DonorsChoose is hiring a
Equity & Impact Researcher

Summary

Join the Equity & Impact team at DonorsChoose as a Research & Insights professional to support two functions: conducting research studies and generating new K-12 education equity insights leveraging DonorsChoose data. This role is a full-time, one-year opportunity, with a potential for renewal at the end of the year.

Requirements

• B.A./B.S. in a related field (e.g., economics, statistics, data science, public policy, philanthropy, nonprofit leadership) with minimum three years professional research experience
• Experience with survey methodology and knowledge of principles of statistics
• Experience with data visualization (Looker, Tableau, PowerBI, statistical software - we use Looker)
• Aptitude and willingness to learn new applications as opportunity and need develops
• Preference for working well independently and collaboratively in a strongly collaborative, multi-disciplinary environment
• Experience with conducting swift, practice-oriented research under varied time constraints
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Ability to explain research methods and results to a non-specialist audience
• Exceptional attention to detail, strong problem-solving ability and logical reasoning skills, and the ability to detect anomalies in data
• Strong organizational and planning skills, with ability to juggle multiple projects with competing deadlines from multiple stakeholders - internal and external
• Willingness to perform other duties and special projects as needed/requested

Responsibilities

• Conduct research studies by surveying DonorsChoose teachers
• Formulate and answer research questions
• Administer surveys to our extensive teacher database and analyze the data
• Manage a queue of research requests from internal stakeholders, scheduling meetings to discover the research needs and building plans to address the needs
• Respond to external research requests from corporate, foundation, government, and major gift supporters - in collaboration with our partnerships teams
• Identify and work with external data sets as needed
• Write reports, one-pagers/fact sheets, blogs, and other knowledge resources to share learnings
• Interpret and explain complex data in a way that is accessible and actionable to a broad and varied audience
• Collaborate with our Marketing and StrategicCommunications teams to develop content related to research projects, including social media, talking points, and press releases
• Occasionally, present research findings to internal or external audiences via webinars, internal all-hands meetings, funder meetings, and at conferences
• Periodically liaise with our community of external researchers, growing our network of thought leaders in the space
• Generate education equity insights with DonorsChoose data
• Mine DonorsChoose classroom project data to identify key trends, issues, and disparities impacting public school teachers and students, with a focus on communities most impacted by systemic inequities
• Generate data briefing decks - which are presentations with visualizations of key insights for our diverse community of donors, teachers, partners, and peer organizations
• Collaborate with Marketing & Strategic Communications team members to amplify equity insights on media platforms, including social media and press releases
• Participate in thought leadership through the publication of research findings and articles, with the support of the Strategic Communications team
• Support leaders across the organization by offering insights to equity-related questions
• Lead and implement an orgwide research study (~9 months of your engagement)

Benefits

• Full-time staff 25 paid vacation days per year
• 11 paid holidays
• Rich employer-paid individual and family health plan
• Matching 401(k) plan (up to 5% of base salary)
• Annual professional development stipend
• Casual and flexible work environment