Senior Research Manager

Job Summary:

The Center for Education Policy Research (CEPR) at Harvard University seeks a Senior Research Manager to oversee and further develop the analytical work of the Center. CEPR partners with school districts, charter school networks, and state education agencies to bring high quality research methods and data analysis to bear on strategic management and policy decisions. CEPR seeks to transform education through the power of research and evidence. CEPR and its partners believe all students will learn and thrive when education leaders make decisions using evidence, rather than hunches and untested assumptions. In pursuit of this end, CEPR both conducts cutting-edge quantitative research on critical topics for the field and develops new and faster models of education research that can better support education leaders. The SRM will be a critical part of the CEPR team, helping education leaders to learn what’s working and what’s not in education.

The Senior Research Manager will develop, manage, conduct, and ensure quality of analyses relating to important educational topics. The SRM hired under this posting will likely manage projects as part of a research partnership with an education non-profit organization in the Philippines and their government partners, supporting school improvement and developing a research agenda. The SRM may also support additional projects within CEPR and manage Research Analysts across projects.

Duties & Responsibilities:

Key responsibilities for the Senior Research Manager include:

• Lead analytics across multiple projects and across the research life cycle including the establishment of research questions, design of the study, grant writing, collection of data, analysis, and writing of reports and academic papers.
• Manage research analysts and lead professional development workshops as needed. This includes training and mentoring research analysts to develop their research and professional skills, as well as leading group learning experiences.
• Provide technical training to analysts and local education agency-based staff on research methods and selection of an appropriate statistical method.
• Plan and lead joint meetings of the research team, project directors, and principal investigators.
• Work closely with executive leadership, principal investigators, and leadership at partner organizations to further develop ideas and strategies for new projects, including identifying funding sources and designing the research for those projects.
• Manage the successful execution of research projects by developing work plans, meeting key project deadlines and coordinating work for current and future CEPR projects.
• Build trusting, professional relationships with internal and external collaborators, including data administration staff, program staff, and principal investigators.
• Ensure the quality and reproducibility of the research by designing rigorous studies, identifying threats to the study design, reviewing statistical programming and output to identify errors and anomalies, and developing protocols for documenting and checking analytic work.
• Conduct analytic work to fulfill project obligations, answer research questions, including performing complex statistical programming when needed
• Review code and conduct quality control checks to ensure accuracy and reproducibility of all analyses.
• Contribute to and create research reports and academic publications. Present analytical findings and methods at meetings and/or conferences.