Senior Product Manager, Learning

Company Description

Uncommon Schools  is a nonprofit network of high-performing, public charter schools providing an outstanding K-12 education in historically under-resourced communities. We have proudly built schools that reflect our student population, with more than 60% of our teachers and staff across our network identifying as a person of color. Uncommon currently manages 52 schools serving more than 20,000 students in five cities: Boston, Camden, New York City, Newark and Rochester. We are proud that Uncommon graduates persist in and graduate from college at five times the rate of their peers nationally. We achieve this by offering strong academic, co-curricular, and social-emotional learning that prepares students for success in college and beyond.

Job Description

As a senior member of Uncommon’s Product Management Team, the Product Manager will be deployed to ensure that the Team achieves its most important goals and objectives. We are looking for a candidate with 5+ years of IT experience and 3+ years of experience in education, specifically working with assessments, SIS, and EdTech. Beyond technical knowledge, the Product Manager must have strong change management, planning, and communication skills in order to manage technology and processes at Uncommon’s scale and high standard.

Duties & Responsibilities

Independent and Expert Administration of Multiple Products

• Set a vision for the technical management of all EdTech to best support Instructional partner goals (Clever,mClass, Illuminate etc)
• Deeply understand Instructional goals and use cases for the platforms (i.e. replace teacher instruction versus practice based on live instruction)
• Develop and manage the implementation of all processes for day-to-day platform use (i.e. Student & teacher access, reporting)
• Build policy resources, including user management policy around roles, access level, and responsibilities for stakeholders and the Data & IT team
• Troubleshoot & manage vendor to resolve Tier 3 issues
• Manage system upgrades, backups, testing, connectivity with other enterprise applications
• Attend training/webinars offered by vendors to build expertise
• Use robust product knowledge to improve systems and process
• Identify new areas/ways the product can be used (either internally or externally)
• Support the implementation and roll-out of new applications

Management

• This position directly manages up to 3 FTE 
• Guide and review team member work product (e.g. product roadmaps, product documentation, product backlogs).
• Support the team members' individual growth within Uncommon and the K-12 Data space
• Facilitate Agile ceremonies, including backlog refinement, sprint planning, retrospectives,etc.
•  Leader planning for 8 to 12 weeks of work for the Value Stream Team via the Planning Increment ceremonies
• Create and foster a cross-functional community by allowing space and opportunities for team members to deeply engage and collaborate with each other
• Facilitate cascading communication through cohorts to breakdown functional team silos and ensure that we are functioning as a fast agile team

Training and documentation

•  Own creation and management of all internal and school-facing Knowledge Base articles on support, troubleshooting, and best practices for all platforms to be used by all teachers and Ops leaders
• Develop and facilitate training for school leaders, which they will turnkey to their staff 
• Help define and coordinate vendor-offered training sessions at the right level for those managing the Service Desk and Relationship Managers.
•  Work with School Leaders to document existing processes related to supported applications (e.g. documentation of methods and procedures of PowerSchool)

Vendor Management

• Manage renewal and payment of yearly contract
• Build relationships with vendors, act as liaison between vendor and Uncommon on any projects, and own school-level escalations & difficult conversations.
• Manage vendor escalations to deliver best-in-class performance to Uncommon stakeholders

Organizational Relationships

• Work closely with Regional Superintendents, school-based Directors of Operations, Curriculum Directors, Chiefs of Staff, and members of the Data and IT Team. 

Qualifications

Education Requirements:

• Bachelor's degree required

Experience Requirements:

• 7-9 years of directly related experience
  • 5+ years working in K-12 environment
    • 3+ years managing or building EdTech software
    • 3+ years managing or supporting student-facing technology/student information system or assessment platform: PowerSchool, Illuminate
    • Experience w