Senior Operational Data Analyst

The Senior Operational Data Analyst will support the Education Analytics and Technical Services team in developing a portfolio of data-driven advisory services and toolkits to help state clients leverage their data to analyze graduate-to-employment pathways. This work will support the establishment and operation of formal Education Economics offices, focusing on supply-demand analytics for occupations and skills, employment outcomes, and workforce trends. The role emphasizes applying data analysis to generate actionable insights and related products that enhance workforce competitiveness and strengthen pathways to opportunity for individuals. Key audiences include employers, policymakers, and state agency leaders including labor market information, research, and higher education data system leaders. This role follows a hybrid schedule, working on-site two days per week from either our Washington, DC or Indianapolis office.
ContextStrada Education Foundation supports programs, policies, and organizations that strengthen connections between education and employment in the U.S., with a special focus on helping those who have faced the greatest challenges securing economic opportunity through postsecondary education and training. Strada’s strategic plan defines five focal areas by which to improve pathways to opportunity through post-high school education: clear outcomes, quality coaching, affordability, work-based learning, and employer alignment. Strada leverages research, strategic philanthropy, investments, communications, advocacy, and collaborating organizations in the pursuit of this mission.
Key ResponsibilitiesThe Senior Operational Data Analyst balances advanced data analysis with hands-on secure operational management of the cloud data infrastructure, focusing on ELT pipelines, data catalogs, and integration of diverse education and workforce datasets. They further support Strada’s Education Analytics and Technical Services team by supporting the development of advisory services and toolkits and creating actionable insights that enhance workforce competitiveness and opportunity pathways.

Data Management and Pipeline Operation (45%)

• Identify, integrate, and manage education and workforce datasets from state, federal, third-party, and proprietary sources, applying modern data cataloging to improve discoverability, stewardship, and governance.
• Design, develop, and maintain scalable ELT pipelines within a Google Cloud Platform/BigQuery environment, ensuring secure, reliable, and efficient data integration and transformation in support of analytics and advisory services.
• Coordinate with external contracted data teams to align pipeline operations, data flows, and platform management with internal requirements, security expectations, and project objectives.
• Implement data quality and governance practices that promote consistent, accurate, and trustworthy data across the cloud environment, including systematic validation and monitoring.
• Ensure secure and compliant management of sensitive data—such as PII/PHI, FERPA-protected records, and wage/employment data—by applying strong privacy, de-identification, and minimization practices.
• Apply modern cloud-security standards, including role-based access control, least-privilege design, encryption, secrets management, and secure service-account configurations across data pipelines and warehouse operations.
• Monitor and audit platform activity through automated logging and access reviews to detect anomalies, support incident response, and strengthen overall data protection.
• Partner with IT and security teams to document data flows, classify information assets, support regulatory compliance (e.g., FERPA, HIPAA, GLBA, SOC 2), and embed a culture of privacy and risk mitigation across environments.

Data Analysis (25%)

• Conduct sophisticated statistical analyses of labor market trends, supply/demand projections, and higher education/workforce alignment using cloud-based data sources.
• Develop and refine models to support data-driven policy and decision-making for clients and stakeholders, leveraging SQL, Python, R, and advanced BigQuery capabilities.
• Integrate best practices in data quality and metadata management to enable reliable, reusable analysis.

Data Reporting and Visualization (20%)

• Work with the analytics team to translate research findings into policy-relevant insights targeted to key stakeholders in postsecondary education and training. 
• Develop reports, dashboards, and presentations to communicate key insights to stakeholders.
• Support the development of reports,  interactive visualizations and presentations using Tableau, Power BI, or similar platforms to communicate key insights to stakeholders.
• Collaborate with partners to refine data products that inform wor