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Postdoctoral Scholar, Improving Math Gateway Course Success Project

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Position description

The School of Education at University of California, Irvine is seeking a full-time Postdoctoral Scholar to work on a project that intends to identify promising ways to improve the success rates of community college students in gateway mathematics. Salary and rank within the Postdoctoral Scholar series commensurate with experience. The appointment is for two years, with possibility of renewal based on performance. The ideal start date for this position is March 1st, 2023, which can be negotiated based on the candidate’s availability. This position is possible to be remotely based.

Responsibilities: The postdoctoral scholar will work on a number of sub-projects related to identifying institutional and instructional factors that are associated with math success. Responsibilities include collaborating with faculty PI and co-PIs on the project; assisting with project management, including communication with the college partner; collecting and analyzing one or multiple of the following data resources depending on the postdoc’s expertise and interests, including administrator surveys, behavioral trace data (clickstream, text data, etc.) from online learning management systems, and longitudinal college administrative data; publishing and presenting findings; writing funding proposals to seek additional external support; consulting with and mentoring teams of graduate and undergraduate students; managing communication, training sessions, and dissemination of research results; and coordinating the personnel and facilities within the project team.
As a NSF sponsored project, postdoctoral research mentoring will be an integral part of this project, which intends to provide the postdoctoral researcher who joins this project with knowledge, skills and rich learning opportunities to prepare him or her for a future career as an independent researcher. More specifically, there will be training opportunities in three key areas: (i) the postdoc will be provided with systematic guidance on a variety of advanced quasi-experimental research methods used in policy analysis, such as fixed effects models and regression discontinuity designs; (ii) the postdoc will receive focused content-related mentoring on the challenges and equity issues of developmental education at community colleges; (iii) the postdoc will gain substantive knowledge of policy-relevant outcomes in post-secondary settings and will have the opportunity to connect directly with education practitioners and policy makers at the partner state community college system. In addition to dedicated training in these areas, the experiences of co-planning data collection, presenting research findings at seminars and professional meetings, supervising graduate and undergraduate research assistants, and being actively involved in paper and grant writing will expand the postdoc’s knowledge and skills as a future researcher and educator.

Requirements:
● Candidates must possess a Ph.D. in related fields, such as Education, Psychology, Learning Sciences, or Economics;
● A good record of research productivity in one or multiple fields including higher education, community colleges, math teaching and learning, education policy, evaluation
● Proficient in one or multiple quantitative research methods, such as regression modeling, causal inference, data mining, and advanced longitudinal methods, and statistical software to implement them (e.g., Stata, R, Python)
● Experience designing and administering surveys through Qualtrics
● Experience working with one or multiple data types, such as longitudinal administrative data, survey data, or learning management system data
● Advanced expertise in academic writing and editing for peer-reviewed scholarly articles
● Successful experience in writing human subjects protocols
● Demonstrated ability to work well with others, including both receiving direction and providing direction;
● Expertise in collaborating with college administrators and leading interdisciplinary research initiatives and teams.

To Apply: Applications should be submitted online at https://recruit.ap.uci.edu/JPF08049. Please submit a cover letter describing your relevant expertise and interests, a curriculum vitae, and sample paper or publication, and names and contact information of three references. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis and applications submitted prior to January the 16th will receive full consideration.

Questions about the position may be addressed to Associate Professor Di Xu at dix3@uci.edu. Questions about submission or receipt of applications can be addressed to Laurie Andress-Delaney at landress@uci.edu.

Qualifications

Basic qualifications (required at time of application)

Candidates must possess a Ph.D. in related fields, such as Education, Psychology, Learning Sciences, or Economics

Application Requirements

Document requirements
Reference requirements
  • 3 required (contact information only)
Apply link: https://recruit.ap.uci.edu/JPF08049

About UC Irvine

The University of California, Irvine is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer advancing inclusive excellence. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, age, protected veteran status, or other protected categories covered by the UC nondiscrimination policy.

As a University employee, you will be required to comply with all applicable University policies and/or collective bargaining agreements, as may be amended from time to time. Federal, state, or local government directives may impose additional requirements.

Job location

Irvine, CA