Student Success Strategy Officer

Summary

Join Lumina Foundation as their Strategy Officer for Student Success! This role collaborates with the Strategy Director to implement Lumina's grant portfolio focused on increasing student success, particularly for marginalized students. You will support portfolio planning, design, and implementation through grantmaking, leveraging expertise in student success approaches and institutional reform. The position requires strong analytical, communication, and relationship-building skills. A key responsibility involves assessing current field dynamics and translating findings into recommendations for new initiatives. The ideal candidate will have experience in higher education, non-profit, public, or philanthropic sectors and a demonstrated commitment to equity. Lumina offers a competitive salary and benefits package.

Requirements

• Demonstrated alignment with Lumina’s mission and values, and proven track record of commitment to equity
• Strong, applied understanding of best practices for removing barriers to successful completion of bachelor’s degrees
• Direct experience preferably in the higher education, nonprofit, public, and/or philanthropic sectors
• Ability to recommend how best to use the Foundation’s resources to ensure the policies and practices envisioned in the current Strategic Plan are aligned with Lumina’s principles of learning and credentialing
• Outstanding project management skills with demonstrated ability to execute and follow through to achieve intended results
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to communicate accurately, effectively, and in ways appropriate to different audiences
• Strong ability to review, revise, and synthesize a variety of information sources and help connect the Foundation’s work to broader discussions within the higher education landscape
• Analytical, problem-solving, and research skills and an ability to coordinate and collaborate with internal colleagues and external field practitioners, researchers, and program evaluators
• Outstanding collaborator and relationship builder, with a track record of deliberately building authentic relationships both internally and externally to organizations
• Ability to learn quickly and connect learning to ongoing conversations related to the assigned body of work
• Ability to make decisions in concert with others without complete information and to thrive in an outcomes-oriented, continuously evolving work environment in which thinking beyond the curve is encouraged
• Ability to work collegially and diplomatically across the organization and audience groups, with a proven ability to resolve any conflicts

Responsibilities

• Support portfolio planning and design
• Implement strategies through grantmaking
• Assess current field dynamics in four-year institutions
• Translate findings into recommendations to the Strategy Director and executive team members
• Articulate and champion the bachelor’s degree student success strategy to internal and external stakeholders
• Lead thought leadership by writing blog posts, participating in panels at conferences, and leading internal learning sessions
• Partner on integrated strategy approaches that aim to scale promising practices
• Manage an assigned portfolio of grants and contracts through the lifecycle
• Develop a portfolio of grants and contracts related to student success
• Ensure that the portfolio of grants and contracts leads to impactful investments
• Help lead efforts in developing technical assistance strategies that empower grantees to implement systemic changes
• Review and revise incoming material and convey thoughts and Lumina’s key messages in a clear and compelling manner
• Work cross-functionally within the foundation, fostering coordination between operational and strategic teams
• Engage with the Student Success Strategy Director consistently for feedback, guidance, and alignment
• Build external relationships with peers and experts in the student success and philanthropy communities
• Advance Lumina’s commitment to improving post-high school educational outcomes
• Apply practices that strengthen and promote equitable approaches in hiring, contracting, grantmaking, and strategic decision making
• Effectively communicate Lumina’s commitment to equity to internal and external partners

Preferred Qualifications

• Demonstrated success in influencing, affecting, and implementing strategies for student success, including practical experience leading change initiatives at the department or institutional level
• Experience building and managing diverse networks that support efforts to produce systemic change
• Demonstrated ability to extract key lessons from past or current work, including recognizing patterns across the field, and using those learnings to both shape and inform future work
• Ability to translate learnings and insights into thought leadership opportunities for the field through various channels for written and verbal communication and storytelling
• Comfort navigating ambiguous roles and evolving organizational strategies
• A general understanding of related policy and sociopolitical contexts for institutional reforms

Benefits

• Health Insurance (medical, dental, and vision)
• 401(k)
• Pension
• Vacation and Sick Time
• Paid Leave
• 100% Employer Paid Group Life
• Long-term Disability
• Hybrid position