? Do you want to make a positive impact on the college admissions process? Our staff help to remove barriers and encourage students to forge their path to a better future. Common App is a national not-for-profit organization dedicated to the pursuit of access, equity, and integrity in the college admission process. Each year we support more than 1 million students, one-third of whom are first-generation, as they apply to our more than 900 diverse member colleges & universities using the Common App's free online application. 

If you are an experienced Research Scientist professional and want to be part of a mission-driven non-profit that uses innovative technology to advance the college admission process, Common App may be a great match for you. Common App is currently searching for a Research Scientist. 

RESPONSIBILITIES

The Research Scientist position is a full-time, term-limited (21 months) position supporting the research outcomes of a major grant from the Gates Foundation titled, Increasing Postsecondary Outcomes Data Use. Working with a first-of-its-kind higher education dataset linking a complete student cohort of college application data from the Common App with enrollment, retention, and graduation outcomes from the National Student Clearinghouse, the Research Scientist will publish at least five research briefs for the Common App that advance Common App’s commitment to access and equity in the admissions process. 

Reporting to the Director of Data Science, Analytics and Research, the Research Scientist will be engaged with all aspects of this research, including the formulation of research questions within the broad domains defined by the grant, preparation of research datasets using Common App’s data warehouse, design of research approaches and appropriate statistical analyses, execution of all analyses, and the drafting of externally facing research products. The Research Scientist, in collaboration with other members of the Research and Analytics team, will also participate in the coordination and support of partnerships with external researchers utilizing this dataset. 

Beyond the basic grant requirement of producing five unique and impactful research briefs for the Common App, the Research Scientist may have the opportunity to publish original research with this dataset in peer-reviewed academic journals, and to present their work at academic or professional conferences. They will collaborate closely with our Communications and Leadership teams to maximize the impact of public- and constituent-facing research products, supporting strategic engagement with other thought leaders, media, and other constituents.

Requirements

QUALIFICATIONS

This role requires:

• Candidates must live in the United States.
• Master’s degree in a quantitative social sciences discipline (e.g., Public Policy, Economics, Education Policy, Education Measurement, Psychometrics, Computational Psychology, etc.) or related quantitative field (e.g., Data Science, Statistics)
• 3-5 years of experience working specifically in producing academic descriptive or causal quantitative social science research.
• History of research publication in peer-reviewed outlets. 
• Passion for, and experience in, higher education.
• Fluent data manipulation and coding with SQL and R.
• Experience working with and validating imperfect data.
• Experience managing analyses for large-scale, interconnected datasets (e.g., memory management, parallel computing, complex join logic, etc.)
• Experience with descriptive and inferential statistics. 
• Experience with data visualization (Tableau, R preferred).
• Experience working with National Center for Education Statistics, Census, College Scorecard, National Student Clearinghouse, Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, and other publicly available datasets relevant to education.
• Understanding of the strategic context of Common Application’s role in the higher education industry. 
• Proven ability for communicating data and research findings to non-technical audiences.
• Ability to work effectively in a collaborative and diverse environment.  

The ideal candidate will possess:

• PhD in a quantitative social sciences discipline (e.g., Public Policy, Economics, Education Policy, Education Measurement, Psychometrics, Computational Psychology, etc.) or related quantitative field (e.g., Data Science, Statistics)
• Experience with AWS cloud computing services (e.g., Sagemaker, S3, Athena, Redshift).
• Experience working with Agile frameworks for cross-functional, product-minded collaboration. 
• A passion for higher education is a plus.