We are actively seeking a diverse pool of applicants who are interested in leading the evaluation work of the K-12 Measurement, Learning, and Evaluation (MLE) team and has primary responsibility to ensure quality of evaluations for the K-12 strategy. This is an incredible opportunity to bring rigor and strong measurement to the foundation and our grantees, helping us all to use measurement to focus attention on pressing issues and promising solutions. This role will provide leadership to other program officers on when to use a program evaluation, what designs might be most helpful, and how we should use those results. This role will provide guidance for overall strategy-level measurement, as well as grant-level measurement. This role will manage evaluation and measurement contracts, ensuring that the deliverables advance the work of the team and our grantees. This role will play a targeted leadership role in the formative and summative evaluation work of the foundation’s Networks for School Improvement (NSI) strategy. This person will get to work closely with our portfolio teams, bringing a performance management and continuous improvement capacity to their work.
Our ideal colleague has deep technical research, measurement and/or evaluation skills. They bring equally thorough communication and collaboration skills. We're looking for someone who can connect rigorous measurement with overall strategic goals, helping us all to ultimately improve our work. To be successful with our team, this person will need to be solutions-oriented, flexible and a team player, skilled in collaborative approaches regarding evaluation and measurement options.
- Lead and carry out development and implementation and monitoring of externally focused evaluation and learning activities. Engage with research partners to provide considerable statistical and evaluation design expertise in order to help them produce relevant and high-quality work. Historically, this role has managed K-12 grants around the evaluation of the Intensive Partnership Sites (IPS) Initiative, and Small Schools evaluation, and the NSI Formative Evaluation
- Work as an embedded lead for MLE with portfolio teams to develop and manage clear measurement models and research, measurement, learning and evaluation activities related to their strategies, refine and monitor research and evaluation goals and implementation plans. Historically, this role has worked with the Social Emotional Learning (SEL) and Networks for School Improvement (NSI) Portfolios.
- Provide leadership to the K-12 team in developing, managing, and implementing evaluation strategies in service of program goals, and negotiate, execute and conduct and manage complex, performance-based contracts/grants.
- Consult with partners to maximize impact of projects and ensure optimal learning. This may include: site visits, convening meetings of key stakeholders, shaping reports on key findings and coordinating on dissemination plans.
- Review contract, RFP & grant proposals; provide clear, concise & insightful written analyses & recommendations for funding including drafting & editing proposal summaries, managing complex RFP processes.
- Mentor colleagues through leadership coaching at K-12 team
- Expertise in research and evaluation methodologies
- Credibility in the field/ability to have in-depth and sometimes difficult conversations with national leading experts and stakeholders
- Ability to translate highly technical plans and findings for general audiences
- Understanding of broad field of education reform and of SEL
Education and Experience
- In-depth knowledge of statistical methods, evaluation design, qualitative research methods, data collection and management, education policy and practice.
- Excellent written & oral communications skills effective with a broad & diverse audience.