National Office Employment Opportunities

Director, Research and Impact
 

Position:	Director, Research and Impact
Location	Washington, DC

Organization
Public Education Network (PEN) is a national network comprised of a National Office, 76 Local Education Funds (LEFs) and individuals working to advance public school reform in low-income communities across the country. Originally founded in 1983 by the Ford Foundation to address the public education crisis surfaced by “A Nation at Risk,” LEFs are unique education reform organizations with deep on-the-ground relationships with both public schools/districts and community stakeholders across the country. PEN leverages its broad base of LEF members to: 1) research how to increase student achievement, 2) advocate for public and policy support, and 3) develop and scale innovative strategies that improve student outcomes within the public education system. Based in Washington, D.C., the National Office plays a critical role in representing the combined work of LEFs, interpreting LEF roles and performance, and acting as the broader voice of PEN.

To-date, PEN has demonstrated powerful impact in communities across the country. Its LEFs are based in 32 states including Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico, and reach 8M students, including 4M students eligible for free-and-reduced lunch. PEN has raised $4B in private support, and leveraged $20B in public funding for education. LEF members have successfully developed leading edge practice (e.g., The Boston Plan for Excellence was the initiator of urban teacher residencies) - and shared their models (e.g.., Denver's Public Education and Business Coalition published and sold over 2 million books on its highly replicated literacy and coaching model).

While the work of individual LEF members – and the support of the National Office – has been impressive, PEN is committed to making a step-change in its impact. In 2008, PEN's Board recognized the need to develop a strategic plan to create a highly active, interconnected network with LEFs working toward common goals, specifically:

• To increase the rate at which low-income students and minority students graduate from public schools ready for college and a career; and

• To help community stakeholders achieve and sustain a permanent commitment to fulfilling a community's fundamental obligation to provide quality public education for all children.

PEN's recently completed strategic plan represents a profound shift from a network focused on improving the capacity of its members, to a network focused on its positive impact on the public education of disadvantaged children in the U.S.

PEN's focus on increased accountability towards achieving outcomes underlines the need for stronger data collection, analysis and management.  At the heart of this effort is the need for a highly skilled Director, Research and Impact to plan, lead and manage an ongoing program of assessment, research, and data interpretation to enable LEFs to continually improve their effectiveness and to help PEN understand and improve its impact on low-income and minority children.

For more information, please visit http://www.publiceducation.org.

Position
Reporting to the SVP of Network and Impact, the Director, Research and Impact will play a critical role in establishing a new research group that will evaluate, and identify opportunities to improve the effectiveness and impact of PEN on student achievement and sustained public commitment to quality public education for all children.  The successful candidate will serve as a primary resource in refining, administering, interpreting, and reporting the LEFs' scorecard evaluation, which is a collection of indicators that tracks LEFs against PEN's student achievement and public engagement goals. S/he will be able to tell the PEN story through data, make meaning of LEFs' work and help to move the network to become consistently outcomes oriented. Additionally, s/he will lead and connect with external research on education reform to understand current dialogue, develop PEN's point of view (e.g., on the definition of college & career readiness), and identify potential practices for LEFs to adopt. The position is also responsible for developing and overseeing PEN's programmatic performance measure and evaluation.

This role requires an individual who has a deep understanding of the research and evaluation tools and methodologies that are valued in the world of education and an ability to utilize that knowledge to effectively navigate the education reform landscape.  S/he must have a commitment to the importance of outcome measurement and the ability to refine, collect and interpret data. Equally important, the Director, Research and Impact must have a successful track record of communicating effectively with other research experts and leaders in the education reform community to help inform PEN's work and enhance its credibility within the learning community. 

With these powerful data, PEN will be positioned to share new knowledge and develop tools that LEFs themselves can use in a process of self-assessment. PEN seeks to identify and recommend best practices within the membership and from other organizations to develop high capacity LEFs and position them as effective nonprofits and advocates for change.  This is an exciting time for a new Director, Research and Impact to play a tremendous role in the organization, its growth and its influence on education reform.

Responsibilities

Learning and analysis

• Lead the design and implementation of a network-wide standardized data framework based on the set of prioritized indicators in LEF scorecards that is able to longitudinally provide progress information toward meeting student achievement and public engagement outcomes.

• Collaborate with leaders in the field of education, metrics and evaluation to help create common definitions, and measures of critical elements in student achievement (eg. college readiness, teacher effectiveness, etc.)

• Survey educational research findings and develop effective methods of communicating and disseminating the salient related findings to network members along with recommendations for applicability to targeted LEFs.

• Thoroughly analyze data trends to identify LEF best practice successes and interpret the network impact of LEFs working with PEN.

• Use data to drive decisions and to gauge the impact of PEN's national office to provide effective and efficient services/technical assistance to LEF members.

Communication and knowledge dissemination

• Enhance the organization's visibility by serving as a PEN spokesperson and participating in national studies, providing research-based presentations, and sharing publications in collaboration with partner organizations.

• In collaboration with the Director of Communications and Director of Development, share examples of summary of impact and ensure that reporting needs of funders are met; report results back in a meaningful way to donors, policymakers and staff.

• In partnership with the SVP of Network and Impact, serve as a resource in identifying and reporting best practices within the network; carefully analyze why best practices work and interpret identified patterns to inform LEFs' program development and practice.

Performance tracking/data management

• Manage (through internal IT staff and external vendors) the development of necessary knowledge and data tracking systems and collaborative tools (document management, CRM, online collaboration, databases) to drive learning and evaluation at all levels of the organization and network.

• Liaise with LEFs to build data collection capacity and ensure that PEN implements a consistent approach to both qualitative and quantitative data collection that is systematic in capturing LEFs progress towards meeting their stated objectives.

• Develop and manage all network-wide research projects.

• Serve as senior staff partner on design, evaluation and measurement of PEN's initiative.

• Recruit, develop and lead a team of two research associates as well as all external evaluation and related vendors.

Professional Qualifications

• At least 7-10 years of professional service to low-income urban communities and demonstrated expertise in public education/education reform, especially in regards to research trends, evaluation and best practices.

• Demonstrated ability to design, implement and monitor both quantitative and qualitative metrics and analyses.

• Experience facilitating program improvement based on data, including success helping to create and sustain change within resource-constrained institutions.

• Successful track record of building research teams including hiring/managing consultants and vendors, and mentoring research associates.

• Proficiency in using technology as an analysis and reporting tool; experience working with a relational database or other platform for storing and sharing data and reports.

• Strong knowledge of statistics and a facility with numbers.

• Outstanding organizational skills.

• Demonstrated exceptional oral and written communication skills.

• Master's degree required. (PhD preferred.) 

Personal Qualifications

• The gravitas and confidence to effectively communicate complex information in a readily accessible manner to a broad audience including board members, internal staff, thought leaders, education experts and key policy makers.

• A consultative approach and demonstrated ability to achieve consensus among varied stakeholders.

• A willingness to think creatively, advocate unconventional ideas and work as part of a dynamic, passionate team.

• Engaging personality and stature, with an ability to coach, guide and influence all levels of staff including external evaluation and related consultants.

• A highly inquisitive nature coupled with superb listening, writing and analytical skills.

• Personal qualities of patience and humility; flexible, a sense of humor and comfort with ambiguity.

• Integrity, credibility and commitment to PEN's mission; a passion for education, youth development and serving low-income and minority populations.

PEN is an Equal Opportunity Employer and encourages candidates of all backgrounds to apply for this position.

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