Research Associate II

Company Description

EDUCATION DEVELOPMENT CENTER (EDC)

EDC is one of the world’s leading nonprofit research and development firms. EDC designs, implements, and evaluates programs to improve education, health, and economic opportunity worldwide. Collaborating with both public and private partners, we strive for a world where all people are empowered to live healthy, productive lives.

EDC’s approach to equity, diversity, and inclusion is grounded in EDC’s commitment to respect the dignity of each individual. EDC has a commitment to promoting equity and access to high quality education and health services that contribute to thriving communities where people from diverse backgrounds learn, live, and work together. EDC expresses its commitment to increasing equity through its strategies, services and products, which contribute to building capacity and transforming lives.

Job Description

The Center for Children and Technology (CCT) is a research and development center within the Education Development Center (EDC) and is based in New York City. Founded in 1980, CCT investigates how technology can influence and enhance teaching and learning across a wide range of educational settings. CCT conducts basic, applied, causal and formative research, working in collaboration with educational, corporate, government and research institutions. CCT also designs and develops prototype software and instructional resources that support engaged, active learning. 

CCT is currently searching for a full-time, Research Associate II who will work with our team on three to four different federally funded research projects. Candidates for this position must be located in New York City, be able to travel to the other applicable sites at least once per year and travel to research conferences.

Project 1: On this project, the Research Associate II will be part of a team working with museums/science centers in New York, Pittsburgh and Albuquerque that are developing a practitioner guide for creating informal engineering design programs with and for neurodiverse audiences using universal design for learning (UDL) principles. The researcher will conduct co-design research with neurodivergent youth on a design team as well as qualitative and quantitative research to investigate whether the UDL-based programs influence neurodiverse children’s engagement in engineering design processes; and whether UDL fosters a sense of belongingness for neurodiverse children and their caregivers. To achieve these research purposes, the researcher will gather data including interviews with the youth co-designers and their families; as well as observations, interviews, and surveys with children and caregivers who participate in pilot programs. Thematic analyses will use inductive and deductive methods, generating and applying coding schemes based on prior studies of belongingness and engineering design processes in informal learning environments.

Project 2: The Research Associate II will join a NASA-funded project aimed at providing a pathway to NASA employment for young adults who identify as neurodivergent. The researcher in this role will work with informal educational partners to co-redevelop NASA educational resources for autistic and neurodivergent youth and disseminate these products to relevant communities. This researcher will also assist in recruiting, programming, and continuous improvement of the program’s high school internship program.

Project 3: The Research Associate II will work with a cross-institutional team tasked with developing, coordinating, and researching an autistic-to-autistic mentorship program for New York City public school students across the five boroughs. The associate will be required to attend school visits regularly, assist in coordinating the mentorship roles across university, and facilitate maker-focused meetings wherein mentors and mentees complete creative projects together.  

You will:

• Coordinate administrative and logistical tasks
• Coordinate quality assurance
• Facilitate project teamwork and feedback exchanges
• Troubleshoot complex problems, proposing initiatives and recommending or negotiating solutions
• Train, supervise, coordinate and provide guidance or administrative direction to junior staff
• Be responsible for parts of diverse, small to mid-size projects or coordinate sections of larger projects

Qualifications

Education:

• Bachelor’s degree in a related field 

Skills & Experience:

• 7–10 years related research, education or administrative coordination or program implementation, requiring solid experience with computer applications (including databases), and Internet research
• Experience working in formal and informal educational set